All White Kitchen Renovation

Hi everyone! Yesterday I did my official kitchen reveal on my Youtube! You can watch the before and after video here. A white kitchen has been my dream since discovered my passion for cooking. Our old kitchen had it's own charm with the dark wood and granite countertops but it never represented our personal style and it felt a little out-dated. 

As promised in the video, I have collected all of the samples and names of the paint that we used for your reference! 

Paint

Lets begin with the paint. I definitely knew I wanted white cabinets to brighten the space and let me tell you, choosing the perfect white was a pain in the butt! We switched it 3 times and would've switched it more had I not found this super helpful chart with all the most popular white paints and their undertones. I realized that my perfect white needed to have cool undertones and all the ones I was selecting had warm undertones. 

I had to keep in mind the color we already have on the walls, the amount of natural light this space gets and the type of artificial light we use. We have Mindful Gray by SW throughout the home and since our home has an open floor plan we had to take that color into account.

I was going for a crisp white look without feeling too stark and ultimately Pure White by SW was the winner! It has a slight grayish undertone that is pulled out by the marble on the countertops. It still looks white at night even with the warm light coming from the island pendants. I couldn't be happier with the amount of light that the kitchen has now, I used to refer to it as a dungeon because it was so dark. By the way, we didn't need to replace the old cabinets, we just painted them :D

Floors

Our floors were the last bit of cream left over from the previous color palette, they needed to go. We knew we wanted the look of wood to warm up the space and since real wood was out of the question(due to how high maintenance it was) we opted for ceramic tile that mimics the liveliness of real wood.

Once we decided on 2 we took the samples home and played them out on our floors so we could walk on them and see them everyday. 

The darker ones had a nice contrast but they showed every little foot print and I just knew that would drive me insane eventually! So we decided on the lighter gray and used a gray grout to pull those grey veins out. 

I fall more in love with these floors everyday, they give the entire house life and it's the thing that no one can stop commenting on when they visit. 

Countertops & Backsplash 

If you know me IRL, you know that I am a go big or go home type of person. If I'm going to do something it's going to be to be done to the boldest degree that my imagination(and budget) can reach. So while having a backsplash that makes you feel like you are in the mountains of Italy might be a little extreme for some, they make my insides tingle with joy. 

We went back and forth between countertops and backsplash finishes, I knew I wanted real stone on both but I had to weigh the pros and cons of each. We almost used a material called Neolith. It looks like real marble, it's more resilient and the cost is a fraction of the real thing, it sounded perfect! Turns out that because it is so new in the US, very few people are certified to install it which brought the cost(with installation) up. Waaayyy up! So much that we decided to opt for the real thing, at least we know what we are paying for. 

We went to about 5-6 different warehouses in search for the perfect marble. I thought it was going to be as simple as walking into a warehouse, showing them a photo of my future kitchen and having them direct me to my perfect slab. Nope, it turns out that you pretty much get to pick from what they have in stock and some places get new stock in as much as every 30 days or as little as twice a year. 

 We were close to giving up on real marble, none of the slabs available had the crisp white background with the exaggerated veining that I was looking for. Then one of the warehouses received a fresh shipment of the most beautiful marble I had ever laid my eyes on. I learned it is called Calacatta Gold and it's perfect. If you look closely you will see slightly tan colored veining which is where the name stems from. I was able to pick out the slabs that I wanted and where I wanted them placed in the kitchen. 

We decided to use the marble for the backsplash and the island. We opted for quartzite for the coffee bar and the counters next to the stove since these are the areas that will get the most spills from food and drinks. I can't find the sample of the quartzite but it is a pretty standard light gray color. Not only did this decision lower the cost significantly but it also keeps the focus on the important stuff, the marble. 

We had the island marble sealed to prevent staining but etching is still a possibility. We have to prevent exposing the marble to acidic things like lemons, tomato and wine. It fits our lifestyle and in case you are new here, I cook a lot! Like everyday and I don't feel like I need to tip toe or baby our kitchen. On the contrary, the white is much more forgiving than the dark cabinets were. 

SHOP THIS POST:

You can see this fished kitchen in his video! I hope you enjoy!

Subscribe to my Youtbe channel here, I have new videos every week!

In this video I go into detail on all the hidden drawers that we have in the kitchen!


Until next time! XO Liz