A Kitchen Opens Up for Entertaining

Project by: Rebecca Chan
Location: Toronto, Ontario

My kitchen used to be a small extension of the main floor, cut off from the rest of the living/dining area. Opening up the wall was our main priority, which would make the whole main floor feel much larger and open concept.

We had to move our electrical, main stack and water lines, which ended up taking a whole week to move. This ate up a big chunk of the budget, but it was so worth it to do. We also insulated one of our walls which didn’t have insulation when the kitchen extension was made.

After opening up the wall to create a more open concept feel, we updated the fixings of the kitchen to create a clean and modern feel.

The new kitchen is mostly white on white. We purchased the simple white cabinets from IKEA to keep costs down. We found our own knobs and handles for a clean look. I had a lot of fun picking out the granite countertop (I wanted the look of marble but without the fuss, so this white and grey countertop was perfect). Since our kitchen was so small, I was able to splurge on a higher end marble herringbone backsplash.

One of our corners was taken up by our chimney, not allowing us to put a full cabinet in. My husband had the genius idea of creating in a custom wine rack and it worked out perfectly. We extended the marble backsplash as an accent piece up the chimney wall too, along with custom made shelving and antique brackets I found at a local store. We found a similar cherry oak hardwood to the hardwood we had in our dining room, to keep it feeling open concept.

The overall renovation took about four weeks to complete. We kept all our appliances that came with the house, except for the range hood microwave and sink which we replaced.

Being a wedding and event planner, I wanted a beautiful kitchen where I could entertain and see my guests in the dining/living area while serving food. The whole main floor is so open concept now with light flooding in from the backyard. I am so thrilled with how it turned out!

Thanks, Rebecca Chan!

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