Victorian House Renovation in Bloomingdale, DC
Sooooo — we had have these beautiful countertops in the kitchen. Originally butcher block from Ikea, we stained them jet black with ink and then invested a lot of time getting them sealed. I had done a lot of research and apparently quite a few people out there have a luck with Waterlox, which is great to use because it is food-grade safe. But bad news for us, I probably didn’t do a great job sealing them.… Read the rest
My beautiful black shiny counters were a bit of a causality in the whole ‘move kitchen cabinets 4″ down‘ exercise. I wasn’t really looking for a solution – I figured that just as well, it was bound to happen eventually, with use. But then I came across this post on Apartment Therapy, suggesting that it was possible to get dings out of wood counters. Intrigued, I decided to give it a whirl last night.… Read the rest
Well we have survived the frankenstorm that was Sandy, without flooding or loosing electricity. That was the best part of the hurricane. Another neat bit of freak weather events –all public transport typically shuts down in DC, which means that the offices are closed as well, and we get to telework from home. Which means that I got to oil, wax, and buff our beautiful island top during my lunch break.… Read the rest
So apparently my choice of colors for the house is a) monochromatic and b) goes in phases. I am in what Sergey calls a “black phase” which follows a “white phase.”
When the kitchen renovation started, Sergey was shocked and appalled at the idea of everything being white: cabinets? white, tin ceiling? – white!, what even the floor?? – yep, white (though featuring black rosettes and black grout.) Oh and yea about the exposed brick…also white.… Read the rest
This past weekend was all about house time for us, in large part because we have plans for every single weekend in October save for one. Life – it gets in a way of house stuff (or is it the other way around?) The big accomplishment was leveling out and putting the finishing touches on our reclaimed wood island counter.
Over the two prior weekends we had selected, prepped and put together the reclaimed wood for our island counter top.… Read the rest
In between our awesome trips, hanging out and hosting- through the entire renovation process, really – friends and family, we continue working on our end of the renovation process. This entails mainly thankless tasks that are hard to get wrong – demolishing, stripping old paint, priming and painting, and of course endless of hours of research of how tos (plaster) and best products ( kitchen hardware has been the bane of my existence).… Read the rest
A little update on our cabinets and island piece. Past weekend, we had some help from our friend Zach (thank you!) which was essential to putting together our Ikea pantry unit, since Sergey’s only got one useful hand as of two weeks ago.
Meanwhile, I played around with various finishes for our kitchen island counter top. I don’t think that we will be using it as a butcher block. I prefer using cutting boards for ease of clean up, and plus the joists are probably pine, which is a soft wood that wouldn’t take that well to constant cutting and chopping.… Read the rest
When we took the house apart, our friends had suggested that we keep the old wood joists for all sorts of salvage projects. Such as a table.Or a kitchen island top. Brilliant, thank you friends! Reclaimed wood has become rather fashionable as of late, which gives me a bit of a pause in using it on such a focal piece in the kitchen. Reclaimed wood is definitely a trend, and maybe even a fad, that won’t stay.… Read the rest