Before and After: Make a Small Kitchen Look Bigger

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Would you buy a house with a kitchen like this?

With keys in hand, one day later the location of the previous kitchen was now a blank slate.

Well before I bought the home the plan was always to make the small kitchen bigger. Here are the elevation mockups we drew during our planning phase.

In the end it not only did we make a small kitchen look bigger, but it is more functional and beautiful too!

The money shot of the final brand new kitchen: new joists, subfloor, drywall, electrical, plumbing, tile, cabinets, countertop, backsplash, appliances, window, and lighting.

The original kitchen had a few things wrong.

1. It was way too small.
2. It had way too much wasted space.

The only thing going for the kitchen was that it was located in the house I wanted to buy.

My husband, brother-in-law and I started gutting it on the first day. Unfortunately, we saw what we were in for only after demo began.

We relocated kitchen to the carport before passing it on to the dump.

The new temporary location of the old kitchen.

We quickly uncovered rotten subfloor, joists, exterior foundation work. Everything else we already expected to replace.

On top of all the old disjointed cabinets and countertops, the old layout had to go. The refrigerator should not be an afterthought, keeping an entire corner of the room off limits. The range should not be a one way ticket to the emergency room. You can see it is already “expanded” with the bank of drawers on one side and a small drawer and cabinet combo on the other side at some previous date!

In all reality, we did not increase the size of the room. The new layout also did not expand past what was already in use or unusable before. If anything, the new workspace of the kitchen is smaller by integrating the refrigerator into the L-shape. We replaced the unusable space in front of the big window and the corner by the sink with cabinets. More storage was added over the refrigerator and range. In addition, the new layout includes a built-in microwave (can you imagine a countertop microwave taking up the already limited space in the old kitchen?). By choosing a large format tile instead of a smaller tile, the flooring also helps give an optical illusion the space is larger.

A better use of the space is one way to make a small kitchen look bigger!

In general, you can always use smaller enhancements like mirrored backsplashes, keeping your counters clear, using different color choices to make a small kitchen look bigger. However, this kitchen was crying out for a total redo! The clear solution inside the room was to clean up the layout, increase the amount of cabinets, and open up the wall as much as possible between the kitchen and living room. Everything else is just eye candy to help the larger effort.

We also upgraded all the materials so the kitchen is now a place you WANT to use. Some of the upgrades included nicer cabinets, large format tile instead of laminate flooring, a granite countertop instead of tile laminate flooring (you read that right), a built-in microwave along with stainless appliances, and granite thresholds.

Lessons learned when you make a small kitchen look bigger:

We cut our teeth on this kitchen. There were so many first experiences: gutting a room, discovering missing house parts, recreating a tileable floor, tiling the floor, running electrical, hanging drywall, taping and floating drywall, installing new cabinetry, building a semi pre-built tile granite countertop, installing new plumbing and light fixtures. Pretty much everything was a first!

A poorly placed window does not have to stay.

This is a scary one. By removing a window you know you are headed into exterior work too! So not only are you reframing and drywalling over it, you also have to commit to figuring out how to fix the exterior.

In my case I knew I was going to have a second phase where the outside vinyl siding and all windows were getting replaced within a year. So a few layers of well secured tar paper were the solution for a year.

Despite my nerves–it was after all my first remodel ever–it was by far the most influential part of the remodel. This one change totally transformed the new layout of the kitchen allowing it to fill in the entire wall. By making drastic changes like this you have so many more options for an improved (and much needed) layout. A better use of space is one way to make a smaller kitchen look bigger! Now the layout works for a modern family.

Open up the space as much as you can.

The kitchen had one small doorway from the kitchen to the rest of the house. We were unable to open up the entire wall to the living room, but anything we could do was an improvement. I knew a family with two small children was going to live here. You can easily envision the following scenario. Mom is cooking and you don’t want the kiddos underfoot. However, you still want to keep an eye on them in the next room. Or you may at some point have a party and want to be a part of it instead of cutting yourself off from everyone in the next room. With the old little doorway you are very limited with your line of sight and interaction.

While we missed the natural light from the window we removed, opening up another pathway into the living space helped. The new opening allowed more light to pour through the front of the house into the kitchen.

Cabinet options

Another recommendation to make a small kitchen look bigger is to have a light color palette. At the time I was a newbie homeowner and looked at the off-the-shelf selection at the big box home improvement stores. At the time the options were white, orange-y oak, and this pretty dark brown. I really didn’t like the look and feel of the white option. It felt cheap. That left the very dark shade of brown.

The other consideration to keep in mind is this is a rental home with a young family. The dark color option hides more fingerprints, dense, and scratches then any of the other options. Orange-y oak is forgiving as well but you will not find that color in many before and after remodel comparison.*

Likewise, you could break up the space with clear and translucent glass integrated in the upper cabinet doors. It would look amazing, especially considering I pre-wired the cabinets for under cabinet lighting which could support back lighting inside the cabinets themselves. However, at some point you have to stop the bleeding and call the project done.

Likewise, open shelving is another optical illusion creating space. Maybe it just me, but the current contents in my kitchen are not showroom ready. I’m not going to replace what I have with something super nice until my newborn is grown. Second, I don’t dust as often as I should. I’m not pushing that agenda on anyone else. So no open shelving for me in the near future. However, I did opt for a half wine cabinet…

Lay tile all at the same time

Do not tile in phases. I started tiling one day and finished tiling the room the next day. I have one grout line that is just a little wider than the rest. It is maddening. Unfortunately, once I discovered it, it was too late to do anything about it.

Clean the edges of the tile during installation.

Do not let mortar get on the edges of the tile during installation. If you do and the grout is a different color you will see the mortar in the grout line.

I spent hours with a hammer and chisel fixing this mistake. Those are hours that could have spent moving forward putting grout in between the spaces I was “cleaning”. Sigh.

Put in a stunning backsplash.

The neat part about the diamonds is that it is the theme for the house. The pattern is also found in the bathroom backsplash as well as in the laundry room floor.

Over time I have realized while it is well thought out it needs to be a little more neutral for selling purposes. It is too taste specific. I might tear out the kitchen backsplash before I sell the house.

Fancy thresholds

If you look hard you can spot this subtle upgrade in the pictures shown above. When my dad and I put in the Hardibacker and I installed the tile there was a big difference between the height of the kitchen floor and the living room floor. Some sort of threshold was necessary to make the transition smooth.

Fabricating the granite threshold was my answer to this problem. The handmade granite thresholds are made from the same granite as the countertop and diamonds in the backsplash, tying the room together.

This was another first time, think outside the box idea that went very well.

Learn on a local job site.

See the previous points on laying tile. Those were hours I could have spent on a project and not wasted. Read: I know for certain all my mistakes took hours that ended up costing another plane ticket and another weekend of insane work. Learn and plan ahead as much as you can before making your rookie mistakes far away from home.

*Right now we are exploring nicer higher end cabinets that are not too much more expensive than off the shelf pre-built cabinets. You know a follow on post will be happening!

Of other note, this blog is celebrating its one-year anniversary tomorrow. How is it possible to have a DIY blog without any before and after blog posts? Problem solved! I hope you enjoyed the first of many.