Hamptons Reno: Kitchen Decisions

UPDATE: Something went kerflooey after I published this post last night, and it disappeared from my WordPress site. I’ve fleshed it out with a few more photos and am publishing it again. Apologies to subscribers who get a second email, and those whose prior comments may have been lost.

I’VE BEEN DOING MY BEST to push the river, and it’s slowly starting to flow. Though yesterday I felt practically paralyzed, stumbling around my far-from-livable house without a clue what to do next. Without water, I can’t clean or paint, and without a sink, I can’t get water. Without the  plumber, who’s been mostly MIA, I can’t get a sink.

Without tile, I can’t get a kitchen floor, and I haven’t bought tile yet. I stopped at Restore, Habitat for Humanity’s building-supply salvage warehouse in Ronkonkoma, on my last trips to and from the city, and there saw tile I should have bought but didn’t buy — 12″x12″ ceramic squares in either leathery brown or mottled black. Of the first, I wasn’t sure I’d have enough, of the second, I wasn’t sure of the color. Now that tile is hours away, if they still have it.

How low can you go? Ceramic tile at Home Depot for 99 cents/square foot, but unfortunately only in white. I want a dark kitchen floor.

The one big accomplishment of last weekend only added to my sense of overwhelm: moving my stored furniture and possessions from the cellar at my previous house into temporary storage in the great room of my new place. There it now reposes, stacked high, much of it wicker or otherwise cottage-y in style, and all wrong for the modern decor I envision this time around. I feel a yard sale coming on.

But it’s not all frustration: there has been progress in the bathroom, above, though not to the point of a flushing toilet. The tile work is done and looks fine. And I’ve moved on to consideration of the kitchen, an open space about 8’x10′ with plain, hand-made solid wood upper cabinets, separated from the dining/sitting room by a divider made of old louvered shutters, all of it fine for now.

This week, a carpenter is building a sink base, simple and open, out of 4″x4″s with a single shelf, to support a 48″ wide double-basin sink, below, found in the shed when it was cleared out recently.

I have yet to order a stove and fridge, but I will shortly. My plan for counter space in between appliances involves stainless steel restaurant supply units, above, that can be custom made to size, look cool, and cost ridiculously little. Below, two new IKEA offerings which might work for my purposes, once I’ve figured out more precisely just how many inches I have.

I’ve been doing a little searching on Houzz, Remodelista, and Pinterest, and finding inspiration in images like these:

Common threads are white walls, dark floors, stainless steel, and above all, freestanding or what is sometimes called ‘unfitted’ cabinetry. After looking at enough such kitchens, the monolithic ‘fitted’ kitchen no longer even appeals to me.

Having left my dining table and chairs behind for my renters, I’m keeping my eyes open for replacements. Above, ’60s plastic chairs seen at Build It Green in Brooklyn, for $50 apiece, and left, classic director’s chairs in white canvas, widely available online for well under $100. Used to have them in the ’70s, and might not mind having them again.

Cottage Furniture in a Brooklyn Souk

IN MY QUEST for a storage solution for the boxes of files and photos presently stacked in the bedroom of my new Brooklyn apartment, I found FIND, a sprawling home-furnishings warehouse hiding in plain sight across from the Lowe’s parking lot in Gowanus. (They’ve been open since ’09, but I was out of town for a year-and-a-half, so it’s new to me.)

The place has an eclectic, even schizophrenic quality, stuffed as it is with wares from every corner of the world. The bulk of it is similar to what you might find at Bloomingdale’s: traditional overstuffed sofas upholstered in beige linen, farmhouse tables, wood armoires. That’s not the part that interested me.

I was drawn to a narrow strip of stuff they’re phasing out, apparently, leftovers from a big sale they had a couple of weekends ago: vintage glass-door cabinets with multi-tone paint jobs, surrounded by brass lamps, poufs, and mirrors straight out of a Moroccan bazaar.

The cabinets look like they’ve been artfully distressed (perhaps even naturally distressed in some cases) and have a cottage-y look, very like rustic American painted furniture of the 1930s and earlier. Except they’re made of teak, mostly, and were imported, I’m told, from India.

Some of them have fanciful moldings. One of the more massive cabinets — 42″ wide and 2 feet deep — is on chunky wooden wheels, inset into the frame.

The smaller pieces — medicine-chest size — are priced around $150; humongous ones range from $400 to $900, with local delivery thrown in. Alas, nothing I saw was quite right, functionally. I have a 6-1/2-foot-wide alcove I hope to fill with one large storage piece, and the cabinets I liked at FIND tend to the tall and narrow. Or else they had glass panes, and the idea is to have hidden storage.

Still, when this bargain-hunting veteran of the interior design/home furnishings scene sees something as unusual as these Indian imports, she takes notice.

FIND is at 59 9th Street, Brooklyn 11215; 718/369-2705.