Showing posts with label ikea. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ikea. Show all posts

Ikea Kitchen Update

Here is where the new kitchen stands. The tile is now up to the middle of the window-the walls were too scarred to leave them bare, but I think it has a nice charm. I'm still working on painting the cabinets and we could use a replacement stove but there's no rush.



















The oak countertops are my favorite new thing- I never thought wood was something appropriate to my messy, sometimes grungy kitchen. I used 6 coats of Waterlox, a tung-oil and resin-based finish. Spills wipe right up, even a day later, and there are no white rings or dark rings. Nothing soaks in. The finish dulls a little when water is left standing for a day, but you wouldn't even notice unless you peered closely. We treat our countertops roughly- though no direct cutting on them- and they haven't chipped yet. If they did, it's easy to recoat or touch-up.

So far we've probably spent 2800-3000 on this kitchen, for a complete re-do. I kind-of regret the new steel-look appliances- they seem cold and not very vintage! How do they look so great in period kitchen magazine photos?

Jason paints!









The pot rack.






Kitchen Archaeology

















Gross-ness aside, pulling out the 1970's cabinets exposed the original silhouettes of the first, very shallow, built-in cabinets and the location of the gas stove and its pipe.

All those white stripes on the right corner were supports for the shelves, and also the countertop, covering up virgin plaster. On the left, it seems the gas stove was not moved when the kitchen was last painted and vinyl-ed. So we can see the 1920s cabinets lasted at least until the age of the golden vinyl.

The sink on the right (unseen here) had a high back, judging from the height of the window. The hole for its inlet pipes is still in the ledger board at the base of the inside wall, since they ran up to the sink back from inside the wall.

The sink was bookended by the two built-in cabinets, the left cabinet being the one shown above. Nearly the entire wall above the countertop line was removed and replaced with drywall, two layers in some places, and this is where I assume there used to be the old white subway tile found under the house. When it was removed, it must have taken the whole wall with it. I'm replacing it on a more extensive scale, probably using in-store tile from Home Depot. It's $.23 a tile, and no longer has the wide spacers or rounded edge as it did just a few years ago.

Now With 98% Less Cockroaches!

With all the holes now patched up, including the rat entrance around the old gas pipe and valve that are still sticking out of the wall, we have installed the base cabinets. Here are the cabinets we chose, from Ikea. The fronts, at least, are solid wood, and they fit our measly educator/non-profit employee budget at $1100. The full overlay is an acceptable substitute for the face-frame, for me.














The idea is to paint them, with appropriate bronze hardware, to match these in the breakfast nook. Not to make them blotchy like these partially stripped guys, but to paint the entire set in the same cream color. I should mention, I've tried every stripper method I know on this pantry; chemicals, heat etc., but the thing that worked the best, and cleanest, was just peeling off the layers with a razor blade. The layers are 1/8 thick in some areas, and they peel with diligent coercion.















Here is where we are now, about 36 work-hours into the project. The fronts had to be ordered and we are picking them up in a few weeks from an Ikea warehouse. The wood-colored post in the cabinet center is my own replacement of a part Ikea got wrong. I didn't feel like fighting with them over the phone about how they had given me an older cabinet and a 2009-model rotating tray. In the past their telephone customer service wasn't great.



















The countertop and floor haven't been ordered yet because I thought I'd be pink-slipped this week in surprise cuts. It has been depressing to walk into the unfinished kitchen everyday thinking it might look like this for months. I don't know how I became lucky, because I'm usually not, and am sad to be losing so many friends and good people from my workplace.

I'm doing the plumbing myself. My mom asked me how that was different from the mess the flipper left us in, and wondered if I should call a plumber. But I've done code research, and if it really gets screwed up then I will call someone. Working in my favor is that every bit of the plumbing is exposed under the house, the drain already at the proper incline, and easy to install. In the crawlspace, however, the glue smells awful!

The Tubby Ticket-Finder and His Bakery

This is my construction paper kitchen design. We watched a holiday broadcast of the newer Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and I decided on the scheme of the German bakery where the tubby ticket-finder meets the press. It had cream walls and pale blue tiles. We only had this brown paper, so this picture isn't accurate. I don't want a yellow sink. But, it's fun anyway. The chance of finding affordable pale blue subway tile is low, so unless some comes rolling my way off the back of a truck on the freeway, it will be Home Depot white.



















Here is what we're really going to do, but in a more, dollar-store, version.

Ikea Kitchen Modification

In the previous post, I had decided on an Ikea "Adel" front for the kitchen cabinets. It's too modern; its stamped rails and stiles are twice the width of the butler's pantry shaker door rails and stiles which I'm trying to match.

So, not being a huge fan of this mdf door and drawer front, and after looking around the IKEAFANS forums, I realized, 1. Because of the modular nature of Ikea, I can order their boxes with the fancy Blum slides, Euro hinges and drawers without having to order their cabinet doors. I would be fine living with cabinets without doors until we can afford the right doors. Anything to move the rats! 2. I can paint the more appropriate door, the wood "Tidaholm", to match, or can order unfinished shaker door fronts from Scherr's where they are familiar with Ikea measurements.

Here are great photos of a painted Tidaholm kitchen:
http://www.ikeafans.com/forums/attachments/photos/6126d1195228802-painted-tidaholm-cabinets-new-kitchen-kitchen-october-2007-b.jpg
http://www.ikeafans.com/forums/attachments/photos/6127d1195228818-painted-tidaholm-cabinets-new-kitchen-kitchen-october-2007-d.jpg

And a spray booth setup for the doors:
http://www.ikeafans.com/forums/modifications/11859-painting-tidaholm.html

I've been thinking also about not having a kickspace, instead filling the area with matching painted strips of plywood. Instead of doors under the sink, maybe a curtain. There are many details I could do to make the basic Ikea kitchen look more period, less Ikea. And then my homeowner guilt will be assuaged.

The Ikea Kitchen

So, we had saved up vast sums of money. Vast sums for us, anyway. Realizing we'll never be rich and with the understanding that neither house nor neighborhood is a period gem, and also that I don't have the time to build cabinets, I decided to go with Ikea instead. This is the front I've chosen. The rails and stiles (false, mdf-molded) are wider than the plain shaker-style doors of the built in pantry.


















"Adel" cabinet

I know, I'm an old-house traitor, but this at least honors the period, -ish, and the 1928 built-in ironing cabinet will be carefully covered by a tall pantry instead of being half-obscured by a refrigerator. A future owner can rediscover it. We're also opting for the period-ish smaller sister of this sink. The cabinets total was $1400, plus our "new" appliances now living at my mom's. Sadly, there is room in this layout for the leggy 1920's electric stove we passed up as being too large at the Salvation Army in January. Anyhow, this was the plan.

And then- we both became unemployed. Mine planned, him on a voluntary gamble. No new jobs in sight yet. No new cabinets. I'd love to just paint the old 70's ones, but renter abuse has caused them to be held together with tape. Dogs have chewed the stiles, feet have cracked the doors.

A week before my last day of work, Ralph was staring intently at the base of the cabinet next to the stove. I bent down and heard gnawing in the kickspace. And I felt depressed knowing how close we would have come to getting the rats out of the kitchen, i.e., using the pile of cash! to remove the rotted remains of the current sink cabinet and patching up the missing floor, wall, and joists over the crawlspace. Then, installing new cabinets with our pile of cash!

There was rat poop on the counter last night. All the kitchen cracks and blatant openings within reach are taped over with long strips of packing and duct tape. Tired of the rats! How do they survive in the flooded crawlspace, anyway? It's like Venice down there in the rainy season.

But I sure feel great knowing the rats love their kitchen Disneyland! Har. And it's good to know FHA loans have an excellent safety net.
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