Should my kitchen flow with adjoining rooms?

12 years ago

Hi, I'm new to this site, my friend just told me about you and I'm so glad she did!!

My kitchen is in the middle of my house with 3 entrances. My living room and dinning room are traditional with French provintial furniture, antiques, oriental rugs and oak floors, the colors are mostly gold and wine. The den is contemporary and is in the earth tones, with ivory carpeting, and a tan couch. The kitchen has a single skylight, which makes it bright, I now have oak cabinets, I'm replacing the doors and having the rest painted antique white. My appliances are SS. I'm changing the floor and hope to use bamboo in a natural color. The problem is the countertop, I thought I had decided on Giallo Veneziano, after deciding I didn't want to go with New Venetian Gold. I love Blue Pearl, DH doesn't care what I do, as long as I don't ask him his opinion. I'm afraid the blue pearl will make the kitchen not flow with the rest of my house, should this be a concern? If I go with GV I was going to paint the walls a similar color to the den, or try to find something in between the den and dinning room. Another issue is my kitchen table which is light oak with white tiles in it I think it will look fine with GV, but I don't think it will go with the BP which in my eyes needs a glass table with black seats, my Mikasa every day china will go better with the GV too, which I often use for company in the dinning room since I purchased service for 20. I really think I should go with the GV or something similar to that since this will go better with the rest of my house, but I don't want to regret not getting BP.

We bought this house a couple of weeks before the market started to drop 5 1/2 years ago. When we looked at it, the one complaint I had was the kitchen countertops, I hated formica, and leaving my granite kitchen in my old house behind.

Any help you can offer me if you think the kitche should flow with the adjoining rooms will be appreciated. My thought are they should, do you agree? I would also appreciate any suggestions/pictures of back splashes you used with these granite colors and antique white cabinets.

Do you like the idea of bamboo for the floor? I was afraid of using oak since new oak floors won't match the old oak floors already in my house, and since I do love hard wood floors figured strand bamboo would probably be a good choice.

Thanks in advance for you help!

Ileene

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Comments (5)

InfoDiva1
12 years ago
I have no opinion on the granite, but I can tell you that I just had new oak flooring (sanded and finished on site) installed in my kitchen and it matches our old oak perfectly. We too have a kitchen that has three openings to the rest of the house--front hall, dining room, and family room--and the oak ties it all together. Talk to a good floor man before you settle on that bamboo.

Can you post pics? It sounds like you have a lot of styles going on.
User
12 years ago
Continuity in a home's decor that is consistent with at least some of it's architectural style does help a home feel more pulled together and thought out as a whole. A quilt of related choices that produces harmony all together.

However, your description of your home's existing decor says that continuity isn't as important to you as is choosing variation in your decor. A crazy quilt of many different colors and patterns, can work too, if there's enough color and pattern and variation when viewed from a distance.

You need to decide on you home's overall direction before you can choose a direction for your kitchen. IF you want to treat each room as it's own entity, then you certainly can do fire engine red slab cabinet doors with stainless counters----as long as your kitchen isn't open to the rest of the home.

However, if you take that road, be sure that you will be living in the home long enough (10+ years) that you will not be penalized on your choices at resale. Home shoppers are way conservative and lack the ability to imagine the home in any other decor other than your own.

So, if resale any time is a concern, you might want to address the home's decor as a whole rather than individual parts. Individual parts do not always come together well in a quilt, and sometimes you have to step back and look at the whole picture when making choices for the entire home, not just the kitchen. Too many directions in a home's decor can look "ecclectic" if mixed well in every room in the house, or it can look schizophrenic if done hodge podge and poorly.
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fran1523
12 years ago
I think you will be happier if it does!
User
12 years ago
If you want it to feel like one house rather than 3-4 separate additions under one roof, then all of your decor choices should relate to each other in some manner, and they should also relate in some way to the house. Faux Tuscan American looks as equally ridiculous in a center hall Colonial as Early American looks in a downtown concrete and steel loft.
joaniepoanie
12 years ago
Hollysprings...I agree with you in theory, but I live in a DC suburb....just about EVERY house here is colonial which would mean sticking to traditional furnishings which I do not like. I like modern, so my house inside definitely reads more modern than traditional. I just put natural maple slab door cabinets in my kitchen with very modern, minimalist pulls. My only "nod" to colonial would be the four panel doors. There is no way I could have done anything else and been happy. I would love a modern exterior, but there are almost no modern homes here unless they are custom. Likewise, my neighbor is Korean and her furnishings are predominantly oriental. Oh, if only we could all build our dream homes inside and out...