Seems like most of that 40,000 was spent on things like wiring, demolition, construction and the CaesarStone counters. Makes it seem like the whole Ikea thing was just thrown in there as an attention grabber for the article.

No doubt they saved money using IKEA, but I wonder what percentage of that 40k was actually spent at Ikea.

When did a 40K kitchen become thrifty? Yikes.

cork seems so costly to me for how it looks

I love the floor of the before

It's pretty...but if $40,000 is thrifty, then I've lost my way, somewhere. Personally, if I could afford a place that had the "before" kitchen, I'd be happy about it! Truly good design should be accessible. To real people with real budgets.

My top to bottom kitchen remodel came in at 23K and that included carrera marble counters, hardwood floors, new windows and Ann Saks tile. There is nothing thrifty about 40K

We have had discussions like that before on another site. Where we were all floored at the costs of kitchen renovations. And the way the articles are worded, it's like it was a huge savings to spend "only" $40K.

The one kitchen I recall had a wine fridge. We all laughed at that, as that was not at all on our priority list of things we needed or wanted in a kitchen.

Here's the part that I found funny in the article:

Before: "Tired of their failing, worn wooden counters, dusty open shelving..."

After: "To get the feel of a custom kitchen, they added CaesarStone counters throughout and floating oak shelving..."

Er, so, what, oak repels dust better than painted finishes? Open shelving is open shelving, and floating oak shelving is open shelving.

I know what they are saying though, they DID put in more upper cabinets. But if they hated dusting open shelving, they still have to do it.

I do think that the majority must have been like TheCount says, the demo/rebuild.

Frankly, just glancing, I thought the top image before the jump was the after, and I thought it was so cute. I love those checkerboard floors. I would be all excited to have the before picture. All I might do is put in upper cabinets. As I too don't like open shelving.

I still say there is a place for thrifty makeovers that don't cost $40K and also don't look like the equivalent of a macaroni glued to paper artwork.

Where a greater number of people could be inspired to do things in their own homes. Like how many people here are architects and married to another architect? How much would it add to the tab to hire architects to make drawings?

i agree with the above commenters about 40K.  it seems like a pattern on AT--as if the editors are pretty out of touch, or else we are definitively NOT the target audience.

just to chime in here, I did an ikea kitchen I am really happy with for $3,000.

ikea: $1,000 (cabinets, sink, counter tops, legs, faucet handles.

appliances: $1,500

Floor paint: $500

now I don't have a wine fridge or marble. I have the butcher block ikea countertop less than lux slate floor. but I mean, come on! it really isn't very hard to install, I did mine myself. $40 k?!?!

Just to clarify: The headline is straight out of the Chronicle -- I don't think AT editors are implying that $40k is a small amount of money for a kitchen remodel.

My own kitchen reno was less than $40k, but it never felt like a bargain (like this article makes that price tag seem). I don't even want to guess what the kitchen in the Chron article would have cost if the homeowners weren't architects!

Nice kitchen! I wish my crapy ugly kitchen would look like that.

I LOVE a black and white checkerboard floor set on the diagonal. I've done it in 2 of my kitchens. But when we gutted and remodeled our current co-op apartment kitchen (for less than $22K) I chose cork and absolutely love it. Its warm to the touch and gives a little, so it's easy on the back when prepping food. And it blends beautifully with the hardwood floor in the rest of the apartment.

I just finished a kitchen renovation. Custom cabinets, top of the line stainless appliances, marble counter tops, poured concrete floors- Half the cost of this so-called Ikea kitchen. This doesn't seem right at 40K, unless Ikea has changed its price points.

I think some y'all are coming down a little hard on the [blog] editors. Check out the actual article...

"New wiring for overhead and counter lighting, new ovens and toe-kick heating panels and new flooring made extensive demolition inevitable, so they opted to remove nonstructural walls between the 100-square-foot kitchen and the adjacent 60-square-foot breakfast nook"

"How could you spend $40k at Ikea?" is part of the story... and the answer is, you can't -- but if you have to pay a designer, contractors and electricians, you might find yourself looking at alternatives to having custom cabinets made.

Money spent in the kitchen is really well spent. I also looked up the area - VERY PRICEY houses. $1M listings. Putting in formica cabinets in a house like that is a waste of time and money.

This was not a simple re-cabinet job and 'floor paint'

The blog post is just a tip of the iceberg.

From the article:

"New wiring for overhead and counter lighting, new ovens and toe-kick heating panels and new flooring made extensive demolition inevitable, so they opted to remove nonstructural walls between the 100-square-foot kitchen and the adjacent 60-square-foot breakfast nook."

New wiring, HVAC...looks like new sink placement, so I'm guessing new plumbing. It also looks like the new window means some patching in the exterior 'finish' of the house (easier if its shingled, more of a pain if its clapboard or brick). The demo and reconstruction is pretty extensive. This isn't a refresh/redecoration, but a serious structural project. 40K in the notoriously expensive Bay Area doesn't seem terrible to me for all that work.

I find AT really interesting some times. If something is expensive, people complain that it is undemocratic. If something is inexpensive, people complain about low quality, exploited workers, environmental impact, etc.

$40K actually seems like a reasonable amount to me if you were contracting out the entire job; however, it seems high if you do much of the work yourself.

We are just wrapping up our kitchen renovation, and we spent about $40K to redo everything but the dishwasher and fridge in 6wks. Nothing done by us. FWIW, our kitchen is probably larger than the average AT kitchen (i.e. approx 20' x 12'), and we sprung for custom cabs, glass tile backsplash, Corian countertop, stainless range & oven.

IKEA must have gone extremely upscale overnight! I'd love to know what percentage of that kitchen is ACTUALLY Ikea. I dont know if I would call 40K for a kitchen redo "Thrifty" but it is certainly at the low end of the costs of kitchen remodels these days. Prices are just out of control, really.

well i think the pt is you can have low end thrify, middle of the road thrifty, and high end thrifty.

For example, I purchased some Tolomeo Classic Floor Lamps for $150 each -- although $150 per lamp is not exactly thrifty, I consider it as a thrifty purchase -- b/c it was for far less than retail.

I think these 3 probably saved a bundle on the actual labor of design, contractors, etc, but bought high end stuff.

The floor before is good but the lack of windows is simply unacceptable.

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"Thrifty"? Hilarious.

My kitchen remodel (which was truly THRIFTY) came in at a whopping $5000, and that's including all of the electrical and plumbing being redone, walls and ceiling being replastered, a new floor, all appliances (Bosch/LG--midrange), cabinetry, shelving, stainless steel countertops...etc.

I can't even imagine what I would have come up with with $40k at my disposal. I haven't even spent that much on renovating my entire house! (And no, I haven't done all of the work myself.) I have a really hard time understanding why an IKEA kitchen was warranted with a budget of that magnitude, especially if, as Jonathan pointed out, this is a home that is potentially worth $1m .

Don't get me wrong, I love IKEA (my kitchen would not have been possible without it!) and think their cabinets are great, but with a big budget like that, it seems like custom cabinetry would have been an option.

Weird. And yes, I read the whole article. I still don't understand where the $40k was spent, unless they're leaving out something major (which I suspect they are). All of the sources listed are either low or midrange, including the appliances.

Kitchens are only a good investment when they are attractive to potential buyers. This looks kinda trendy and unfinished to me.

siobhan: great accurate observation.

Is that all they got for $40k? I expected more.

hey anna at D16 -- i'm in the NYC area.. how do you get all of that done at that price? I'd love to be able to get my kitchen redone with the cost of the Labor being 5k.

did you do a large part of the work yourself?

They did a lot of changes in the structure of the room so for all the work I think 40k is ok, but if you ask me for the kitchen design itself I dont like it much.
The color combination is nice, but for example the hood above the stove hangs way to high. I don't understand the one single hanging cabinate on the left, it seems like it doesn´t fit in the whole design. In total I have to agree on earlier comments that it seems unfinished. All in all I am surprised that they are both architects or designers and could not pull off the job, but maybe they got lost on the way with all the major structural changes they did.

Leaving aside the $40k budget, the kitchen lacks any real amount of character. I'm sure it is more functional than its 'before' counterpart, but it is crying out for some personality: color, textiles, art. It seems like a good blank canvas, but I'd like to see it revamped with some edge that would indicate it's not just a showroom.

The light's much better in the new kitchen, although it's not to my taste. Personally, having lived with the black and white checkerboard for several years, I hate it more than any other kitchen floor covering, including our current vomit-colored linoleum. That color combination is impossible; if you're baking, spilling flour makes the black tiles look crappy, and if you're cooking anything else, the white tiles look dirty. I sweep my kitchen floor daily and okay, it doesn't look perfect, but I nearly lost my mind with the checkerboard floor. It looked filthy at one end before I'd finished sweeping the other, just because the cat walked across the room. And this was before we had the baby (who softened my attitude about vomit-colored linoleum, I'll admit).

Don't ya hate it when they do "Before & After" shots from different angles?!

this is a thrifty kitchen remodel.

@loislane: That's a GREAT link!

I like how they mentioned sources and gave suggestions. It is especially good for me to see HOW they came to their decisions. So that I can see they read these books, visited these sites, got ideas from these pictures, and this is how they used the ideas to create their own style.

The naming of SPECIFIC things helps me. Rather than saying "We looked around at a few things"...what does THAT mean? Ha! It gives everyone else a chance to follow their train of thought, and to put their own minds into action.

Inspiration is everywhere. But sometimes we all draw a blank. Or don't even know where to start. That 10K Kitchen Remodel gives many places to start! Thanks again!