Monday 12 September 2016

How We Got A Fancy New Kitchen On A Tiny Budget

When I bought this house eight years ago I, like most first time buyers, stretched myself financially in order to do so. As a result, doing anything to it beyond painting a few walls was out of the question, so I resigned myself to living with a kitchen I hated. From the grey laminate worktops to the torn lino floor and cheap metal sink, this was no-one's idea of a dream kitchen.

So how did it go from this...
... to this?  Read on...
1. Don't try and do it all at once. We just didn't have the funds to do all of the work at the same time, so we prioritised. First up, two years ago, we replaced the horrible lino with slate-effect tiles and, at the same time, repainted the walls, added chalkboard paint to the door, made new blinds and put up some shelves: all small changes and cheap, too, but they made the room much more liveable while we saved for phase two.

2. Ask yourself: do I need a whole new kitchen? The cost of new units was prohibitive but we realised that replacing the whole kitchen wasn't actually necessary. By replacing just the worktops and sink, the whole kitchen has been revitalised. If you want a more drastic makeover, you can replace cupboard doors, paint the existing doors, or - as I did when I first moved in - just replace the handles. Think, also, about using open storage: our shelves, teamed with a wall-mounted pan rack, mean that the majority of our pots, plates and dry goods are out on display and easy to access, leaving the limited cupboard space for the ingredients and equipment we use the least.

3. Can you keep any existing appliances to save cash? I love the original 60s freestanding oven and hob that was in the house when I bought it, so there was no need to buy a new one: having new worktop & tile surrounding it is enough to completely change the look. Likewise, our existing fridge-freezer & washing machine are both still going strong and, as we weren't redesigning the layout, could stay put and save us £100s. 

4. Do it yourself and, where you can't, utilise the expertise friends & family. We were incredibly lucky to have my good friend Abby on board to help us out with this makeover. Abby is a PE teacher by trade but has done three house renovation projects of her own and absolutely loves big DIY jobs (weird, I know). She was more than happy to give up some of her time - paid, of course, but at mates rates rather than full market price - to do the jobs we couldn't manage, like... well, pretty much everything! Abby installed the worktops and the sink and also did the tiling (although I got her to teach me how to tile so that, come the next project, I can have a crack at it myself).

5. Know where to find a bargain. Abby's advice was once again invaluable for us: because she's done so many renovations, she knows where to source affordable yet good quality materials. She pointed me in the direction of Wickes for our worktops where, thanks to a discount event, two 3m lengths of solid beech worktop set us back just £130, and Homebase, who had the white metro tiles we wanted on special offer. Do you know someone in the building trade who can give you tips on where to find what you need at a good price, or have any friends or family recently completed a big project? If so: ask them where to shop.

6. If in doubt, chuck it in a jar. Finally, open shelving may be a cheap storage solution but if that's where most of your dry goods are kept, it could easily look messy. I spent £25 on glass jars in Ikea, bought a labelmaker from eBay, and hey presto! We have well organised, neat rows of food instead of half empty packets shoved into the back of a cupboard. Although I have to say that making labels for lentils, roiboos tea and udon noodles is about the most middle class thing I've ever done.
We spent just over £500 on this second phase of the makeover, which included all materials - worktops, new sink and mixer tap, tiles, shelving timber, brackets, and jars - plus labour. And the result is nothing short of amazing, turning a dingy space into one of my favourite rooms in the house: light, bright, airy and modern.

Details:
* Beech workstops: Wickes
* Reginox ceramic sink: Amazon * Mixer tap: Amazon
* Shelving timber & brackets: B&Q * Korken jars: IKEA
* Orla Kiely coffee jar: Douwe Egbert's Ltd edition *
* Freda white leaf jars: Habitat * Utensil rail with hooks: IKEA *
* Screw The Patriarchy print: Redbubble *
* Quotation chopping board: handmade by Abby *

33 comments:

  1. Looks ace - I love that chopping board! Btw where's your spaghetti jar from? I've been searching for one and IKEA shockingly had none last time I went! x

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    1. Thanks! The spaghetti jar is IKEA too- hadn't seen the huge ones before but I found one in the Leeds store.

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  2. Nice I Capture the Castle chopping board. Are you going to start doing nude communing with nature and write a James Joyce like book now?

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    1. Almost certainly to the first, very possibly to the second ;)

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  3. First of all, I love that cutting board. Second of all, I love your kitchen. It looks so beautiful. I hate mine and now I am thinking maybe I can update it without spending a fortune.

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    1. Isn't it amazing? And I'm not even sure how Abby knew or remembered how much I love that book and that quote particularly, it was such a nice surprise!

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  4. Love it! And really great tips. Well done with the transformation :) B x

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  5. You have yards of countertop! I love the sink and the anti-patriarchy print (so appropriate in a kitchen!)

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    1. hehe, I tell Thomas the print is there to remind him why he's the one doing all the cleaning and washing up - he's helping to smash the patriarchy!

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  6. I love a good make over post, especially a kitchen one! Your kitchen is lovely and well done for making it so on a budget.
    Im with you on the put everything in a jar. I started doing so after I had an incident with flour mites (yuck!) and I love it! I am very tempted to buy a label maker now. x

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    1. Oh yuck, very happy we moved all our flour into jars now. And do it! I love mine, it's quite addictive making labels. If Missy sits still too long she may find herself labelled.

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  7. Awesome job! and better yet, who doesn't enjoy doing it on a budget! I find doing something great while saving money is far more satisfying than just buying everything you can.

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    1. Oh god yes, I get really braggy about bargains too (hence this entire post I suppose!)

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  8. Wow, absolutely inspiring that you got such a dramatic and lovely result on a budget! Looks amazing, love all of the personal touches, they really make it homey! xo

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    1. I see such beautiful minimalist kitchens on other blogs but I am very much NOT a minimalist myself, I like to fill every room, including the kitchen, with personal touches, aka loads of stuff!

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  9. Totally jealous of your eye level gas grill - was reminiscing with my Dad about how the best toast (and cheese on toast) were made on these cookers

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    1. I LOVE it, will be devastated if and when it breaks (although these old appliances are so reliable hopefully it won't happen any time soon). Thomas, though, hates it - he's 6'4" so it's very much not eye-level for him!

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  10. Gorgeous! I think I'll have to go find those countertops.

    You'll have to let me in on your secrets of jar storage, though. I've tried it but never seemed to find ones the right size, so I still wound up with 3/4 empty bags of rice, flour, sugar, etc.

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    1. I realised recently that the key to jars is buying the ones that look laughably huge when they're empty in the shop! After years of buying the standard 1L size from IKEA and having that exact issue with half-empty packets, on my recent trip I bought the 2L size and they're exactly right.

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  11. Janet this is gorgeous, I always love seeing corners of your home your stye & attention to detail is incredible!
    -E x

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    1. Thank you! One of my favourite things about reading blogs is getting peeks into people's homes so I am always more than happy to share my own space.

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  12. I love this! I've just started a similar thing with our kitchen, and now I've added a new sink and worktops to the list (I won't tell my husband it's your fault the list just got bigger).
    It looks so different - and fabulous!
    I've been pondering wooden worktops - how do you find them. My husband is messy and not fond of using chopping boards so I think they might be a bad idea for us...

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    1. Thanks :) I had similar concerns - Thomas is not the neatest person in the kitchen and I was worried about damage to the worktops from spills, etc. But the beauty of wooden worktops is that if anything disastrous happens you can sand them back down. We had a bit of an issue with the rubber feet of our laptops leaving marks but we were able to just sand that spot and they're flawless again. It also helps that they were so cheap! If they'd cost the same as some I'd seen, I'd be a lot more paranoid.

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    2. I hadn't thought about sanding them! Of course - what a wally. It's given me something to think about. Thanks :)

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  13. Ah Janet, it truly looks amazing! You have done so well and these are brilliant tips. Please remind me of this post when I bought a home next year and are bemoaning my grotty kitchen!!
    I LOVE the Chopping board. You have an 'I capture the castle' chopping board!!!!??!?!???!?!?x

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    1. I will! And If I've learnt anything, it's don't put off doing a project for SEVEN years because that will be seven years of hating part of your home.

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  14. It looks amazing Janet, so warm and inviting! I love the open shelving. I always love the snapshots of your home. It took us 7 months to do the kitchen and still now, it's not quite finished, needs a bit of livening up.

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    1. I'm so into open shelving at the moment, pretty much every room in our house, if there's an empty wall, we're like "put a shelf up!"

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  15. This is amazing! A total transformation. Given me lots of ideas as I think we need to do our kitchen soon. I know we won't be able to do it as on budget thanks to a stupid tiny built in oven (about to conk out any day) which means things have to be ripped out. But I'm definitely going to investigate those worktops. I love the open shelving - out of interest do you find you have to wipe stuff down more often if it's out rather than in a cupboard? That might just be me me revealing my slovenly ways there!

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    1. Err, this will expose MY slovenly ways because after 7 years in this house I only last week wiped down the inside of my cupboards. I know, I'm gross. So in the sense that we wipe the shelves and jars down every few weeks, yes we do have to do it more, but it takes a few minutes at most (and anyway, dusting and wiping is one of Thomas's jobs, haha!)

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  16. Your kitchen looks fab! I can't wait to get started putting our own stamp on our new house!

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    1. My one piece of advice would be to do as much as you can afford right at the start: I really regret living with a kitchen I detested for so long, but once I'd been here a while I sort of got used to it and just put up with it. I wish I'd bitten the bullet while I was first redecorating the house and at least painted & refloored the kitchen. But hey, hindsight is a wonderful thing!

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