apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I love it...I have a passion for cooking as well and my friends most hang out in the kitchen too, but my kitchen is nothing close to yours... this is just beautifulllll

I hope this got entered into the smallest coolest kitchen as well.


LOVE IT!

I agree with the above.. you definitely should've entered the kitchen contest. That is the exact green color that I've been lusting over for MY Kitchen. Your space is so colorful, cute and cozy (3 Cs!!) without compromising functionality. I so dig this!

I don't think I've ever seen an apartment this size where someone managed to carve out a space to eat in the kitchen with a window seat and mini-garden and also find room for a dining room. Great use of space!

I love it! It looks so inviting and livable. One of my favorites, so far.

I love the kitchen, but any time I see red and yellow as the main colors in a space, I automatically associate it with McDonald's. :(

Love the colors and the flow of the space. Well done.

Very cozy space. Great little kitchen. The smaller upper cabinets were such a great idea. So many people go with standard 40ish" upper cabinets in small kitchens and they just dominate the whole scene. Your's are proportionate to the size of your kitchen and you can show off that brick.

I love the fact that you have a separate dining area.

Rich and eclectic. I love that so many kithcen spaces incorporate greenery into the design concept. Plants make a space feel so fresh and inviting.
One of my favs thus far!

Wow. Love the bistro seating and the fact that the kitchen looks functional despite being tiny.

Wow! Adorable and cozy! LOVE the green wainscoting in the kitchen, this space is an inspiration! I hope you make it to the finals so we can see more pics!

Well, I'm glad I've finally figured out how to hang plants in my window and hide the street outside!! What a great idea....can I ask what your using to hold them up?

Love the living room too....

I lived in Boston for years and I was always able to find wonderful apartments, that were affordable and had a lot of character. Don't miss the city but miss the spaces.

Anyway, this is the winner. So much personality, it looks livable and comfortable. Well thought out and the use of space in the kitchen is right on.

I love it! I want to move in.

This is great -- love the kitchen, love the colors, love the breakfast nook -- what a wonderful place for living and entertaining. While not "my taste" per se -- I could plop right down and live there quite happily -- a true testament to a job well done!!!

This is amazing - I want to live here.

Damn. This is the first entry so far where I am consumed with total jealousy. Great example of an entry where the owner clearly has the means to not only own but also afford to do a renovation, but the end product doesn't come off as overly showy and managed to feel quite homey.

Proof that you don't need to hide everything in order to creatively organize your household. That kitchen washer/dryer is awesome. As is the herb garden - where did you the pot mounts?

Very nice use of color and whites, esp. that fun yellow in the dining area. And you managed to squeeze a dining area and a living area and not have it feel cramped. I even I spy a TV that managed to be functionally accessible to the living room sofa while managing to stay safely out of the way and ancillary to the conversation space.

Sweeet.

Adorable apartment, wonderful kitchen. I agree about the McDonald's paint job, but other than that, great job!

This is fantastic and you did a great job of showing most of the apartment in only 3 photos.

I absolutely adore it!

And I too would love some more information on your plant-window-apparatus.

P.S. I'd also add - this space is totally NOT my style at all, but I totally love it nonetheless.

I knew this would be one that Dave liked.

I like it too and, though but my taste tends to the sleeker and more minimalist, I cannot fault this at all.

Great use of space, imaginative remodel, and a strong overall look to it.

A great entry...this one looks like home, not just a house with really cool expensive furniture (not that I would mind...). Perhaps a requirement for the winner?

I posted that before I saw your last comment Dave.

Must admit, can't see what you like so much in the others that you prefer. I thought that this would be the one.

@jamie pup - Ha! Touche, touche. Am I that transparent? I guess so - I freely admit, I have strongly held opinions.

That said, like you, my personal style runs to the more sleek/minimalist/modernist, but I also can't find fault with this.

I guess what attracts me to this contest and the general philosophy behind AT is the idea of "house" vs. "home" (in apartment form, obviously.) When I leaf through the various shelter porn mags like Dwell, Architecture Digest, Metropolitan Home, etc., I generally see lots of aesthetically beautiful houses, but not very many homes. I can appreciate them as I would a painting in a museum - from a removed distance, appreciating the finer aesthetic qualities of the design. What I can't see, is me living in them, propping my feet up and having a cold drink after a long day at work and catching the highlights on SportsCenter.

I don't think this means a space needs to be of the "Organic/Contemporary Eclectic" mold - you can have modern and still feel like a home. David and Im's OneSpace was clearly a modernist "machine for living" concept, but it still captured the essence of a home.

I'm hoping one of the reamaining to be revealed entrants manages to combine the "sleek and minimal" with a home. Although not an entry, "Uri's Monochrome" from today accomplishes that homeinees inside of a New York Loft Industrial Chic style.

@jamie pup - Yes, so far this is the one. The other ones I preferred I liked as, in the context of what had been posted so far, I preferred them - even with their imperfections - to the more polished/finished but not home-y entries that I did not like.

Could you also mention the brand and model of your washer...
(Love the apartment!)
Thank you!

awesome... by far the best I've seen.. so rich and fun!

I LOVE THIS FLOORPLAN

great apt.

my favorite thus far, I adore it.

My fave!

Ditto on the great use of space and the how'd you rig up those plants? This is making me miss all the brick on the East Coast!

Where is the FRIG?!

@katrina - Lower left, you can see the white front of the FRIG in the second photo. See the floor plan - its labeled REF.

Katrina,

The refrigerator is kind of diagonal to the washer/dryer on the floorplan. Looks like it is kind of recessed into the wall in the 2nd photo.

WOW! Color, color, and more color... so tastefully done. As others have said, this apartment truly feels like a home.

I love it!

The kitchen is amazing, and that little seating nook looks so cozy, but still modern and stylish. I love the plants in the window. And the yellow wall against the exposed brick--awesome!

As the contest goes on, it's getting harder and harder to pick favorites, but this one is for sure one of them.

Wow, love it! Love how you made that "french bistro" thing while not over doing it.

I love it and it makes me realize - we do have a AT contingency here in Boston. I live in Fenway and was too busy in the hospital to enter the contest this year. Where do you live?

Gorgeous! The kitchen is to die for. I love the little bench and pillows.

I'm labeling it as insta-finalist.
That said, I'll concentrate on the "minuses" of the place.
1) I would reverse the dining and living groups for convenience of access from the kitchen. As it is it could only be justified, in my opinion, if the owners had a great view from the windows in front of the bbuilding and they wanted the diners to have the advantage of it. But - the dining is usually happens at the evening, and isn't the purpose of having people over is to have a mutual lively conversation rather than enjoy the views? So those would be my arguments against it. Naturally, the owners might have their own, unknown to me, considerations.

2) There is no coat closet/hanger/mirror/separated foyer area created at the entrance.

3) Kitchen island looks deeper than 2'-0", which looks like either there is a partial height partition inside, or there is at least 1"-0"d wasted space on the "breakfast" side of the counter. I'd make additional cabinets w/doors there, for dishes storage, or a cooking bookcase.
4) The nook is a great idea; will be even better if the table was square with possibility to unfold into rectangular: then you could use the nook for informal meals when you only have 1-2 friends over.

Oh, and the another, insignificant but mildly annoying matter: on the plan your armchairs should be rotated 180deg; as drawn they are facing the dining table instead the sofa.

Tatyana,

Based on the floorplan, my first thought was also to reverse the living and dining areas. However, the (present) dining area is several feet narrower than the space that holds the living room furniture. Also, I suspect that they eat most of their family meals at the bistro table.

Simply awesome. You must have a very good eye for design.

I checked, DS: no, not really several feet, based on how furniture actually looks vs. the plan. The chairs are definitely of a different and smaller footprint. Also, if you count the floor boards, there are 4 of them between the chair and the bedroom partition, and they are at least of 6" each, so it must be minimum of 2" for passage. And there is a gap between the brick wall and the other chair, of what I estimate to be at least 1'-0", so there you have it - your 3' passage if you shuffle the chairs to the wall, wich is plenty.

True, they probably use the bistro table for their regular meals. But isn't it nice to be able to minimise going back and forth with the dishes when you have company for dinner? The owners did say they entertain a lot.

Sorry, I meant "there must be minimum of 2'-0" for passage", counting the floorboards. (not 2")

No, no, leave the big dining table where it is! First, the living room furniture would look more cramped there, even if the space technically was big enough.

Second, having the big dining table at the other end of the apartment gives hosts much better control over the flow of a larger party. Not only is a formal dinner peacefully removed from the bustle of the kitchen, but if they're having a cocktail party, there can be food in the kitchen and food on the big table, and then people will flow back and forth, actually using the central seating area instead of congregating around the artichoke dip.

This is my favorite entry so far. I love the clean lines and thoughtful layout. Well done!

Really lovely. Where did you get the kitchen rack/rail system?

The kitchen racks & rails look like IKEA Grundtal.

Just seeing that shot of the eating area in the kitchen made my whole day. What a wonderful use of color and light! My favorite apartment so far.

I agree with wende in phoenix about leaving the dining table where it is for the sake of flow. Also, when there is not a party in progress, the owners are probably either in the kitchen or the living room, and they want to be able to converse with one another, etc. If you swap the dining and living areas, they'd be shouting across the apartment. Nice to keep the energy clustered together.

Love that green in the kitchen, the window seat, the wood floors and exposed brick. Very homey. I bet these are relaxed, affable people. I'm personally not so keen on that particular red and yellow, but you have to go with whatever delights your own eye.

I really like your kitchen counter? What kind of tile is it? What about the grout and trim around the edges?

I like the dining furniture where it is also. This is my favorite apartment so far.

There's simply no reason to comment further. It's appealing in every sense possible!

Beautiful!

It's a wonderful, homey place--great kitchen. I wish there was a shot of your bedroom. I used to live around the corner from your place 25 years ago, you live in such a nice neighborhood.

Adorable! The kitchen is a bit cluttery (particularly above the cabinets) but you don't have a lot of storage, so I think that's understandable. The green is lovely, and so is the window seat.

Kudos! Love the layout, the colors, the scale. Yay!

I want to know more about those floating plants in the window...

What make is your washer/dryer combo? Are you happy with it?

this is gorgeous! i want to see the bedroom! also, where did you get those planters- yes floating plants- that sit high on the window? I want them!

Lovely, warm, organized, efficient, beautifully photographed, cozy, colorful, welcoming.

But low on innovation, which keeps it from being an Insta to me.

But you would have to PRY me out of that breakfast nook window seat during the winter!!!

That kitchen is the epitome of cozy to me ... wish it was mine ;-)

LUV IT! The red and yellow is fabulous. I want a washer dryer too :(

Wonderful kitchen. Very inspiring. Good luck. Lovely.

Completely awesome. Wish we could see the bedroom too.

Love love love it.

P(too) you'd have to fight me for the window seat, and it would be ugly.

I just want to know the name of the green in the kitchen, pretty please?

Love what you have done with the kitchen, great work!

Lovely , lovely place! The bench and windowgarden in the kitchen are gorgeous! Very cozy.

absolutely gorgeous!!!.
my favorite so far i think.

as someone else asked...what are you using to hang up the plants? i would love something that can hang plants in the window, not just a stand.

Reversing the living room and dining room locations would be a horrible mistake.

Right now, as you enter the apt., you are welcomed by comfortable seats in the living room. While your hosts are cooking in the nearby kitchen, you can sit at the bistro table or within talking distance in the living room. If the dining room were there instead, it would be much more unfortable for guests to have to sit at a dining table while talking to the hosts and waiting for their meal.

The dining room is perfect where it is by the window. I don't see any problem in carrying on a conversation during dinner while enjoying a nice view out the window. After all, most restaurant diners request a window table with a view (at least I do whenever possible).

Also, I totally agree that having the dining room where it is by the window promotes the best party circulation.

This is a beautiful apt. It is perfectly put together.

I LOVE IT!! - to echo sentiments above this is one of the few apartments that looks like a HOME - its welcoming and gorgeous - I could move right in (as long as you left your gree le creuset!!)

GREEN le creuset - damn autonomous fingers!

where is your dining room light fixture from?
thanks
jessica

P2,
What are examples of the type of innovations you seek in an insta-finalist?

Something about plant shelves in a window just makes me happy :-)

gekko--

Good question! Something like the raised-on-storage bed nook of Jawrite's entry, or an open plan studio where a bed is successfully addressed. That, or something aesthetically innovative, which is much harder to define.

I want something a little less conservative to address the "Coolest" part of the contest criteria (but that's just what I'm looking for).

That said, this is is undoubtedly lovely. The kitchen layout comes pretty close to innovative, I'll give you that.

And like many, I could picture myself here (although it is heavier on open storage than I could deal with, and a little broken up by color than I think benefits a smaller home).

But it's all highly personal, granted.

And hey, Dave, where are the family photos here? I must have missed them.

Very nice, and realistic for a change.

Tatyana -- Your advice to reverse the dining and living areas doesn't account for the narrowness of the dining area.

is that a combo washer/dryer? i would love to know how you like it.

This really strikes a balance between homey and stylish for most everyone. It looks fresh, colorful and comforting like a beautiful bowl of apples. Tell us about that little washer dryer combo in the kitchen. Love the window seat and the plant shelf. The whole apartment radiates hospitality.

kristine: asked and answered.

Sometimes it cracks me up how much some people overstep simple critique of a home here all the way over into just plain being bossy and telling the homeowners how to live, where they should eat their meals, etc. Good for such a laugh. ;-)

This place isn't entirely my style, but I think it's so cozy and wonderful nonetheless. It's homey and looks well loved so that's all that's important.

Actually ... one other thing important ... what is the model of your washer/dryer combo? Is it one of those ones that are made for RVs mostly? I want to convert my utility closet to a mini laundry and the no-vent thing is very enticing! That's one thing I miss about living in London ... every kitchen I had included one of these beauties.

Beautiful!!

Do you mind sharing your resource for the window planters in the kitchen? Thanks in advance.

now this is how to have bright colorful walls :)

Great layout, great visual focus, looks like a wonderful place to live.

Thank you all for the wonderful comments, please hurry and vote, we have to move to San Francisco soon for new jobs. We are sad to leave the apartment, but we are not selling. To anser some of the questions...

-The color in the kitchen is Asparagus Green from Behr.

-The washer/dryer is from LG, got it locally, but you can find it on compactappliance.com.

-The herbs in the window is a system from IKEA, but they no longer make it.

-The bedroom layout is right, but in the middle of being scraped and painted- no pics for now.

-Kitchen counters are black granite tiles with an aluminum edge from a company names Schulter.

This is lovely! It's so inspiring to see such small spaces turned into living masterpieces. Also, I <3 your lime Le Creuset.

ah everytime i see awesome brick walls in east coast homes i get so jealous!

love it :)

Tatyana -- I did miss the first response to your post.
But pointing out my oversight with "asked and answered" is a little snippy. I think this site is great, and I love reading everyone's comments and being able to share mine. I just wish we could keep things polite and (for lack of a better word) nice.

This is one of the most tasteful-yet-generous uses of color I've seen yet, and to me the place looks great. The photography is pretty lush, as well, which really helps. I had to say Stellar.

kristine, I'm a busy woman, a professional, and I value my time. As well as other people's time - I don't pound my arguments into people's heads again and again, out of respect to others' intellectual abilities.
I paid attention to your comment and replied - that constitutes politeness. Note: I didn't call you names or lectured you on "proper" behavior. That's politness.
Wish I could say the same about you.

Greatness of the site has nothing to do with the topic here, which is design critique of the apartment shown for contest.

For some reason, this entry is the only one not yet posted on the contest page.

I, on the other hand, am never too busy (nor too professional), to take a little extra time in order to be polite to others. "Politeness" isn't synonymous with "lack of total brutality."

I love your place--the decor and use of color is wonderfully warm and inviting without feeling either too cluttered and frumpy or (as happens more often on this site) uniform and unrealistically spartan. It's also a beautiful example of how well eclectic can work. This a place I would love to live in.

The only thing that I find odd is how far the dining area is from the kitchen. That seems to me that it would be a bit awkward when you have dinner parties. Have you had any mishaps as you walk through your living room?

Tatyana you seem to have plenty of time to engage in back-and-forth posting squabbles on this site. Perhaps your time would be better spent focusing on your busy professional life?

Um, in 520 square feet, some of that bedroom, the kitchen isn't really that far from *any*thing...

I actually did kind of notice that living room separating the kitchen and dining room, but I think tha basically, since the whole place is so dang pretty and civilized, I just kind of imagined everything going well in that kind of environment, regardless of that tiny little point.

The more I come back to this entry, the more I wish it was in NY and available ;-)

AT needs to do a full house tour before the owners move across country. I want to see the other two rooms and all the other details like that fab built-in pantry in the kitchen.

Insta (my 4th). Can't decide whether I most want to live here or have you invite me to dinner. (The kitchen and sociability of the layout generally, greatly inclines me towards the latter).

tfaron - I heart you. :-)

Man! I have GOT to get some design sense and do something about my apartment! I can recognize all the elements I am now in love with, but I don't know how to transfer all this new data into real life.

If AT decides to hold a (rented) apartment make-over contest, why, they should start with me, cos I'm patenting the idea right now. (I'm pretty sure I'm the first one to think of this. Heh.)

Lovely. The only thing I don't like at all is the brick wall. I've seen too many to be charmed by them, and its mutedness seems to compete with, or drain, the great colors.

i love the brick wall. adore it.

the kitchen is a little too clutter for my taste...

SO pretty!! Love the kitchen window seat!

This is utterly spectacular. I truly do not know how anyone voted "not my thang" for this submission. It is so well done and is simple yet not sparse with a cheery feeling to it. Color preferences aside (as some people have remarked on), this is THE gem of all gems.

Amazing job!!!!!!

Aha We're practically neighbours, 42Anderson. Glad to see a fellow Beacon Hiller on AT- I'm around the corner on Myrtle. Cheers to a beautiful apartment!!

Excellent use of stop light colors :=] I especially like the kitchen. I keep returning to these pix. Thanks for the inspiration.

Now that's how you use colors.

Freakin' cool! Love the colors.

I missed the voting for this, but this should be an insta-finalist.
your kitchen design is awesome, i only wish the cabinets went up to the ceiling.

I love the mini cabinents.

I am working with my landlord on my kitchen upgrade and I am going to suggest we use them. I want room for an exposed shelf below them and plan to use the top for bulky, not used daily items: popcorn maker, juicer stcok pot etc.

Thnbaks for the inspiration!

WOW.

FANTASTIC!!!

I love the dining room in front, it makes perfect sense right there. Kitchen is NOT cluttered....it's fully equipped by a passionate home chef, and the placement of the so-called "clutter" makes this kitchen perfectly functional :-)

I love it.

I LOVE YOU!!

don't change a thing! the look is homey and cozy.