Kitchen Nightmares: Somerville Edition

When I posted last Monday, I really expected that we would not have tile for a few weeks and that it would be a while before I had pictures of the truly completed kitchen to post.  Then we met with Matt from Payneless Flooring, who had an opening this past Thursday.  He and his crew worked all day Thursday and Friday, and then half the day Saturday, to install our complex tile design.  Now the kitchen is really finished and looking exactly as we envisioned it so many months ago.

Fact is, Anne and I had no idea how difficult our tile would be to install.  It’s handmade tile, all irregular, and it’s thick clay mixed with little stone mosaic tiles which happen to be much thinner than the clay.  There’s the big design above the stove, with all its intricacies, and the field tile/stone layout, which required clipping corners from most of the basic 4×4 field tiles.  I was home on Thursday and got a sense of how much effort they had to put in to make the design look right.

After so many weeks without a kitchen, worrying about how every detail would turn out, it was great that this final bit went so well.  The guys from Payneless did an incredible job, and Matt refused to raise the price despite the job running about a day longer than planned.

Here’s how it all turned out:

Main wall with design above stove

Framed tile design above stove

Desk area

Sink corner

Whole main wall

And that’s it!  That’s how we wanted the kitchen to look.  We’re so happy with the result - tile, cabinetry, counter tops, appliances - everything ended up exactly as we wanted it.  Although… Anne’s not too happy with the paint color on the walls… that might get changed.

We did tile the dry bar too, though because the exact design for the dry bar changed so late in the process, we didn’t have enough tile to cover the whole back of the cabinet.  So it’s a bit incomplete while we wait for the last bit of tile to arrive:

Partially-complete dry bar tile

More of these stone tiles should arrive next week, at which point they’ll be cemented to the wall and grouted.  And then we’ll really be done…

Uncategorized after, design, dry bar, tile

After 10 epic weeks without a kitchen, we finally got to move our stuff back in this past weekend.  The floor was refinished on Friday and the whole room got a cleaning on Saturday afternoon, after which Anne and I went into an unpacking frenzy.  By Sunday night we were ready for our first meal at home!  But there are still a few final details to finish up…

It’s been over a week since I posted so I’ll fill in the gaps.  Despite protective efforts, the kitchen floor looked pretty bad by the end.  George had planned to have it buffed and coated with polyurethane after all of the major construction was done.  Friday night the fumes were awful so we were happy to get out of the house for an amazing dinner at Salts.  Of course, Clyde managed to run briefly into the kitchen while the finish was still wet, so now we have startled kitty streaks right inside the doorway.  Tomorrow there will be another coat, hopefully fewer kitty streaks, and some fresh fumes.

Shiny floor

The dry bar has glass shelves, wood-and-glass doors, and LED lighting.  It’s looking pretty good but still needs a few last details, like stoppers to keep the doors from folding into the cabinet.

Dry bar cabinet with doors and shelves

LED light strips inside dry bar cabinet

A cleaning crew spent two hours on Saturday vacuuming, dusting, and scrubbing every surface in the kitchen.  By 5pm we were able to pull boxes from the basement and start putting stuff away.  By 10pm we were exhausted.

Sunday it was time to remove the thick layer of construction dust from all of the glassware in the dining room.  By mid-afternoon we were slouched in the living room watching High School Musical 2 on ABC Family.  But then… it was time for the first meal: Trader Joe’s carne asada, rice, refried beans, and tortillas.  Not as gourmet as some of Anne’s past creations, but most of those didn’t follow two days of lifting and cleaning.

Yay!

Still, there are some things left: the vent to outside, some crown molding, details on the dry bar, a mountain of trash in the back yard.  Plus we’ve got a new project.  Our hot water heater has decided to die a slow and leaky death while we wrap up the kitchen work.  Anyone know anything about on-demand water heaters?

Uncategorized after, carne asada, dry bar, floor, trim

In the waning days of this project, I have to admit that it’s harder to get excited about blogging every night, or even every other night.  There are just so many little details that progress isn’t that dramatic day-to-day.  I look forward to finally posting some before and after comparisons once we’re completely finished.  For now, just a few updates.

The dry bar’s getting all trimmed after being wired for electricity the other day.

Dry bar trim making it look more like a built-in

Soon there will doors and lighting, and then paint, and then shelving.  Removing the old trim as well as part of the chair rail and baseboards has exposed some really ancient plaster.  Nasty stuff.

The last electrical work in the kitchen was finished.  A couple more under-cabinet fixtures, plus dishwasher and oven hookup.  The blower fan is in place but still not hooked up to the vent.

Anne and I went over to the office building where our company is moving this weekend.  It looks nice, but it also looks like there’s still a ton to do before we can move in and start working.  I feel the same way about the kitchen.  Both projects should be done by the end of the week, but it’s hard to see how that will happen.  Oh well, that’s for the professionals to figure out.

Tonight we ate at The Independent in Union Square.  It’s one place that’s never crowded, to the point that we sometimes wonder how they stay in business.  But the food is great, and the beer list is extensive.  At least you know you can always get a table.

Uncategorized dry bar, electrical, lighting, trim

It’s already Sunday and I haven’t posted anything about Thursday and Friday’s progress.  Whoops… On Thursday, the last pieces of soapstone were delivered and installed, and the first coat of mineral oil was applied to help them oxidize consistently.  As a result, they look much darker than before.

Darkened segment of countertop

Darkened top of laptop station

On Friday, the faucet was installed, one of the first really final finishing touches to be done.  It’s stainless steel, like all of the appliances and most of the other decorative accents.

Decorative faucet and matching sprayer

Also on Friday, the insert and part of the blower fan were installed in the vent hood.  It’s not too interesting to look at, so I won’t post any pictures.  It’s yet another appliance to be installed though.  This week it’ll be hooked up to the vent duct, which will also be cut and capped off outside.

A lot of work was done last week on the crown molding around the top of the room.  I’ll post pictures of that when more of it is done, there’s not too much to look at right now.  Most of the finishing boards around the bottom, underneath the lower cabinets, are done as well.

The last thing to report on is the dry bar: the frame that was sitting in the middle of the dining room in my last post has moved into the space and had its countertop installed.

Dry bar frame and countertop

Next steps will include removal of the existing trim, installation of new trim to cover the frame, electrical work to support the wine fridge, lighting, and an internal electrical outlet, and addition of glass doors.  The goal is to use very low-wattage LED lighting in the dry bar; we would have used it more throughout the kitchen, but complications and misunderstandings about what it requires made it impossible.  Specifically, you can’t get LEDs which run on line voltage.  Instead, you need to install large transformers to lower the voltage between the main electrical wiring and the LED fixtures.  The transformers need to be planned for before wiring.  Since we didn’t know that up front, we couldn’t plan ahead.

Work continues tomorrow despite the holiday.  Plumbing work will be completed and finish electrical work will begin.  All of the new wiring will get routed to the panel downstairs, outlets and switches will be installed, and the pendant lamp will be hung.  It’s conceivable that we would have a functional kitchen by the end of the week, but there’s still a lot to do and I’m not getting my hopes up.  Still, we are very close.  It’s hard not to be really impatient.

Uncategorized cabinets, countertop, dry bar, lighting, plumbing

Tonight we got our first look at Anne’s new Wolf cooktop.  It’s pretty impressive-looking:

Hungry like the Wolf

Obviously it’s not completely installed or even unwrapped, but it’s getting close.  The big accent posts are in place in the front there as well.

Also today, the guys from Matrix Stone came to make the countertop template.  That means we should have it installed Monday or Tuesday of next week, assuming everything goes as planned between now and then.  That’s a nice change from February 16.

In the loose ends department, the faucet and pendant lamp we ordered over the weekend both arrived today, in plenty of time for finish plumbing and electrical work.

As I mentioned yesterday, we’ve got a little side project in the dining room.  There’s always been a closet space in that room, with no real purpose or use.  We hung a glass rack in there when we first moved in and used it to store some of our wine glasses.  Later, our wine fridge moved loosely into the space.  We always wanted it finished off, but we weren’t sure how.  Finally, with this project, we decided that we needed to come up with a plan and have the work done along with the kitchen.

Here’s what it looks like now:

Dining room closet space. The blue tape is markup for the electrician when he installs outlets and lighting.

We always thought it should be turned into one of those nice built-ins that are in a lot of New England homes, where people store their nice glassware or china, if they have nice glassware or china.  Anne and I wanted to use it for a sort of dry bar, where we could put glasses and other equipment for making cocktails.  The wine fridge would be more formally integrated, like an under-counter installation in a kitchen.

George drew up a plan which places a glass-door cabinet on top and boxes in the whole space, including the wine fridge.  It will have a small soapstone countertop to match the kitchen, but otherwise it will be painted to match the trim in the dining room.  The upper cabinet will have glass shelves and lighting at the top.  I think it will end up looking pretty nice.  It all should be installed in the next week or so.  I’ll post pictures when it happens.

Uncategorized countertop, dry bar, stove