Elizabeth November 2nd, 2011

 

 

Part 1: Entry & foyer
Part 2: The living room
Part 3: The dining room

 

If you’ve been following my little house tour you’ll know that I have a terrible attitude about our kitchen.  I think our relationship got off to a bad start the first time I noticed that all the (pink!) cupboard doors all open in the wrong direction.  Or when I realised that there was no pantry.

Or, perhaps it was when I realised that the Barbie-pink curtains were strung up with telephone cable.

Those curtains have been carefully stored away for the next lucky tenant, and taking them down was an immediate improvement to the room.  Bit by bit we’ve worked on making our little kitchen a place that doesn’t make your eyes bleed.  There are things that we can’t control as renters, but we have done an awful lot to improve it!

Pink cupboards notwithstanding.

 

If you’re wandering through from our dining room this is the first thing you’ll see.  Straight ahead is the door to the bathroom (the other hilariously terrible room in this house), and that little hallway also leads to the spare room and master bedroom.

 

There are three entrances to our funny little kitchen.  The door in this photo leads to the toilet and laundry, and you can also spot our back door through the window.

Give yourself bonus points if you realised that you have to walk through the kitchen to get from the toilet to the bathroom to wash your hands.

I know, right?

(And then give me a high five for setting up a handwashing station in the laundry instead.)

 

The tragedy of this room is that it’s a really great size, but just really poorly designed.  The kitchen cabinetry has clearly been taken from some other house, as no builder would actually choose to hinge a cupboard in such a way that you can’t open it when you’re using the oven.  There’s a single powerpoint near the bench – way up high – which means that we have to use a powerboard on the counter.

It’s ugly, and not terribly safe.  But what are you going to do?  (Answer: hide it with a pot plant, of course!)

And then there’s all the pink.  Since there was really no way to ignore it, we decided to just go all out and add hot pink planters to the windowsill.  I imagine that Paris Hilton would approve.

 

The kitchen started to feel like it was ours when we finally put some art on those big, white walls.  We’re not allowed to put any holes in the walls here, but so far the 3M hooks and tape have been excellent.

I’m completely in love with the series of 3 “foodie” watercolours that hang above the microwave, by Irish artist Bridget Farmer (she has a cute blog, too).  And the set of 4 birds by Beth-Emily were birthday presents from my parents.  It kills me that they’re hanging in $2 IKEA frames, but we needed something light enough for 3M poster strips and these did the trick.

I credit these beautiful prints for converting the kitchen from spartan share-house chic to something a little more grown-up.

 

If you look up high you’ll notice our collection of vases (a girl can dream, right?) and some big kitchen gadgets that don’t get used too regularly.  And yes, it is possible that I have a slight problem where indoor plants are concerned, but it’s a pretty nice problem to have!

You may also find yourself wondering why the landlord of such a beautiful house would choose an upside down standard lamp shade for the light fitting on this high ceiling.  But try not to strain a brain muscle, because there is no right answer to this question.  Except, perhaps “stop it”.

 

This post is starting to get way too long, so here’s a jumble of photos that show you some of the details of this room.

 

 

 

Of course, I really can’t call my kitchen tour complete without showing you the dining arrangements of the boss of our household, Harry.  It was never ever my intention to share my food preparation area with the family fleabag, but in this house it’s the only possible solution.

I’ve tolerated this arrangement because there’s just no other choice.  And besides, you need to walk through the kitchen to get anywhere else in this house (our back door is used far more than our front door) and so we were never going to be able to keep him out of here.  It helps a lot that he’s clean, he doesn’t shed fur, and he’s beautifully behaved most of the time.

But still, ew.  I just want it on record that it’s something I struggled to come to terms with!

 

And that’s it!  Congratulations if you made it this far, because I know that this post has exceeded the number of photos that is considered polite in blog land.

But really, you should see what ended up on the cutting room floor!

 

One last shot, taken from the door to the hallway.  The next installment of the tour will be the toilet & laundry – I bet you’re on the edge of your seat!

 

• Home
• Comments(4)