Color Conundrum, etc.

So, after all that work on choosing a color, and we went with the greenish gray, when they put the tiles in, it was clear it was not going to work. Blech. The green apparently had too much yellow in it, or something, but there was a weird glow that was happening that was not good. So much for my dream of a yellow kitchen. So we got a professional in, a decorator that Maurice and Jeff are working with and she proposed a couple of colors, each of which were way more blue than anything I had considered. Blue. Is. Not. Me. However, one of the "bluish" ones was more green than blue, so I decided to go for it, especially given how unsuccessful I had been choosing the color -- clearly, my instincts are completely wrong, everything I was attracted to was yellow.

I tried to convince Jeff that we should just do an accent wall, leave the walls with the cabinets and tiles white -- the contrasty thing was getting to me. He was opposed, and everyone was opposed, including the decorator. They painted the whole kitchen and promised that if I didn't like it they would do it white. So here it is, I like it, not sure I love it yet. It looks really blue in these pictures, it doesn't really look that blue in person, more gray green. You can also see the tin tiles and how they look over the stove. So nice. So we are close enough to being done to move in this weekend - a few small things need to be finished, mostly lights. They are going to move to the outside to work on the decks and then we'll be done!

Colors

So, some more colors. Here they are:
Golden Honey:


Concord Ivory:


The sagey green that I don't know the name of:


All of them, from the top: Golden tan, Concord Ivory, Golden Honey and the Sagey Green to the right - note how the golden colors look nice with the red dining room:


Sagey green and Golden Tan (near the window) some very bright yellow on the left (which we rejected already):


The sagey green this morning, before I tried any other colors:

Floors, Sink and Appliances -- And Color Trouble

We truly feel like we are getting to the final stretch here. They've taken down all of the protective doors and plastic, and we can wander through the kitchen anytime now. The floors went in last week and after some consternation about color, no color, etc. and whining about how they won't match the existing floors, the day they went in, I came home from work and had to catch my breath -- they are soooo beautiful. They did the mahogany strips around the edges of the room and it just looks amazing. I was worried over the matching for no reason, really, they put clear on it and "floated" a little color in the stuff they put on top (so it wouldn't go into the grain of the wood). They don't actually match the floor color in the rest of the house, apparently it is really not possible to simulate 100 years of aging in oak (who would have thought?), but they will age on their own and will get closer over time.

This week, they put in the sink and faucet, and the appliances are in! The sink is in, it looks great. We are going to move our stuff in the new fridge and get rid of the other fridge so we can have a living room again.




We are still futzing around with color - we had chosen a color, then got some feedback from various places that it was too dark, too intense, etc. so I backed off and went with a paler, less intense yellow. They did the kitchen in it when I was in LA, I came home saw it and hated it. Like the color of a baby's room. Then we went back to the drawing board, tried some other colors on the walls as samples, and they all looked dirty and awful. Then we tried to go back to the intense color I liked so well up front, and now I don't like it. Yellow, it turns out, is VERY HARD. I am going to try one other yellow that I found last night, but may give up and go with Anjou Pear, which is a green color. I was stressed out about it until I talked to Kim, who said "everything goes with white cabinets, don't worry about it. Whatever you choose will look fine!" And this is true, and besides, really, stressed out about paint? Really? I need to get some perspective.

Lights, Paint and Deck Action

With the cabinets in the hard decisions have come home to roost, and so far, at least, I muffed one. Luckily it is undoable, with some (albeit small) cost. I wonder if you will notice it in these pictures. Answer will be below!

I've been playing with the tin tiles, moving them around, trying to figure out how they should sit behind the stove. I've never quite been satisfied with the layout, it always seemed ok, but lacked a center somehow. I thought that maybe I'd try to center one over the clock on the stove, but in a diamond pattern. Maurice sent his brother Jeff over (Jeff is the artistic brother, I think, and works with a lot of folks on color etc.) Jeff hmmed and hmmed, moved stuff around, then came up with a much better idea - use the tiles around the kitchen, not just behind the stove. We hung them where they will be -- essentially embedded in the tile - very nice, I love it. And most importantly, the tiles over the stove seem to set right, finally. The pendant lights look great over the island, I think, they are so pretty.



The painters have primed the walls, and have been waiting for the color choice. So again, Jeff helped narrow down the colors. I wanted a yellowish, ochre, sort of the color of the pottery we saw in the south of France. You can see the color here - it is the one on the right -- the one on the left is too acidic (although hard to tell the difference from this picture):



Look closely at this picture and you can see the mistake. See the lights over the window? Agh. I chose them when the original ones we had settled upon became unavailable. Ugh. Bad choice. Anyway, they are gone now, and we will have to sell them on Craig's list because for some crazy reason, lights are not returnable. Not sure why this is - wacky. Now I am on the hunt for lights that work, but since I've been burned once, I am worried about making the wrong choice.

Anyway, the Ipe (Brazillian hard wood) came in and it is beautiful. Check out the deck (Sage already loves it):



And, probably most importantly, we have stairs! Finally, we can bring our laundry up from the basement without going all the way around to the front door. Also, we can let the dogs out to the back yard and let them go in and out (except for Rocky, who won't go back up the stairs once he's down there).




Next up: floors, counter tops, paint and designing the deck railings!

CABINETS!

Just when things got slow, then they got really fast. The cabinets came in on a Friday, and they started putting them in on Monday. Here's what they looked like this last week (AWESOME!!):This is the desk and the broom closets.


This is the view out the back window (doesn't the island/table look great?).


The east wall -- I am so glad we did the little windows. The tin tiles will go behind the stove. Can't wait to see what they will look like.


The pantry -- Maurice and I worked out the shelving in the pantry, and I was worried because, really, what do I know about pantries and how they should be? But it looks great, perfect, in fact, and I am so happy about the design inside. Plus, it has a light that goes on when you open the door. How cool is that? You can see the bookshelf on the wall there on the left -- all of our cookbooks will fit (and more).

Next up, trim on the cabinets, paint on the walls (still have to pick a color everything looks very WHITE right now, and it will be so great to get some color in there), countertops (already picked out the slab -- they will be soapstone), recycled wood for the desktop, pulls for the cabinets (already picked them out at Restoration Hardware), tiles, putting up the lights, wood floors - still a lot, but every day it is so exciting to come home to see what the workers have done.

Walls, an Island and Tin Tiles

A provocative title, no? So, as promised, we got walls, outside and in:





And wonder upon wonder, after living through the disappointment that the island I thought I had nailed down went missing, I found an island that I think I like even better. I was disconsolately trolling the Alameda Antiques Faire on Sunday, aisle upon aisle of stuff that almost worked, but would require so much modification, or a special top, or would have to be custom built, blah blah blah. I almost had given up (it was cold and I was sure I wasn't going to find anything) when I came upon this:




My initial reaction was, too simple, no drawers, etc. etc., but then I had a revelation which was -- this is it. I had the guy measure it and it was almost the perfect size. I called Maurice (on a Sunday, he was working, such luck) and he asked me to take a picture of it with my cell phone and send it to make sure if it didn't work they could modify it. I did, he agreed it could be modified, if necessary, and we could add wheels to make it the right height. I was sure it was meant to be, so I just made the decision that I was going to get it. I talked the guy down some on the price, but actually it cost us so much less than anything else we'd been considering. I was on cloud nine. Problem solved.

Then, I was so happy with my find that I thought that I would treat myself to some vintagey cool object that I would put in the kitchen and found these:



Aren't they awesome? I was going through them, laying them out in a design on the ground and all these people were passing by saying how cool it looked and how great they were, so that of course egged me on. A woman stopped to help me find ones that would go together and confirmed that I was indeed a genius. Here is the idea, although I am not sure it will be allowed, but I'd like to have these as the backsplash behind the stove. You can see the tile on the upper left of the picture -- the tiles could surround them -- we'd have to get some border type tile.

What do you think? The brownish one was a compromise, they didn't have any other white ones, but I thought I could probably come up with a white wash that I could do with paint that would appromixate the other ones.

Anyway, we are coming down to the fun stuff now -- the cabinets have come in and are ready to be installed, then we'll get the counters measured out -- in short, we can see the end of the tunnel!

Insulation and More Windows

Its funny how everything moves so fast when you first start a remodel, and then it seems like progress slows just when things get interesting. Actually, its not really that things a progressing more slowly, the guys still show up every day and work all day, its just that what they are working on is not as dramatic as it was in the beginning. Take for example, insulation. Its pretty cool, actually, made of recycled denim (I think it is, at least, thats what Maurice had said in the beginning), but not that exciting to show in pictures.

The big window over the sink was installed, however, and it looks great.

Also, we are working with Maurice on determining what the ledge outside on the deck should look like -- we are trying to make it more open so it doesn't feel as heavy. This looks so much better than it did originally, I think, and now we just need to figure out how to put up the right railing so no one falls through!


Speaking of railings, we've been trying to figure out what style of railing we should use. Maurice had an open house for two houses that he built in Berkeley and we went to see the railings on the decks there. I didn't take pictures, so I can't post them here, but here is the link that shows pictures of the houses and you can see the railings on the decks. http://www.openhomesphotography.com/1411_7th/

I like them a lot -- very simple -- but they might end up being too modern? What do you think?

Up next week -- stucco and dry wall. Pictures should be good!