Dream Kitchens & Baths Fall/Winter 2021

THE TRIED-AND-TRUE OFTEN MAKES US HAPPY, but sometimes it’s fun to let things take an unexpected turn. Take the classic all-white kitchen, for example. It’s destined to always be in style. But how about an update to express your personal flair? See how soft colors bring playful appeal to a country-style kitchen in “Family Traditions,” page 16, and discover how distinctive alderwood cabinets (mixed with white) introduce welcome texture and warmth in “Rustic Charm,” page 22. Or why not mix design styles for a whole new look? In “Custom Blend,” page 54, contemporary details are interwoven with traditional features to create a timeless cooking space. If you like a bit of drama, see how kitchen designer Mick De Giulio created a sleek, clean-lined kitchen within the soaring architecture of a…

RESOURCES BEGIN ON PAGE 92. NEUTRAL KITCHENS HAVE LONG BEEN POPULAR—AND WITH GOOD REASON. They offer a timeless look, and they won’t scare anyone away if you end up selling your house. But these days more homeowners are interested in shaking things up a bit (or a lot) and adding color to their kitchen. “People seem to be more interested in color. They are spending a lot more time at home and they want things to have just a little more personality,” says Rebekah Zaveloff, co-founder and principal designer at KitchenLab Interiors in Chicago. You can use just about any color in the kitchen, but many homeowners gravitate toward greens and blues. Hues can range the full spectrum; popular blues, for example, include dark navy, gray-blues, and light blues—essentially, anything…

Cabinetry Designer Rebekah Zaveloff is seeing more clients interested in adding color with cabinetry, but this doesn’t necessarily mean they want to add color throughout the room. Choosing a color for an island and keeping perimeter cabinets more neutral is a popular choice, for example. “Islands are always a good option for color, because it’s a very limited space in comparison to the whole kitchen,” says Ili Hidalgo-Nilsson, principal of Terracotta Design Build Co. in Decatur, Georgia. You can also use color to accent a particular area of the kitchen. Hidalgo-Nilsson likes to add color to highlight a specific function in the kitchen. “If we have a client who is a big baker, we might have a baking zone and treat that particular area with a color,” she says. “Or…

CONSIDER YOUR SPACE Keep in mind that the same color can look different in various settings, depending on the size of the space and the natural light available. The same color can even look different from one end of your kitchen to the other if the amount of natural light varies. Designer Sarah Blank advises homeowners to paint a good-size area with their chosen color and live with the space during the daytime and nighttime before finalizing their color choice. She also recommends choosing colors for the kitchen that will complement the design scheme used in the rest of the house. “Make sure the overall aesthetic of the house is integrated into the kitchen,” Blank says. NARROW YOUR OPTIONS If you’re feeling overwhelmed by too many color choices, Rebekah Zaveloff…

THE VIBE OF THESE KITCHENS IS LIVED-IN AND WELCOMING, BUT THEIR CLASSIC LOOK IS FRESHENED UP WITH WOOD, UNEXPECTED COLOR, AND MODERN ACCENTS THEIR HOME MIGHT BE BRAND-NEW, but Jennifer and Sean Bleiler wanted it to feel as though it had been nestled into its bucolic setting near Allentown, Pennsylvania, for decades. They called on interior designer Lisa Furey of Lisa Furey Interiors and architect Christopher Carrigan of Historical Concepts to build in the character they craved. In the kitchen, Furey drew inspiration from classic farmhouse kitchens. “I deliberately chose the textures, colors, and style that would make the kitchen appear ageless,” Furey says. “The Shaker references in the style of the cabinets give the room a timeless look, one that I updated with the color choices and hardware. I…

FOR MELISSA BOURGEOIS, STEPPING OUT HER KITCHEN DOOR is like stepping back in time to summers at her grandmother’s Kansas farmhouse. It’s not the lace curtains or the cheerful wallpaper—though she delights in those accents—but rather the ability to come and go with ease that fills her heart with joy. “When we were at the farmhouse, we would walk outside to get the eggs. Go out to the fruit trees in the backyard and come back in,” she says. “That connection to the outside is one of the things I love about my kitchen.” But that connection to childhood memories almost didn’t happen. The kitchen started out in the center of the new house that Melissa and her husband, Mark, were building in a planned community in Tennessee. It soon…