How I am Planning on Brightening up my Kitchen

a bright and airy kitchen
*Collaborative Post

We’ve been living in our current home for almost 7 years now and I have decided it is time for some changes. When we moved in, it was a blank canvas. It had previously been a showhome and the owner before us only lived here for 2 years before choosing to move on. She hadn’t touched the standard magnolia walls or cream carpets so even though it was completely liveable it lacked personality.

Now, I’m a doer. I will look at something, make a decision and jump in and just get on with it. Hubby is the opposite. He has to mull things over, weigh up the options and then wait even longer… often driving me nuts! This is why he is never surprised by the fact I may have painted a room or changed some furniture whilst he’s been at work that day. So, when we moved in I immediately set to work removing the boring creaminess and adding some injections of colour around our home. Thing is, after 7 years I am bored again. The walls look tatty, the colours are all a bit much for me now and I want to brighten everything up to make it feel fresh again.

The kitchen is going to be my biggest project. For whatever reason, I went with a lot of darks. Not sure why I think maybe I thought matching everything was a great idea at the time. But now I have a dark floor, dark oak effect worktops, medium oak furniture and dark blinds which is all making the room feel pretty glum. So, my mind has been slowly planning and these are my ideas for brightening up the kitchen.

 

Light Oak Worktops

The country cottage kitchen look is my dream. The light oak tops, the saucepans hanging next to the aga, the deep sink… Beautiful!

We won’t be able to do a complete kitchen overhaul so by simply changing the worktops we can make it feel newer for a lot less. I am also still trying to decide whether to go for real wood or laminate due to the maintenance levels. I know that the real wood can take a battering from the water and with 2 little ones I am thinking that time would be a real issue if I needed to clean, dry and oil my kitchen tops.

a large spacious kitchen with oak worktops

 

White Tiles

Our splashback is currently the same dark oak as the worktops which doesn’t even go all the way around because we had to add more workspace but we couldn’t get the match for the wood so it never got added on. I would love to have modern bevelled tiles all the way around that are sleek and easy to clean. I think white would also work best against any colour scheme and will never go out of date of course.

 

Flooring

Our current floor was supposed to be temporary– famous last words eh! Yeah, so that was about 5 years ago or more! We needed a quick fix after a leak ruined the last floor and as we were unsure of colours we went for a cheap offcut to go down until we made our minds up. Well, wedding, kids, life all just happened and the floor never took priority. It now looks awful and I am desperate to have a lighter colour to make the room feel bigger. What I haven’t mentioned about our kitchen is the fact it is also our dining room. This means I have to tie one end in with the other so the flooring needs to work throughout the room. I also need it to be warm for the children so tiles are out of the question. I quite like the idea of a light grey lino or perhaps a stone colour. This is definitely the hardest decision overall because I feel that the floor can make or break a room.

 

Lighting

The lighting in the kitchen area is fine but above our dining room table it isn’t really to my taste (shame it’s also in the living room!) and lacks brightness which may sound strange but they give off a dull glow rather than a nice bright feel. I would love to have some fancy drop lighting to showcase the table at dinner times and to provide better lighting when I am doing arts and crafts with Jake.

light fittings

 

Colour

As I mentioned above, our kitchen is also our dining room so to make these look different I did the kitchen in a pale yellow and the dining area in a medium green. The kitchen colour is ok I guess but the green is just far too dark for my taste now and I am looking to brighten it up with a few shades lighter. I think a quick lick of paint always makes everything feel so much better.

 

Blinds

Blinds in a kitchen are a must in my eyes. This is because curtains can end up stained and smelly from cooking and I don’t have time to be maintaining those on top of everything else. Blinds can be wiped clean, they are a quick way to block out the sun if it streams through at certain times of day and with so many styles on the market you can really make a statement if you want to. I’ve spotted these Luminette blinds which would be perfect for us as they are lovely and light to give the brightness I am trying to achieve in the room but they also provide the privacy I need from the path that is right outside.

luminette blinds

 

I reckon these fixes are a going to be a great way to brighten up a room without spending a fortune and I cannot wait to get started!

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*This is a collaborative post. For further information please refer to my disclosure page.

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