Modern Mid-Century Kitchen

Modern Mid-Century Kitchen

Barton-Arendt Kitchen Remodel

Our clients, Kristen and Anthony, came to us with their sweet, mid-century rambler home in Columbia City, looking to open up the living room into their small, compartmentalized kitchen — a very popular trend back in the day but less useful to how we live today. As such, their goal was to create a flexible dining space, open the flow of the layout, and let in more natural light.

With an out-of-state architect on the project we had to adapt our typical processes to flexible communication modes to co-create a lovely space — balancing the clients’ desires and maintaining a sustainable footprint.

Together we cultivated a gorgeous, more modern mid-century look. By combining white and fir cabinetry with integrated appliance panels can get persnickety — especially the fir. As such we brought in one of our custom cabinet builders, resulting in a high-grade, grain matching, aesthetically pleasing, and highly functional product. With the paneled appliances, warmth of the fir, higher island, and flush-mount stove vent* — the space feels more integrated into the living area and less like a kitchen. The sleek, stainless counters complimented the clean design of the cooktop and light cabinetry, integrating the mid-century minimalistic feel.

The original house design included a single kitchen door to the backyard with windows along the living room’s back wall. Swapping that for large, sliding doors created an easy flow from the indoors to utilize the outdoor space as part of their day-to-day living space; adding loads of natural light, and complimenting the warm openness of the now conjoined space.

Removing a wall has several challenges: you lose space and sometimes lose structure! To obtain the open span desired we were required to add a steel post for support. Not part of the original concept, we worked through a number of aesthetic options — from boxing it in to giving it a special finish. Ultimately Kristen and Anthony chose to just give it a clear coat finish and live with it for a bit. Oftentimes changing a finish selection down the road can create more trouble than it’s worth — as such we are usually huge advocates for choosing the end solution. In this particular case however, anything extra we could do to the post wouldn’t impact any of the other finishes — giving them the opportunity to keep the solution simple in the moment.

Solving the loss of storage space was a much more fun opportunity. The dining hutch not only added a ton of function, but also a beautiful focal point in the room. Every detail planned and executed masterfully, the hutch strategically included push latches to minimize visual distractions from the gorgeous fir and supporting the simplistic, modern mid-century design Kristen and Anthony desired.

*Surface mounted flush ceiling flush stove hoods have come a long way. It is critical, if you consider going that route, that you do extensive research and stick with a high-quality brand. A number of features need to go into that product to make it successful with the extensive amount of space from the cooking surface. The extra time and money invested in a quality mounted flush ceiling stove hood will be well worth it if that is the direction you choose to go. (See image below).

Barton-Arendt Kitchen Remodel 2
Barton-Arendt Kitchen Remodel 3
Steel Post
Love Your Kitchen, Love Your Family Remodel

Love Your Kitchen, Love Your Family Remodel

Join us for a chance to tour this beautiful kitchen remodel in Ballard

May 5, 2019 on the the Northwest Green Home Tour! 

This family was unhappy with the layout of their existing kitchen. They needed a new kitchen that encouraged social cooking within the family, better storage solutions, and more counter top space. The goal of the project was to create a space where, while one person cooks, the other can occupy the same space to keep each other company.

Through the collaborative efforts of Entero Design and Mighty House Construction, we worked within the existing footprint of their kitchen to create a space that fit their design aesthetic and their personal needs. Entero Design worked with the clients to develop a kitchen layout that encouraged socialization between the couple and incorporated a variety of sustainable finishes and materials to make the space unique. To gain more kitchen space, the unconditioned back porch was enclosed and incorporated into the kitchen space, enlarging the kitchen by a few feet.

 

Mighty House Construction handled the construction process for the project. We were able to keep the pre-existing exterior stairs and reuse the interior kitchen doors. The old flooring was replaced with Marmoleum, a natural linoleum made from linseed oil and mixed with other natural products on a jute backing. The new counter tops are made from Paperstone, a solid surface counter top made from recycled paper, and the newly installed cabinets are from Canyon Creek, a local cabinet company in Monroe, WA whose wood products are Carb2 compliant. The beautiful new back-splash features Bedrock Recycled Glass tile made in Seattle from 100% recycled glass product. The space also features newly installed LED overhead lighting, and under-cabinet lighting from  Northwest LED.

Phinney Kitchen Remodel

Phinney Kitchen Remodel

A few years back, the owners of this Phinney Ridge home completed a fantastic addition that, however, left the old kitchen untouched, leaving it cut off from the dining room. Mighty House Construction, with the help of Entero Design, just completed this beautiful remodel that opened up the space without changing the original footprint of the kitchen. Now, the flow between the dining room and kitchen is expansive, inviting, and much more practical.

The kitchen includes cabinetry by Canyon Creek Cabinet Company that is notably low-VOC and locally made. Beautiful, man-made, quartz countertops that are heat-resistant and non-porous from Cambira were installed. The kitchen also includes custom, wood feature pieces created from salvaged wood. The flooring of the kitchen was finished with tile and was installed throughout the kitchen and the dining room.

More photos pf this beautiful kitchen remodel found here

Dark Green Kitchen in Green Lake

Dark Green Kitchen in Green Lake

Nancy and James originally reached out to Mighty House because they wanted to work with a contractor who had a strong commitment to using salvaged materials. MHC was the only contractor they spoke to who was willing to reuse the existing cabinetry and meet their budget constraints. Finding a contractor with high sustainability standards was really important to them!

BEFORE

Keeping the character of their existing cabinetry was also extremely important. The design plan required re-locating some of them and adding cabinets to where the refrigerator had been. This made it unreasonable to reuse the base cabinets, but we were able to reuse all the upper cabinets. We played with several ideas  – should the new ones be starkly different to stand out? Or perhaps we should mimic the look with a semi-custom cabinetry line (like Canyon Creek). In the end, neither of those options really did justice to the house or matched the style – which really mattered to the homeowners – so we went with custom cabinet maker, Cabinetworks.

green lake kitchen sink windowgreen lake kitchen stove and hall

Additional green and eco-friendly choices included:

  • Custom built eating nook bench – made by local manufacturer
  • Painted cabinets – no need for fancy imported wood or finish
  • Upgraded to new, more energy efficient appliances including an Energy Star certified dishwasher and refrigerator
  • Natural Marmoleum flooring that is non-toxic, anti-microbial, and durable
  • Pental Quartz countertops – low-VOC and chemical emissions

 

 Check out more photos of this project in our Flikr gallery.