The Kitchen Reveal: Our Ikea Kitchen Remodel is Finished!

The day has come. I finally have pictures and details to share with you of our new kitchen! Our Ikea kitchen remodel was a long process, but it’s finally done. Our home style is “cozy modern” and that’s the general look I wanted in the kitchen. Specifically, our kitchen is a blue, white, and woven kitchen with a modern Central American vibe. You can find the kitchen moodboard here. When you come into our house the kitchen is just on your left. And this is the old view that used to nauseate you when you first came in. And now this new view welcomes you joyously to our home. I’ll give you a moment to just be amazed.

The cabinets are all from Ikea. They are the Akurum high gloss white cabinets. The high gloss finish makes them super wipeable–I love how easy they are to clean. And I love the sleek look. The door and drawer handles are all Ikea Blankett handles. I chose them because they wouldn’t interrupt the sleekness. It’s hard to say what my favorite part is. The full wall of tile is up there. The tile is hand-painted cement tile made in Nicaragua. It’s awesome. Before it was installed, I had only seen one sample tile. The way the tiles fit together to make even more patterns makes the look even better. And after a college history class and trip to Nicaragua, Phil and I developed a special love for the country, which makes the tiles even more perfect for our kitchen. My other favorite is probably is the 8 foot long butcher block waterfall island. The other side of the island is full of drawers of various sizes and a trash pull-out. Those drawers provide an incredible amount of storage, holding all our dishes, tupperware, baking supplies, spices, utensils, silverware, and more. On either side of the fridge are tall pull out pantry cabinets. I love the pull out feature so it’s easy to see everything, even at the very back. The microwave is above the oven. Both have a sleek white finish. There’s a dishwasher in the above picture too. Do you see it? No, you don’t. It’s the big cabinet below the knife block and it has a front to match the cabinets. I love that it blends in and disappears.

The pendants above the island are woven out of jute or twine or something like that. When the lights are off, the look brown and the texture really shows up. My favorite lighting is to have just the pendants on and the can lights off. It’s such a warm beautiful light. There are also three can lights down the middle of the kitchen and one above the sink. The dining room light fixture is the Firefly Pendant from CB2. It’s the only part of the remodel that I’m not totally sold on. It was installed in the exact same spot as the old fixture, but with the added space to the kitchen, it isn’t centered over the table. Also, it hangs pretty low and is very bright. We moved the cooktop from the center island to the wall. It was definitely the right decision, but it was one I hadn’t even considered until the contractor mentioned it. I like that the island is more open without a vent hood over it. And I like that the prep space it what primarily overlooks the dining area and living room.

The process: We decided to use a contractor because Phil and I didn’t have time to do the work ourselves (and we didn’t trust the quality of work we’d do). But I was still sold on using the Ikea cabinets because of the price, the features, the high gloss finish, etc. It was a little tricky to find a contractor willing to work with Ikea cabinets since it isn’t the usual way. Ikea provides an assembly and installation service, but I’d read really bad reviews of it. I found an independent Ikea installer with years of experience and good reviews (http://blueboxhomeservices.com). We ended up not going that route, but I was very impressed with his skill, price level on the bid, and ideas for design and planning.

We chose a contractor well-recommended in our neighborhood and demo started in the middle of July. Using a contractor was pretty nice and the quality of work they completed is excellent. My complaint though was that delays that made what I was originally told would be a 4-6 week project into a 12 week project. Some delays, I understand, are to be expected. But many of these delays seemed to be related to poor planning by the contractor and lack of communication between subcontractors.

The planning: We lived in our home for over a year before we started our Ikea kitchen remodel. I think this was super important. For starters, it took us about 6 months of living in the house before we realized that we could easily incorporate a storage area in the garage into the kitchen. And that made a HUGE difference in the kitchen design. The first thing we settled on was the tile really. I saw the tile online somewhere ages ago and knew right away that it would be the star of the kitchen. So moving on from there, I wanted a simple cabinet that would be clean and bright and modern. I loved the high gloss finish because it was modern and oh-so-wipeable. Sleek handle and stainles steel finish completed the clean and modern look. But too much sleek would make the kitchen sterile, so I knew we needed to add some warmth. I chose the butcher block countertop and woven lights to add warmth and texture. The cork flooring continues into the kitchen from the dining room. It doesn’t match the wood floor elsewhere in the house but it does have the same warm coloring so that it flows and seems more seamless.

The sources:

• Cabinets: Ikea Akurum Cabinets in High Gloss White
• Hardware: Ikea Blankett stainless in various sizes
• Lighting: Island Pendants–Light Weaver Lamp from DotandBo.com, Dining Room Chandelier–Firefly Pendant Lamp from CB2
• Tile: Blue Fez pattern by Granada Tile
• Countertops: The black countertops around the edges are black granite in an antiqued finish. They are matte and not shiny, with lots of texture from little pockmarks. The butcher block countertop was custom made by the carpenter.
• Paint: White, Behr, off the shelf.
• Appliances: the dishwasher, microwave, oven, cooktop, and vent hood are all Ikea.
• Sink: Kohler
• Faucet: Pfister

And of course I can’t resist one more good before and after:

Whew. So much better. And we are loving it. It’s so nice to cook in that we are making homemade meals way more often. Phil has even started making homemade bread every day. It truly turned out to be our dream kitchen. What do you think? Is the blue tile your thing? What would your dream kitchen look like? Are you getting ready for a kitchen remodel? If so, learn from our experience and consider these 8 Questions to Ask Before Starting a Kitchen Remodel.