One Room Challenge: Week 1

The One Room Challenge: I have dreamt of participating in this amazing event for so long now, and I am just over-the-moon happy to finally get to be a part of it! I hope that you will enjoy following along with me as I create a happier, prettier, more functional kitchen! I cannot WAIT to share.

The kitchen: My favorite room of the house! But our current kitchen? Not so much. It’s not that it isn’t updated or even that it isn’t beautiful. It just isn’t “us,” and its also pretty “vanilla.” So, why exactly has it taken me two years to finally address ours? To put it simply: I wanted to take my time making decisions for our kitchen. I wanted to live with it for a little while, learn what I love and what I don’t love, and THEN dive on into making changes! 

Here are a few before photos of our kitchen. It’s fine, but it’s “meh,” and it definitely doesn’t reflect my style.  Keep in mind that these are actually photos from before we purchased our house, but the only thing different now (beginning of the ORC) is that we hung blinds and made over our pantry!

See? Not bad, right?! But you know that I could never leave well enough alone when it comes to design. I want to ADORE my home! So. let’s chat about all of the changes we plan to make in here, which will result in a kitchen that has both beauty and function (my favorite combination)!

The biggest visual change will be painting the cabinets! I knew before we even purchased the house that the cabinets would absolutely need to be painted, because the “grey” was actually very PURPLE, and looked even lavender in some lights 😳 The people who remodeled our house prior to our purchase also chose grey for EVERY. SINGLE. FINISH. Grey cabinets, grey walls, AND grey floors. Not my favorite at all.

My dream has always been a white kitchen, but I am also feeling brave and wanting to try adding a pop of moody green like what I added in our pantry. The color we used is Rainy Afternoon by Benjamin Moore, and it is SUCH a gorgeous green/grey!

Other Changes:

• replace cabinet/drawer hardware

• remove non-functional corner cabinet (trust me – its awful when it comes to storage/being able to reach things)

• remove broken microwave + replace with a range hood (and pretty DIY hood cover!)

• find long-term, functional counter stools

• extend the backsplash to the ceiling

• dress up the island with a treatment (shiplap or board and batten)

• add open shelving to the corner (in place of the cabinet) to hold cookware, plants, canisters, etc

• add pendant lighting

My design plan/mood board:

As you can see, my plan is to mix bright, clean whites with some moody pops. I plan to bring in some texture with wooden or woven counter stools, and add interest with mixed metals (the pendant and cabinet hardware/faucet). I. Am. So. Excited!

Finally, here are some photos of kitchens that really inspire me:

I am SO excited to partake in the One Room Challenge as a guest participant, and am truly looking forward to the inspiration I know I will find from everyone else who is participating! Be sure to check out the ORC site here for tons of inspiration! 

Be sure to also follow my day-by-day progress on my Instagram, here!