Owens Corning
Remodeling Strategies for the Kitchen
We're not gourmet cooks by any stretch of the imagination, but our kitchen has always been the most used room in our house. When we remodel a kitchen, the operative words are easy to use and easy to clean. We want a floorplan that makes traffic between appliances and the sink and eating area flow easily. It should have plenty of work surface for fixing things, good lighting for reading the paper, and storage areas to tuck away utensils and cookware.

Working on some of our first kitchens back in the early 1970s we never considered hiring anyone to help us. We tackled everything. We gutted the kitchen, rearranged the walls, did the necessary plumbing and electric work, installed new cabinets, flooring and of course, hung new wallpaper and painted the trim. Most of these projects turned out well and the experience was invaluable, but today we do it differently when we have a kitchen to remodel. Except for a strictly cosmetic makeover, we farm out some of the work to subcontractors.

Our Most Recent Kitchen Work

The work we recently completed on our current kitchen is a good example. A pass-through between the kitchen and dining room looks fine in a contemporary home but it's hardly appropriate in an 1870s Victorian. We closed off an 6 ft. wide by 4 ft. high opening with a counter of gold and olive green ceramic tile shelf fronted with an oak bullnoze. This opening was closed off by reframing the opening with studs and then covering the studs with drywall.

Next, we worked on the oak door fronts on the cabinets that were in bad shape. The cabinet frames were all right, but the finish on the door fronts had worn thin and even completely through in places. The wood was streaked and stained with water marks, especially in the base cabinet under the sink and the cabinet near the dishwasher. After several hours of sanding, and 4 coats of tung oil, the oak was rejuvenated to its natural good looks.

To get the kitchen up and running, we only had to purchase one new appliance, a refrigerator. We chose a 32-in. wide model to fit on the wall where the former owner's had been. The electric oven, gas range, and dishwasher were in workable order but required a thorough check-up and cleaning.

We spent the better part of a day refurbishing a charming old wood burning stove that sits in the center on the back wall. Before the house had central heat, this stove was the only heat in the rear of the house. Obviously a focal point then, we think it's a charmer today and decided to keep it. We replaced the stove pipe, painted the stove, and sealed all joints with stove cement.

We spent several days working on what the room really needed - a washdown of the walls, woodwork, and ceilings. We removed the old wallpaper and patched the walls where it was needed and primed them with a wall sizing. We patched and painted the woodwork and ceiling in a white enamel and then watched a professional hang a new washable wallcovering that feature rows of tiny taupe and grey sheep. That transformed the room, but the most dramatic change came when we laid a striking new white and grey vinyl sheet floor, which replaced a worn and weary dark green-grey linoleum.

We did not begin working on the kitchen until we lived in the house for about 6 months. The time gave us a chance to decide what worked for us and what we wanted to change. We also had plenty of time to change our minds, especially debating the choice of wallcoverings and flooring.

Work We Do Ourselves - Restore Instead of Replace

In our remodeling projects, one kind of work we do ourselves is small electrical jobs like relocating an outlet or rerouting existing wiring to appliances. We'd spend time crawling up in the attic to find an accessible opening for wires to a new range hood. If a Jenne-air was being installed, we'd carve out the space to run the vent ducts. We don't like to pay a skilled worker to do work that we can do ourselves. That includes demolition and clean-up.

In two of the 1920s bungalows that we owned, we were fortunate to find a maple floor buried beneath layers of old linoleum and vinyl flooring. We'd provide the grunt work of scraping and hauling away the old flooring and then hire a floor sander to sand away the old finish. Then we'd apply the stain and a couple of coats of polyurethane varnish or use a penetrating oil finish. Today, we are more careful about what we tear into, because old flooring can be a source of hazardous materials. To be on the safe side, we would hire a professional.

If the existing cabinets were a good quality wood or metal, we'd prefer to refinish or paint them instead of buying new ones. This is not an easy job, particularly when removing them from the wall isn't practical.

We got the best looking finish when we took the time to sand and fill all the surfaces before painting. We also found that an alkyd semi-gloss enamel laced with a couple of ounces of Penetrol per quart gave us the best finish.

Replacing hardware is always a quick facelift for old cabinets. Sometimes we have to do some serious shopping to find new hardware to match the existing holes already in the door. The old holes could be patched and painted over but the patch would show if we finished the cabinets with a clear, natural finish.

When it comes to appliances, we'd opt to buy new unless the old ones were the correct size needed and in sound working order. In one kitchen we had a perfectly good 42-in. gas double oven range. We swapped it for a new 30-in. gas range because that extra 12 in. gave us room for much needed cabinet and countertop space.

How We Work with Subcontractors

Before we begin any remodeling job, we prepare a list of all the work that we want completed either by us or subcontractors. That does two things. It gives us a gameplan to follow scheduling the work and it helps pinpoint what we want done if we're hiring a subcontractor. We found most subs were agreeable to doing segments of our project if we had it laid out and we all knew what was expected of each other.

For electrical work, we'd hire an electrician to bring in new circuits and to wire up new appliances. We'd spell out what part of the job we'd be responsible for like locating all the new openings on the walls, floor, and ceiling.

We'd work in the same way with a plumber. We'd get the work area ready and then let him install the drain, vent, and supply pipes. Sometimes we'd purchase the fixtures and appliances from the plumber because they gave us a better price, at other times we could do better on our own at special sales.

For new cabinets, we'd get an estimate for their installation before deciding if we'd hang them or have it done. If the installation was a tight squeeze or require, special carpentry skills and tools, we'd opt to have an installer.

We'd handle installing new countertops if it was a straightforward replacement, but if the material was high-end material like Corian or had a bullnozed detail we'd call in a pro. Over the years we've learned to seriously consider the cost of the material before deciding if we'd do an installation ourselves or hire a contractor. One mistake cutting expensive laminate quickly offsets any money saved by doing-it-yourself.

Installing a kitchen floor is the kind of project that we often do ourselves. Years ago we used 12-in. tiles, but today we'd more likely lay down seamless vinyl sheet flooring because they're designed to be installed by do-it-yourselfers. Laying a new floor isn't the challenge that it used to be. We've learned to always remove the appliances before laying the floor so the new floor completely covers the floor area. This is a preventive measure, because years later we didn't want to have to replace an appliance and find the floor tiles came up short.

Written by the editors of HouseNet
Copyright HouseNet, Inc.

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