Thursday, July 9, 2015

BEFORE, Our Schoolhouse, The Kitchen & Solarium

A kitchen and a solarium are not a likely thing to link together, but since they are adjoining in our new house, I am showing them together. The solarium is on the right in this picture.
The solarium, who has a solarium??

The former owners are master gardeners and they LOVE plants.  We like plants and the humidity in here is fabulous with our dry Montana air. There are fun, unique plants like bamboo and a bird of paradise in here.  

But there is also, dirt, lots of dirt for my dog to dig in.  Lots of earthy air, lots of space that I think we want to use differently.
The doors to the kitchen are on the right in this picture and the white door on the left leads to the back deck.  This inside deck is raised form the planting area.  It has a nice space for a seating area.  
It also has a fountain now.  You can see in the first picture where they had the fountain on the left under the windows.  We moved the very heavy marble piece to the solarium deck on the left here.

Our plan with the solarium is to remove the plants (we will ask a friend who owns a nursery if they can remove them and save them for their nursery) and to put a floor in the area and use it as a sun room.  The floor needs to be down where the dirt is because the basement shop windows open into the solarium.  I want window planter boxes all along the windows for herbs and maybe some lettuces and things in the winter.  But, I think this space will make a fabulous sitting area and a place to have a hide a couch or futon for guests when need be.   My son thinks we need to put an infinity pool in here--hmmm, that could be fun!
The kitchen is very open with lots of space.  It has dark cabinets that I am living with for now because all the walls are white.  

And...the countertops are light pink or blush.  I didn't notice that until it was ours.  The counters are Corian with tile around the stove.  The tile will come out first and be replaced with wood.
The Corian will be lived with for a time.  I wish the sink and dishwasher were on the island to look out and the stove was on the wall with a hood, but, oh well.  I am not sure that will ever change.  There are a few appliance garages that are flush with the wall, I do like those I think.  I planned on changing out the brass knobs right away.  The 18 year was "helpful" and removed all of them because he said he couldn't look at them any longer.  I haven't decided what I want yet to replace them with.  

The stools at the kitchen bar you see in the first picture were also left.  They are very comfortable and very not my style.  I might try to make them over, but haven't come up with anything brilliant, so there is a good chance they will just be replaced. 

You might notice the fridge has the cupboard facade too.  When we replace the fridge, which won't be right away, we will lose that.  Here is my feeling on it, "Hey, guess what, I have a kitchen and it has fridge in it--no need to hide it!"

I love the exposed brick. There is a chalkboard in the basement that was from the schoolhouse that I will hang here.  
To the right of the exposed brick is a pantry. It has quite a bit of space, but I did leave behind a really fabulous pantry so this will take some adjustment.  

I am loving your ideas, comments, and suggestions so bring them on!!

4 comments:

  1. What an awesome place to work with!!

    Judy

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Becky - I'm a long time reader, and have always loved your creations. I'm so enjoying the walk through of your new house - I like that it's not perfect, but has so much potential. I'm having fun visualising what I might do with it :) and I can't wait to see how you tweak things and make the areas personal. What an adventure!

    ReplyDelete
  3. so much room! I'm not going to offer any suggestions, just simply follow your journey!

    ReplyDelete
  4. So much potential , I cant wait to see the transformation xxx

    ReplyDelete

Thanks so much for taking the time to comment, I really appreciate your kind words!