South Stuy Reno

Yeah, this kitchen looks a whole lot like the other two tenant kitchens, but the big difference is that this is the first one we did ourselves top to bottom. Although I assisted by building the cabinets, sanding and painting, this was T’s baby–and he did most of the work himself.

Because the space was originally a closet, we had to blow out the walls to create an alcove. I started off tearing down the falling plaster ceiling, but the 100+ years of dust and various dead, dried-out bugs and bug shells got the best of me, so T finished. We put up sheetrock and fashioned a basic square medallion from plywood for the lighting fixture. T then demo’d the floor down to the subfloor and put down concrete board for tile. He laid the tile, built the island for the stove from scratch, installed the sink and stove, connected the plumbing and gas, cut and installed the counter tops, hung the cabinets, etc.

Laying and grouting the tile

We ran out of black tile so had to improvise with a row of white–which is hidden from the world now that the cabinets are in.

We built out a partition to house the small stove and to provide a bit more counter space.

Hey–it’s thirsty work.

Yes, it’s small but highly functional. We have been living in this apartment for the last 6 months and have added all kinds of handy Ikea organizers. We also fashioned some left-over butcherblock countertop into a cutting board that fits neatly over the stove to provide even more surface for food prep, necessity being the mother of invention.