
	  When Elise and Ben bought their Mount Washington house, the kitchen looked like this. They used this sad kitchen for five years until they finally updated it. The end result is modernized, but still captures the spirit and integrity of the storied older house.



	                    Using IKEA cabinets to keep the costs down, they were able to upgrade and personalize the look with Calcutta marble and Schoolhouse Electric hardware for all the cabinets.



	                   And what an amazing transformation after:



	            More details to drool over:






 In Elise's words: 


		                   I probably made about 12 different floor plans and elevations trying to   fit everything in, yet achieve a light, open, airy feeling. The  biggest  issues were the appliances. How do you fit these huge things,  plus a ton  of storage space, into a 10x10 room? Really, the only  solution was to  downsize as much as possible and get a a little  creative with the old  "kitchen triangle." Breaking up the cooktop and  oven, forgoing a good  looking oven hood and for a sensible micro hood,  and getting the  narrowest refrigerator we could find/afford (even if  that meant it  wasn't counter depth) ended up making the most sense.
	


         What we ended up doing: 


Removed a wall between our tiny kitchen and mud room to make one   larger kitchen and create a peninsula for the kids to sit and eat.

Removed and replace acoustic ceiling tiles with skim coated drywall

Replaced two louvered windows with one awning window

IKEA cabinets and fronts in the high gloss white. I looked into both   Semi Handmade and Kokeena but because of budget and timing we stuck with IKEA

DIY Brass toe kicks

Solid Brass hardware

Calacutta Marble countertops/backsplash/waterfall

White Oak wood floors

IKEA refrigerator, microwave and cooktop

Smeg oven






	     Elise also has a more DIY tips and details on their kitchen remodel on her blog Burke Decor Blog. She was also gracious enough to share a few valuable lessons she learned during the process of renovating their kitchen using IKEA → Stress-Saving IKEA Kitchen Reno Lessons from a Real Homeowner



	                  The surprise that Elise found during renovation was  unreal. The house she bought had tenants who lived there for 50 years.  It turns out that the previous resident Ruby also wanted new cabinets just as bad as Elise!



          Thank you Ben and Elise! 



(Image credits: MLS Listing; Marisa  Vitale)

