The Kitchen – Getting Started

This week, I am going to talk about the kitchen again, specifically about Lowe’s kitchen design.

We were snowed in on Tuesday. We got so much snow that even Andy took the day off. With him home all day, I was able to spend most of the day in M’s room finishing up the prep work. I am happy to report that the prep is done! :: insert a round of high fives here :: I started priming yesterday, and we should be entering the home stretch (read: blog-worthy) part of the renovation very soon. Please don’t give up on me.

The Kitchen

I got some great feedback from all of you last week. I loved reading about what works for you in your kitchens and what items are on your wish list. I sympathize with everyone who has challenging kitchen issues that cannot be changed. I have put many of your ideas on our list, and we will see how it all shakes out as the process unfolds.

How We Got Started

A couple of years ago, my friend in California, who is a talented foodie, did a beautiful gut remodel of her kitchen. It was sleek and modern, and I am not exaggerating when I say that I gasped when I saw it. She was kind enough to let me open drawers and cabinets, to ooh and awe over soft closing drawers, and to rub my hand across the new countertops. I was able to peek in all of the drawers and cabinets to see how she stored items. The most amazing part to me was that all of the cabinet bases were Ikea, and she had used a company called Semi Handmade for all of the doors. Because of her experience, She was the first person that I contacted when we knew we would be gutting the kitchen here at BHH.

Although I loved what I read on the Semi Handmade website, I was still left with questions. What did the Ikea base cabinets look like under the faux fronts? How did the logistics work when collaborating with two different companies? Would I get carpal tunnel from using an Allen wrench to put all that Ikea stuff together? I pictured the assembly process taking all summer to complete, and Andy would hate me. No really. He would hate me. How many swear words would it take to get this kitchen up and running? Could this marriage be saved?

She assuaged most of my concerns. She designed the kitchen with Ikea software. Semi Handmade worked seamlessly with the Ikea cabinets, and she even hired a company that specialized in putting Ikea furniture together to come and put all the cabinet bases together. No physical therapy or divorce would be necessary.

It was all sounding very promising, and I thought about it for several weeks. Ultimately, we decided that this system would not work in our kitchen for a few reasons.

1. Our closest Ikea is in Canada. Although our money would go further in Canada, we would have to cart our purchases across the US border. Our personal exemptions would far exceed $800, and we were unsure how much extra costs we would incur. In addition, we would have to rent a truck to pick up the load.
2. Semi Handmade is located in Southern California. While they do projects all over the USA and Canada, our location would require many phone calls and the shipping of products. Costs would skyrocket, and I do not have a lot of time to be on the phone.
3. I need to keep my stress as low as possible. I am in a comfortable place in my life where I know my limits. The idea of coordinating 2-3 companies, designing a kitchen by myself, spending the day at Ikea matching cabinet codes to boxes in the warehouse section, AND finding a general contractor to make this all happen was just too much at this point in our lives. I need my sanity.

The next step was to contact a few people that I knew here who had taken a different approach. Everyone had the same general idea. They met with a designer, chose what they wanted, and then had a contractor do the work. That felt a lot more manageable. Deep breath. The only question was, which company should we choose? The answer to that question led us to endless possibilities.

How We Landed At Lowe’s

I would love to tell you that we chose Lowe’s because we are such successful bloggers now that Lowe’s reached out to us with an offer to help. However, I will not tell lies. The truth is that I went to Lowe’s to daydream a little, and I stayed for the cabinets and our new project manager, Janet.

About twelve years ago, when we lived in our house in California, Andy and I had initiated our kitchen remodel with a different big box store. We were not too far into the project before we figured out that it was way out of our budget even with builder basic cabinets. My memory of this whole ordeal was incredibly expensive prices for cheaply made cabinets. We ended up scrapping that idea entirely, and we did our own kitchen remodel/refresh over a four year period using a combination of DIY and a trusted general contractor.

With those memories as my only frame of reference, I headed to Lowe’s while my son was in Tae Kwon Do. My plan was to look around at what was available in order to see if it sparked some fresh ideas. We are in Lowe’s on a regular basis, but for years, I had breezed past the kitchen section with nary a look. Well, guess what? There is great stuff there now.

Andy and I both wanted high-quality products in the kitchen. The rest of the house is such a masterpiece that we wanted to make sure that the new kitchen we put in would fit in with the existing architecture. While Lowe’s does carry builder basic cabinetry, they also carry high-end lines from KraftMaid and Diamond. Andy and I agreed that the bulk of our kitchen remodel budget should be spent on the cabinetry. Although I have always wanted to shout out the phrase, “Spare no expense!” we are real people with limited funds. We wanted solid construction and timeless design that fit into our real people budget.

I was instantly drawn to a traditional Shaker style cabinet by KraftMaid. The cabinets can be made to different specifications including solid wood throughout. I sort of fell in love with the kitchen exactly as it was set up by Lowe’s. Marketing goal achieved. Well done, Lowe’s. Well done.

And then I met Janet, our project manager for Lowe’s kitchen design. What was meant to be a 5-10 minute stop at the store turned into a preliminary meeting. I had an hour. She had an hour, and we hit it off right away. Janet has her job for a reason. She is energetic, understanding and she wants us to love our new kitchen. During our general meeting, I was able to explain our basic wants and ask my questions about the quality of cabinetry supplied by Lowe’s. I also received an introduction to the Lowe’s process of design and execution.

• Would Lowe’s design the kitchen? Yes
• Would I have to use only Lowe’s products? No
• How was the cabinetry priced? Per cabinet/basic construction. Upgrades extra.
• If I cried at any time during this process would they laugh at me or talk about me behind my back? No, to the laughing. Maybe, to the talking behind my back. (I can’t blame them.)

Janet set up a meeting for Andy and me to come in to create a kitchen layout. I figured that we had nothing to lose since the first meeting was free. I left Lowe’s with an armload of pamphlets and lots of ideas.

Andy and I have had our first meeting, and I will tell you all about it next week. The next kitchen post will address how we chose the layout and what happened once we had our site visit.