Coming Home
Spring 2020
by The Dream Homeowner
Coming Home: Boy, are we ever!
The kitchen and bathroom cabinets have been selected for My Dream Home. The designer had blocked out 3 hours for me; I got Dear Husband and myself and Chance, the Wonder Hound, out of there in 2 hours! There is nothing like bringing your hound into the Cabinet Design Showroom to SPEED UP the process and clear out all of the wastebaskets, post-lunch.
The time did speed by, except for a minute or twenty when the design computer froze. I was told that going to this small-business-site on Valentine’s Day would be a unique treat for me. And it was unique, in a manner of speaking. I’d no idea of the awful trends being installed into the Modern Kitchen!
There are, for example;
The LeMans shelf unit: Not Daytona, but LeMans, this swing shelf comes out (at you) from behind the plumbing under the kitchen sink. I told Mr. Cabinet that I can still bend and squat to get to the cleanser and Clorox spray under the sink. The physical labor will shorten the length of my routine exercise workout.
Spice rack and towel-drying rack, built-into the space along each side beneath the sink: NO.
And then there is The Hardware!!
I confessed to Mr. Cabinet that the Van Dyke’s Catalogue and I have spent a lot of time together, especially during the past decade when I dreamed of The New Home. Some women go for shoes. For me, it’s knobs, pulls, and handles!
My first choice, made rather quickly, turned out to be the most expensive items in the entire supply place. Solid Bronze! Even more expensive than copper!
Mr. Cabinet suggested a less expensive brand with comparable designs. In less than a minute, I found the cheapo replacements, at 1/2 to 1/3 the costs for, respectively, the Bin Pull and the Handle. My love nonetheless for Sir Solid Bronze remains unabated.
The staff at this local small-business informed me that I hold the record for the quickest choice of cabinet hardware. They even timed me:
3 minutes!
According to these pros, most people agonize over their selections of hardware. The deer-in-the-headlights look is a very common sight. I opined that when you know what you want, why look at 30 more options? These savvy sales specialists had no answer! Their job is to provide 300 more options, most of which take up space and collect dust. The sales assistant spends a lot of time keeping that hardware shiny!
The
Kitchen Hood
was still an undecided item at the time of our afternoon session with Mr.
Cabinet. His schematic showed a
pipe-like design with 5 question marks in the middle. “You kinda gave up on that one,” I verbally
nudged him. His assistant laughed. He did not.
After changing the cabinetry wood from maple to knotty/rustic alder, and reducing the height of the cabinets so that they do not butt up against the ceiling (the effect is, to me, claustrophobic), I was able to choose a vent that fits the space. The Stainless-Steel Industrial Look is not something I favor, ever, having worked in office spaces that did in fact run exhaust venting through them.
The Kitchen Vent, however, is 100% functional, so I reject the mere idea of trying to make the exhaust pipe look like a design function in a Normandy castle.
To coordinate the color with the rubbed bronze hardware and to bring out the darker tones in the alder wood, I selected a blackish-tone hood over the stove. The stainless-steel-industrial models all look like the Tin Man!
Having worked in one too many restaurants, I can assure you that this Chef does not hunger for a restaurant kitchen in her home!
And those hideous subway tiles that are currently so chic! If you’ve ever had to really take the subway, anywhere, but particularly in New York City, the sight of those extreme-function glossy tiles ought to repulse you. The overall effect is not quite as frightening as the ghoulish-celadon green tiles in the darkish Holland Tunnel, where I recall the seeping water trickled down and left lovely rust trails on the surreally-lit tiles. This tunnel was the first under-water tunnel in the U.S., and as a child riding through the thing, I felt certain the water was coming in to get me!
My theory about the current craze for the Modern Urban Industrial Vibe (for domiciles in the sticks, and for urban blobs that produce no industry):
Within the space of three years, the dwellers will all flock, in droves, to Re-model Sites, online and elsewhere. The Designers and Sales Crews know what they are doing!
I await, with impatience, full-sized cabinets and drawers, anywhere and everywhere in my Dream Home. At present, the Rental House contains Dollhouse-Sized cabinets and drawers. I had to spend a good 10 minutes in the Cabinet Design Showroom to acclimate myself to Adult-Sized cabinetry.
My re-entry into Adult Living gave Chance ample opportunity to sniff out the lunch-time burrito remnants in the wastebaskets!
Coming Home with Chance is poetry in motion!
