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in Celebrating Our 100-Year-Old Beach House

Our 100-Year-Old Kitchen – Before, After & Everything in Between

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As I continue to share all the behind-the-scenes in my “Celebrating Our 100-Year-Old Beach House” series, I’ll take you through the many phases of our 8-year cottage kitchen renovation project.

100-year-old kitchen renovation

Are you in love with your kitchen? I am! It’s one of my favorite rooms in our beach cottage. But it took a while to get here. 8 years to be exact. We worked on several kitchen projects in phases, due not only to our budget restrictions but also because my husband and I kept coming up with more and more ideas.

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Are you ready to see what the cottage looked like on moving day?

kitchen before picture
kitchen before picture

Phase 1

  • Painted the cabinets white and added new hardware
  • Painted walls
  • Installed hardwood floors
  • Added a pot filler
  • Installed new light fixtures
  • Demolished the main bathroom and added a walk-in pantry
100-year-old kitchen renovation

The first phase happened immediately. We had the cabinets painted white, knowing it would be a few years before we would be in a financial position to install new kitchen cabinets. The walls were a quick fix. Sadly, I was really into yellow walls back then.

pot filler

And this little beauty made me happy. I had always wanted a pot filler. Do you see that fun tile? When we did finally renovate the entire kitchen, we took the broken tile and mixed it into the cement path we created in our backyard dog run.

100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation

Here’s the hardwood flooring being put in.


Phase 2

  • Installed new windows
  • Replaced door and window trim
  • Updated plumbing
  • Relocated the refrigerator and created a hallway
kitchen before picture

Moving the refrigerator into the actual kitchen area was a big project that really made an impact. The refrigerator was originally behind the wall where the hallway door was.

100-year-old kitchen renovation

We removed the door to the stairs and reconfigured the space to bring the refrigerator into the kitchen. I’ll share more about the renovations we made to the rest of this space, including adding a walk-in closet to the bedroom by closing off that wasted space, next week.

100-year-old kitchen renovation

Have you ever wished for a double deep cabinet where you could store all the things that you only use once or twice a year? Holiday platters, those appliances that you received as a gift that are so complicated that you’ve never used them, cookbooks you never use? We built one of those cabinets above the new refrigerator space and I LOVE IT!

100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation

Getting new windows was the most fun of all. The windows we took out were original to our 1920 house. I remember every winter morning we would have to take a squeegee to them to get all the excess water off the window. And when the extra-wide trim was added, it really made a beautiful statement. (You can see the before and after window pics in the window seat section below).


Phase 3

  • Complete renovation and tearing the walls down to the studs
  • Replaced sink with a vintage farmhouse sink
  • Replaced garden window with updated window
  • Installed subway tile
  • Added new cabinetry
  • Updated all appliances
  • Tongue and groove ceiling
  • Replaced lighting fixture in the eating area
100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation

We had issues with water damage behind the walls and a lack of proper insulation, and although we never planned for it, we ended up tearing the kitchen down to the studs.

100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation
100-year-old kitchen renovation

The vintage farm sink was our main inspiration for the kitchen. We basically built the rest of the kitchen around it. We went with quartz countertops with a stone speckled color palette for a more beachy feel. White cabinets were installed. And I FINALLY got my dishwasher!

And how beautiful does that window and trim look?

100-year-old kitchen renovation

We wanted a classic and timeless look for our 1920 beach house, and felt that subway tile was the perfect choice.

100-year-old cottage kitchen

Here are some “after ” pics. The island was created from a dresser with a piece of butcher block from a Dunkin Donuts that was going out of business.

My husband and I made the iron pot rack last year.

100-year-old cottage kitchen
100-year-old cottage kitchen

kitchen before picture

Here are the before pictures for our cozy little eating nook. The improvements we made to this area since these pictures were taken were …

  • updated the windows and trim
  • removed the baseboard heater
  • installed tongue and groove to ceiling
  • removed the cabinet to the right and the wall it was on
  • installed hardwood floors
  • installed updated pendant lights
  • painted the walls
  • installed new quartz countertops
  • added open shelving above the window and above counters

Phase 4

  • Built window seating in eating area
before kitchen picture
100-year-old cottage kitchen before picture

You can see the new windows and trim in the picture above, but we still hadn’t addressed the small space for entertaining. No more than 4 people could fit at the table so we decided to add window seating.

100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation
100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation
100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

We installed bead board along the wall for a more cohesive look. As you can see at the time of construction, we hadn’t taken the wall out between the living room and kitchen so we built the seat all the way around the table for a “u” shape.

100 year old cottage kitchen window seat
kitchen window seat

It gave us so much more space for entertaining!

cottage kitchen

Phase 5

  • Tore down the wall separating the living room and kitchen
  • Replaced one kitchen cabinet with open shelving
  • Repainted the walls

Tearing Down the Wall Between the Living Room and Kitchen

kitchen before picture

The cabinet was one of the first things we took out to make a little bit more room in the eating area.

cottage kitchen before

The window seat was already in before we started this phase. We had never even thought about taking the wall out between the living room and the kitchen. So we felt terrible when we had to ask our contractor to tear out part of the window seat.

100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

And the wall is down! Look at all that space.

100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

Finding extra hardwood flooring for this space was quite the challenge.

cottage kitchen looking at the living room view

Here’s the new view from the living room

before picture

Let’s look at this wall project from the other side.

before living room picture
100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

The dry wall is down and look what we found! The original shiplap walls from 100 years ago.

100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation
100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

It was better than I could have ever hoped for.

100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation
100-year-old cottage style kitchen

The final view. Taking this wall down was one of the biggest changes that we made to our home. We have so much more room for entertaining.


100-year-old cottage kitchen renovation

The above picture shows the white cabinet that we had originally installed. We decided to take the cabinet out and replacing it with open shelving.

100-year-old cottage kitchen

Here’s the final view.

100-year-old cottage kitchen
100-year-old cottage kitchen

We lived through a lot of noise, mess, and chaos but I wouldn’t change a thing. We are so in love with our 100-year-old beach house, our “forever” home.


More Before & After Pictures

I hope you enjoyed our 100-year-old kitchen before, after & everything in between. What’s your favorite part of our kitchen? I’ll share the pantry and hallway renovation with you next. Here’s why we fell in love with our 100-year-old beach house.

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Filed Under: Celebrating Our 100-Year-Old Beach House Tagged With: kitchen before and afters, kitchen renovations

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Comments

  1. Diane says

    04/03/2021 at 7:37 am

    What a wonderful study in vision, flexibility and patience. Thanks for all the inspiration!!! Love the outcome!

    Reply
    • Kim says

      04/04/2021 at 9:39 am

      Thank you, Diane! Now that you mention it, we did have to have a lot of patience during one of our remodeling phases. Thank you goodness it’s now just a distant memory.

      Reply
  2. Jeff says

    04/03/2021 at 11:22 am

    Love the before and afters. A blog story on boating the Puget Sound would be fun!

    Reply
    • Kim says

      04/04/2021 at 9:33 am

      That would be fun, and I need to get one posted. Thank you for the feedback.

      Reply
  3. Kathy A says

    04/03/2021 at 6:23 pm

    Loved the before and after pix–especially the fact that you took the pix from similar angles. I hate it when magazines use such a different angle that you can tell it was the same space. I hate my tiny kitchen but am unsure what I would do differently. Your space looks so workable!

    Reply
    • Kim says

      04/04/2021 at 9:30 am

      Thank you, Kathy! I’m the same way. I love seeing the exact angle to compare the view. Thank you for being here.

      Reply
  4. Barbara at Mantel and Table says

    04/04/2021 at 2:10 pm

    Wow – before and afters are so exciting and I agree with you and Kathy – I love seeing them from the same angles. You really had a fabulous vision Kim. It’s so gorgeous now, and totally you!!

    Reply
  5. Carol Karl says

    04/05/2021 at 12:35 pm

    What an amazing transformation. Kitchen renovations take such a long time and are hard, especially if you’re doing the work yourself. Your kitchen is just stunning, as is the rest of your house.

    Reply
  6. Kim Waldorf says

    04/09/2021 at 10:35 am

    What an amazing transformation! I love that you showed us all the stages! What a difference taking down the wall made. You have such a beautiful “forever” home!

    Reply
    • Kim says

      04/09/2021 at 1:28 pm

      Thank you, Kim! I’m so glad you took a look. I agree, taking down that wall was huge!

      Reply

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Hi! I’m Kim! I live in a beach cottage on the PNW’s Puget Sound with my husband and pups, Lucy and Jax. I have a passion for home decor and gardening and can't wait to share life in the PNW with you! Read More…

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