On a Bohemian Kitchen Update

"A good home must be made, not bought. In the end, it's not track lighting or a sun room that brings light into a kitchen." Joyce Maynard

A while back I mentioned, we remodeled our downstairs bathroom.  As we all know, once you remodel one thing you get "remodeling fever" and want to keep going and redo your whole house.  Of course, that is not always possible.  I did get the fever, however, and decided to do something in the kitchen.  

My husband and I have discussed remodeling the kitchen but agreed that we need to wait a couple of years - lets pay for the bathroom first!  I still wanted to do something to make it look different so I felll back on the cheapest option for a new look: PAINT.   

Now our kitchen has not had a remodel in close to 25 years.  Twenty five years ago we did not know that much about home remodeling and so some of the choices we made weren't the best. One of these was in regards to the cabinets.  The  cabinets were not the greatest quality and so after about 10 years the hinges started breaking.  It got to the point that we just took the doors off the upper cabinets and then about 8 years ago I had the uppers removed and put in open shelves which I actually like a lot. The other problem with the cabinets was that the doors were press board coated with foil  (never buy these) so the foil started peeling off.  I ended up peeling all the foil off and just painting them white.

Back to the present.  Since we are planning on doing a remodel in a few years I thought why not go a little wild now.  I will never be a minimalist but rather love the Bohemian look so I though why not use that as inspiration. My husband, much to my surprise was ok with the idea and actually suggested we paint all the cabinets different colors - be still my heart!  Of course my youngest was horrified at the very thought of it.  So as a compromise I decided to on painting the cabinets red and the side board a distressed turquoise blue.

The other thing I did was to revamp the worn Formica counter top and back splash.  I used a faux granite film on the counter top.  

I originally had visions of doing an elaborate mosaic back splash using broken china, found object etc but then reason prevailed and I ended up painting the back splash with chalkboard paint which adds a bit of fun but also comes in handy for menu planning.

Then to top off my Bohemian redo I hung up a lot of different things that had been stashed away like trivets and some souvenir plates, and rearranged the pictures.

There was a small what not shelf that had been in the bathroom, so I painted it bright green and added it to the mix.

So there is my kitchen which cost less than $200 but a lot of elbow grease.  While I am still planning my kitchen remodel, I am happy with the one I have now so, no rush..

Have a fun day!
​Cynthia