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As you can see, the old kitchen is gone! John Mueller, our remodeler extraordinaire, has completed the demolition of the kitchen and hallway. The electrician has been getting the electrical work in order and everything is being prepped for the cabinet installation. We'll keep you informed of developments as they happen. |
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Our kitchen tear-out is beginning this week! (Don’t worry; it was not the original 1955 kitchen.) Gone will be: * An impossible-to-keep-clean kitchen sink * A glued-down cutting board with a giant crack * A drawer which can’t be opened unless the dishwasher is opened * No counter space between the cooktop and the frig * Double ovens which routinely set off the nearby smoke alarm Stay tuned to see our new retro kitchen! |
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John Mueller, our remodeling contractor and an artist, has been working away on the project. The picture on to the left shows the new tile that is now completely laid. The grout still needs to be applied, which John will do next. That's it for for now. We’ll keep you informed as things develop. |
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We spent the past week painting. The walls and ceiling of the new master bedroom and bath have three coats of fresh paint. What a lot of work! We are deeply grateful to Deb Allstott, from Home Matters in La Grande, for helping us select our colors. She was a sanity saver. Our final choices were Benjamin Moore "Palace White" for the ceiling in both the master bedroom and bath, Benjamin Moore "Somerville Red" for the master bedroom walls, and Miller Paint "Caper Tree" for the master bathroom as well as the original bath. We love the results, and would highly recommend Deb for help with color selection.
Home Matters – Deb Allstott |
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As you can see from the pictures to the left, the future master bath has been stripped to the studs. The top picture is taken from the bedroom into the new bath. The next picture is from the new bath into the bedroom. We are on our way! Our contractor is John Mueller, who is better known as a local La Grande artist. You can see his work and learn more about him at his web site. He does his art work out of Way Point Studio. Fortunately for us, his day job is working as a general contractor doing home remodeling and construction. We went through a lot of contractors before we found one who appreciated our vision of what we wanted the house to become. We are very fortunate to have found John. The bottom picture to the left is huge wasp's nest John found when he pulled down the ceiling. Fortunately it was an old, mostly abandoned nest, and the remaining wasps were sluggish from the cold weather, so it wasn't terribly nasty. As you can see, the nest is huge. It entirely filled in between two rafters. It was most impressive. We added sealing off the holes to the outside where the wasps got in to our to-do list. We've had enough of those critters. So that's where things stand with our mid-century home remodel project. Stay tuned for further details. |
Choosing paint colors for our mid century home has been particularly challenging.
In this video Anne shows our progress in painting the house interior while explaining the particular challenges we faced in selecting our color scheme.
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As we mentioned in our previous post about our master bedroom/bathroom remodel, we are having two new windows installed. One is for the new master bath and will go where there has never been a window. The other will replace the vinyl window in the original bathroom. Both windows face west and are adjacent to each other in the back of our house. Since the original bathroom has a vinyl replacement window, we have no idea what the original bathroom window was like. This left us with no template for our new windows. We had to get creative and design new windows based on the appearance of the original windows we still have. The top picture on the left is of our original kitchen window. One of the things we love about our house is the rather unusual windows which combine a casement window with a fixed sash. We wanted to replicate that look throughout the house. After a lot of thought, we decided to design our own windows based upon the style of the original windows. We did a rough drawing of a casement window with a small fixed pane designed to fit in the rough opening of the original bathroom. We then worked with Versatile Sash to turn our drawing into finished windows, one of which you see at the bottom left. Though there are some minor differences due to changing technologies, the windows are remarkably similar. We are quite pleased. As you can see, Gary has already primed the windows and they are ready to be installed. Once the ice melts that is making it nearly impossible to do anything, we are going to have both of the windows installed. |
It's a challenge trying to explain a remodel project on a blog.
Conveying how we intend to change a space with only words and pictures is quite difficult. We decided to try a different approach. Video.
Though we recognize helping people understanding what we are attempting to accomplish through this video is still confusing, at least it give you a better idea of what we are up to.
We hope you find it interesting.
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We are almost ready to begin remodeling the master bedroom area of our home. The top picture on the left is the current bedroom, and the picture below it is of another bedroom that was converted to a bathroom/utility room by previous owners. We had considered turning the utilitarian bath back into a bedroom, but it was impractical. After all, with all the plumbing and electrical already installed it would be crazy to yank it all out. We decided instead to join the rooms in a master bedroom/bath suite. Where the closet is in the bedroom (top picture) will be a passage way into the master bath. Closets will be on either side of the hallway leading from the bedroom to the bath. On the wall you see in the picture, there will be a stackable washer and dryer next to a built in vanity. The existing window will be removed and replaced by a long narrow fixed pane window higher up. The back wall will have a custom-made new window from Versatile Sash that will go where the blue tape is. Although it is a different shape from the existing windows in our home, we designed it to mimic them in style. We are excited to be working with a couple of very talented people in La Grande. Our contractor is John Mueller who is really an artist but does contracting to pay the bills. We became overwhelmed with the decision making around paint colors, flooring, countertops, and tile and turned to Deb Allstott and her business Home Matters for help with making these choices. Stay tuned as we begin this project early in 2009!. |
 It is interesting how this house really lets us know if something will work.It’s a contemporary house; but the contemporary is 50 years old. We’ve found with furniture that what was contemporary in the 1950’s and 1960’s immediately settles in and feels right.We’re starting to find the same thing with the kitchen. Months ago, when we first bought our house, we drooled over modern kitchens in magazines like Dwell and Natural Home as well as in the IKEA catalog. We considered going that route, but something didn’t feel right. |
 As you can see from the pictures on the left, our hall and bathroom have the original plywood/particleboard painted cabinetry. It’s not a choice everyone would make, but we’ve come to realize the kitchen cabinets need to match.We wondered if it were even possible to have matching cabinets.A trip to Millers Custom Cabinets, a business that has been in La Grande since Anne grew up here in the 1950’s, answered that question. We are now working with Ben, a cabinet maker at Miller’s, to help us return the kitchen cabinets to their original style. Stay tuned as we discuss materials, layout, and color! |
