Our Amazing Kitchen Renovation On A Budget!

We were a young couple with two sweet little boys, aged 3 and 5 in 2004.  Three years earlier we had moved from a cute historic house in the heart of Mystic, CT to a vanilla box townhouse in the Philadelphia suburbs and I was miserable.

I mean how cute is this house?

I wasn't miserable with life in general, just with living in a vanilla box.

Home–and the feeling of home–is something that I have been wired to be sensitive to my entire life and nothing felt right about our townhouse, even though to most people it was perfectly lovely.  I wanted to raise my boys in a house that they would someday love to bring their families home to.  A place that felt safe and happy and good.

So the hunt was on for a house with “good bones” and great curb appeal.

I longed for simple things.  The sound of a wooden screen door closing with a soft thud like the one we had in Connecticut.  A beautiful porch.  Unexpected details and nooks and crannies.  And I was willing to sacrifice some amenities in the short term (like an updated kitchen, finished basement, etc) for a house that was worthy of love and future updates.

Fischer (aka my husband) followed my lead with great reluctance.  He loves to say that his ideal house is so new it hasn't been built yet.

After a year of house hunting, we found it.

A beautiful Victorian on a pretty street.  It was so great in every way except that the kitchen was put in during the 50's and, let's just say, it was not awesome.

Cupboard doors started to become loose and fall off their hinges…repeatedly….

Drawer bottoms were sagging.

The sloping floor–that incidentally was tiled in the same stuff that was in the bathroom of the Friendly's restaurant down the street–was freezing in the winter.

Olive oil coagulated while sitting on the counter in the middle of winter.

Oh, and my washer and dryer were right there. Right. there.

We lived with this for 13 years, but we finally got to do our kitchen and we did it in a really unique way….

Our Kitchen Renovation Story

We had learned about a company called Green Demolitions, now Renovation Angel, in the New York Times.  This incredible company removes and resells kitchens, appliances, bathroom fixtures and lighting from showrooms and high-end residences across the country.

When you purchase from Renovation Angel, a portion of your purchase price goes to benefit drug and alcohol rehab programs.  It is such a feel-good kind of thing to do all around.

I went onto the site thinking that I would check it out as a resource for my real estate investors when I saw this kitchen that stopped me in my tracks.

I knew it was “the one” for our house.  I frantically texted Fischer that I had found our kitchen.

But, I know that pictures can be deceiving, so I drove the 2 and a half hours to go see it in person and what I saw amazed me.  The quality, the condition, everything was incredible.  With the go-ahead from Fischer, I bought it on the spot.

In my next post, I will fill you in on everything that we had to know before buying a kitchen this way and I'll share some of the things we learned along the way that are super important when you are considering something like this (and any kitchen renovation in general).  In the meantime, here is the transformation and the link to my pendant lights. (ps–we had started the process of clearing the kitchen when we took our before pictures so it is a super disaster!)

pendant lights | stools | refrigerator

door color|  Benjamin Moore Wythe Blue

So there's a quick background on our kitchen renovation–I'll have more details on the how-to's and what-to-considers next week!  Would love to hear what's going on at your house–fill me in in the comment section below to tell me what project you have checked off your list that you are in love with or what the next one is going to be!

xo,

Lori