Our Kitchen Remodel
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- pr20
Love the open space but the lighting is "horrible" (i put quotation marks so you take it easy after all you are a proud daddy of a new kitchen). Putting those cans of par lights in the ceiling is almost as bad as having one large fixture in the middle of the room to illuminate whole space. You got to invest in some night stand lamps that will become your actual lighting source - remember the idea is not to more-or-less evenly light the space but create pools of light that people will gravitate to (kinda modern day "fireplaces" sprinkled all over the room.
- pr2 has a point.. that is a lot of high hat lighting in your place.. use more lamps 2 create vibe..e-pill
- mg330
Pr2,
We added lighting and actually removed some horrible 6 inch cans that were metal on the inside. All lights have dimmers as well. We're getting some lamps for sure, just not to the full decorating part yet. Luckily we removed a huge can light that was above where the tv will go, it would have been awful. They're pretty soft actually and using halogen lights. The smaller lights in the kitchen are LED lights.
- led light are great. 6 inch cans are horrible.. halogens can get hot..e-pill
- Frosty_spl0
Nice! I like the lighting actually. Floors and cabinets look rad too.
- pr20
mg33, think of this like that - you don't go out on romantic dates at high noon - because there is too much light (thus no mystery) and the light is at the most horrible spot - directly above our heads. Now, in turn, think when do do go on romantic dates and what kind of lighting you have there... Fireplace (low to the ground), a cafe with a small night light on the table (again below the eye line)... When you think about all the places that you enjoy (and how they are lit) you will see that it's good to have top lights but use them sparingly. Again think of the places that use top lights: hospitals, cheap diners, malls. There is a psychological reason for all the lighting wash - lack of mystery, safety in knowing, cheapness (as there is nothing hidden).
- mg330
That makes sense, yes, so I'll just say this: we don't turn them all on very often, and if so they're usually dimmed. In fact I'm sitting here now with kitchen led lights on, while on the couch, with only the lamp to my left on. It's perfect. But if we need the place to look like it's about to blast off, then we can do that too.
We're getting a nice pendant light to hang above a dining table which will be able to run on it's own. So that, and a couple of lamps do indeed make for some nice "pockets" of light. Totally with you on that. The lights we installed are pretty low way lights, and honestly when it's all on full blast it feels pretty ambient and not collectively bad. I'll say this, if you saw the 8" can lights that were there before, that were shiny silver metal on the inside, and if you looked at them you were blinded. They were gross.
Also, if you see the kitchen lighting, the same halogen lights are there too - not too bright, but generally nice soft ambient light.
- ebertzjaw0
Nice flat and all, but is it natural for a male to obsess over home decor so much?
- mydo0
nice job. I took on a project like this a year ago. (but with less budget) I can completely relate the the pride you must be feeling.
- mydo0
few shots, though i think i had but these in the blog...
- drgs0
and now pics of the girl, please
- you can see her clearly in this pic http://farm8.staticf…********
- is she playing bagpipes in that picture??PonyBoy
- you can see her clearly in this pic http://farm8.staticf…
- ********0
Ohhh man, even better job than I had thought. wow
- cannonball19780
fuck you all. now I have to buy a place. thanks a lot.
- ETM0
Great thing about Ikea cabinets is that they almost never change them. So in 10 years if you want a change, you can usually just buy new doors and swap them out.
- mg330
Woah... I swear I posted photos of the completely finished renovation that we did. I had to get some photos up online for a neighbor to use and realized I never posted any final pics. Thought you'd like to see! It was all pretty much completed August 2012.
- sureshot0
That looks dope! But won't the TV burn?
- Nope. Fireplace kicks out very little heat in the front. TV is high enough to be OK if we used it a lot, which we don't.mg33
- http://www.nextmovie…sureshot
- Hombre_Lobo0
Dude that's stunning! Love the huge windows too.
What state are you in?Great stuff dude.
Qbn 'new-kitchen-warming-party' you say! Awesome!
- mg330
Thank you Hombre! We're in Chicago.
Everything was fully finished just after we got married last summer.
About to redo our two bathrooms starting in August. I'm ecstatic that it won't take more than 6 weeks total.