Interiors: Kitchen/Dining Room Style

The first time we came to look around this house, it was a bare shell. Literally everything had been ripped out. The thought of a brand new kitchen left me very excited {middle aged much?!}. To finally have a brand new kitchen that no-one had cooked in before was fantastic. Shiny new cupboards and a lovely unused oven. We treated our selves to a few new pieces – those oven gloves and matching tea/coffee tins from M&S and a lovely new espresso pot {this one from La Cafetiere} – coffee is my morning indulgence and I’d be lost without it!

With glossy white cupboards {that are easy to keep clean}, black work surfaces and,oh yes, those subway tiles it’s pretty much my dream kitchen. I love love love the big window behind the sink, not only does it let lots of light in, but it also has gorgeous stained glass panels. Those tall wooden doors in the top picture house the boiler {and give me space to hide more junk} and you can just see to the left under the pinboard there is another cupboard. Built into the old chimney breast, it’s a ‘flap-down’ style opening, G attached some chains and the girls use it as a baking cupboard/workspace. It’s just the right height for them to work at, and great to have all our baking supplies in one place -because you know how much we love to bake cakes {and eat them}.

The room itself is lovely and big. Big enough for us to have our dining table in there. I talked before about how much we’re enjoying having a social kitchen. While a seperate dining room would be fantastic to have as well {and I’d have a great time decorating it up – I’m thinking sideboard stroke bar!!} for the way our family functions right now, a kitchen/dinner is the perfect solution for us.

The only thing we’ve found is that the room is pretty echo-y. When we’re all sitting around the table and there are several different conversations going on, as well as a squealing baby making noise, it gets a bit loud and hard to hear clearly. I think the room needs some more prints on the walls to soften it, I’m hoping G will make me some shelves to house all of my cookbooks too. I’ve just bought a gorgeous String of Hearts plant – I think a couple more houseplants will warm the room up a little – it’s still quite big and empty and white! It really just needs living in for a while so that it starts to feel a little more homely.