Modern Kitchen Makeover – A few years ago, my brother and sister-in-law and I renovated a dark 80s kitchen into a bright, modern kitchen on a budget.
I shared the remodeling plan and some of the projects along the way, but never shared the last big reveal…until today!
Modern Kitchen Makeover
This kitchen remodel was a major DIY project. We taught my brother-in-law some DIY skills and put in a lot of work to keep the budget low. It took us almost the whole summer to work on weekends.
Before And After: Mid Century Modern Designer Kitchen Redo
This post may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn on eligible purchases. Click here to read my full disclosure policy.
But the end result was creating an amazing kitchen and creating amazing memories along the way with my favorite people!
Check out the before and after photos of this stunning kitchen transformation. And I’ll share how we managed to make such a big impact on such a small budget.
The main purpose of this kitchen makeover was to update the kitchen to suit the young, hip couple who lived there. And to make it better for fun.
Remodeling: Kitchen Ideas And Case Studies
The kitchen felt cramped into one side of the room with a large open space on the other side. I guess the open space was for a dining table, but there was another dining space right next door, so it was empty and unused.
The kitchen island was too small for the entertaining and cooking they love to do. And that left a lot of wasted space in the kitchen.
So we removed the too small kitchen island and flipped the island over. Using the wasted space from before, we added a 9′ long kitchen island.
In the island on the side closest to the stove, we have new cabinets for storage and a “built-in” microwave. Next to the dining room, we replaced the cabinets with a pedestal table base to create an island dining room.
Our Diy Kitchen Remodel
The kids can easily sit up at the bar for quick meals. And when entertaining, this huge kitchen island is the perfect place to gather around.
If you don’t want floating shelves, you could just remove the cabinet doors from the existing upper cabinets and paint them. Leaving the cabinets without doors creates the same open feeling without losing as much storage space.
Removing all the dark, heavy cabinets in the corner and around the stove created a much more open feeling in the kitchen. And it makes the space feel much bigger than it was before.
All items that were previously stored in the upper cabinets were easily transferred to the new cabinets in the kitchen island.
Our Kitchen Renovation (cost Breakdown, Before/after, Etc)
Now the solid concrete floating shelves are left for mainly decorative items. It makes the kitchen feel very clean and spacious.
When we pulled down the upper cabinets to make room for the new shelves, we discovered that the cabinet boxes for the upper cabinets went behind the soffit. Big win!
We were able to remove the face frames from the cabinets we kept and replace them with face frames that went right up to the ceiling.
The higher cabinets make the whole kitchen more elegant and modern. The upper shelf in the cabinets is not adjustable but offers plenty of storage for less used items.
Unbelievable Before And After Kitchen Makeovers
If you have a soffit on your cabinets, you might get lucky like us, but probably not. instead, you could still create the look of your cabinets going all the way to the ceiling by getting creative with paint and trim.
The panty cupboards next to the fridge offered plenty of storage but it was a hot mess inside! It’s too easy to lose things in the back of the 24-inch deep pantry shelves.
Even though the improvements made to the cage are not visible from the outside, they were totally worth it.
When I updated the face frame, I left the center style and that made it possible to add pull-out shelves to the pantry.
My Ny Apartment Teeny Tiny, And Old Kitchen Renovation
Deeper drawers were added to the bottom of the pantry to store bagged items like chips and pasta. And shallower drawers were used as pull-out shelves for the top of the panties.
Now you can easily find and reach everything in the pantry. This adds so much storage space to the kitchen without the need for more cabinets.
When my brother and sister-in-law moved into their home, there was a built-in desk on the small wall in front of the pantry. They didn’t use it and removed it a few years ago.
But thankfully they never got around to throwing away the piece of granite that was the desk. So when they asked to add a dry bar to their kitchen, I knew exactly what to do!
Kitchen Remodel Ideas For A More Beautiful, Functional Space
I used the piece of granite as a countertop and built my own cabinets to create the perfect wall for entertaining. Stay tuned for the complete construction plans for this dry bar!
One of the challenges I had when designing the kitchen for my in-laws was her contrasting design ideas. She wanted a modern kitchen with lots of grays, but then found pictures of very earthy rooms for inspiration.
She loved terra cotta, colorful hand-painted tiles and natural wood from Mexico, where her mother is from. So my goal was to add some Mexican design…but keep it modern and contemporary.
The first thing I did was put natural wood in the kitchen. Painted cabinets can sometimes be very bland, especially in a cool color like gray. But we heated the kitchen with beautiful maple wood.
Mid Century Modern Asheville Kitchen Remodel — Homesource Design Center
The light color of the maple kept the look modern, but added lots of warmth. And I added it throughout the kitchen. My trick is to use it in at least 3 places so it doesn’t feel like an afterthought.
We also added some smaller touches of Mexican design throughout the kitchen. Some more permanent and others with just colorful decorations.
A built-in microwave oven is 3-4 times more expensive than a countertop one. But to make it look built-in, but still allow for air flow, I created a cut-out design based on Mexican pattern tiles to frame the microwave in the new kitchen island.
It’s painted the same color as the cabinets so it blends in, but the design really stands out!
Modern Kitchen Design, Open, Airy, Kitchen Design, Custom Kitchen Cabinets, Kitchen Remodel, Clean Lines, Sleek Expanses, Natural Tones, Earthy Hues, Contrasting Accents, Functionality, Minimalist Kitchens, Spark Joy, Marie Kondo, Declutter
Aside from DIY, one of the easiest ways to save money on a kitchen renovation is to use what you already have!
In this kitchen, the cabinets were in excellent condition. The custom cabinets were well made from real wood. They just needed a facelift.
Repurposing all the cabinets around the kitchen saves us thousands of dollars. We painted the kitchen cabinetry with a resilient primer and cabinet lacquer paint. And all the cabinet doors and drawer fronts were replaced with brand new shaker style doors.
Changing the cabinet doors on an existing cabinet will instantly change the entire look of the cabinet. These DIY closet doors were a great use of time and budget.
Luxury Modern Kitchen (sleek & Inspiring)
One of the things my brother-in-law hated about the kitchen was the old-fashioned granite countertops. But they just couldn’t afford to replace them and granite is a great countertop.
So to make him fall in love with the dated brown granite, we worked the colors into the new color scheme.
The brown granite had shades of gray and black. Painting the kitchen cabinets light gray brightened up the entire room (granite included) and brought out the gray tones.
Then we accentuated the black tones by adding a new black quartz countertop to the large DIY kitchen island I built.
Unbelievable Modern Kitchen Renovation!
The modern black tabletop was not cheap! But it becomes the focal point of the kitchen, making the outdated granite blend into the background.
And finally we put in a lot of natural warm wood throughout the kitchen to blend in with the brown in the granite.
Changing the location of plumbing and electrical will immediately increase your kitchen remodeling budget! Unless the placement of the sink and appliances is completely crazy, work with it to save money.
Even if you reuse your cabinets, you can still move them. If you have a peninsula in the kitchen, remove those cabinets and turn them into a kitchen island instead.
Spectacular Before And After Kitchen Makeovers
We added tons of counter space and storage by flipping the kitchen island. Instead of a small 40″ wide by 36″ deep island, we flipped it and created a 40″ deep by 9″ long island.
This added tons of storage, room for a built-in microwave, and a place to eat in the kitchen. For our kitchen, we reused the cabinets around the kitchen and used new cabinets for the kitchen island, which saved us a lot of money in our budget.
The high quality finish feels so luxurious, but costs a lot. Renovating a kitchen on a budget doesn’t mean you can’t have luxury, just that you need to be smart about where you spend.
If you splurge on smaller items, you’ll have a big impact on the design without a big impact on the budget!
How Can An E Designer Help With A Kitchen Renovation?
To make a big statement in this kitchen, we added tile to the entire wall around the opening