kitchen inspiration - ross chapin architects

For the cottage projects that I have worked on at Ross Chapin Architects, we have typically put in white painted cabinets with a granite 12x12 tile counter. The look is classic, clean and has always been received well. Fred Kimball of Kimball Woodworks in Port Townsend, has been our cabinet maker of choice. Thinking about it, I realize I've worked with Fred on 70 some homes...repeating plans of course, but still that's a lot of homes. When it came time to choose cabinets for the Karina, to me it was a no-brainer to use Fred. Neil did get 2 other bids just to be sure. One from a much larger company, that was cheaper, but was not a true custom cabinet maker, so we would have had to use standard sizes. Our kitchen doesn't have a lot of extra space, so I wanted to maximize cabinets. The other was a similar outfit and gave a similar price. We are going with the Shaker door style as shown in these photos of past RCA projects, but they will be maple cabinets and we still haven't decided on the countertops.

kitchen inspiration

Many of the open houses we go to tend to be more modern in their detailing. Style is a funny thing to define. I'm not much for labels and find it hard to describe my style. In simple terms, I say traditional with modern detailing or classic with a twist. That's the way we have designed and detailed the Karina as well as our current home. The form may be the classic gable, but some of the detailing and plan layout is modern. Anyway...the kitchens below are all pretty modern.
love this deep stainless steel sink!

kitchen inspiration

Neil and I go to many AIA and other architecturally interesting open houses. Most of the time I can take pictures. I'm not always good at getting the overall picture, due to lots of other people at these open houses and the lighting is not always best, so I tend to take more detail, close in shots. Things like counter edges and how 2 different materials are coming together. Good shots for the files, to see what looks good together. Here are some kitchen shots from the past year.
concrete counters with metal edge
polished granite tiles with metal edge - nice thin dark grout

busy day - appliances

We were up early for a Saturday and out of the house before 8:00am in order to stand outside in the rain with a couple hundred others waiting for the Albert Lee Appliance Warehouse Sale to open. What a very organized mad house that was.
Neil and I split up, and while he went to grab a range, I was able to find the dishwasher we wanted - KitchenAid Architect Series II KUDC03FVSS - stainless steel with the hidden controls for a slightly better price then this.

We met up over in the microwave/hood section and found the matching one to the slide-in range he had found. - Frigidaire Professional 30" Slide In Electric Range FPES3085KF & over the range microwave FPBM189KF - I had previously taken a picture of the two in the store.

Then while Neil was standing in line to pay, I went to look at the washer & dryers. We weren't planning to purchase these today, but these were such a good deal when you calculate in the rebates we can obtain, so these too will be showing up in a couple weeks. Whirlpool washer WFW9400SW & dryer WED9400SW
As Neil pointed out, we did overspend our budget, but we were able to purchase higher quality appliances without going too far out of our range. Plus, there will be more savings once I send in the different brand rebates I found online and the energy star rebates.

appliance selection

One of the easiest decisions we have made to date was picking out the refrigerator on Saturday. I knew that I wanted french doors with bottom drawer freezer, stainless steel and Energy Star, but figured it would still be agonizing like other big purchases. We went to Albert Lee Appliances and within 15 minutes of talking with Aaron, a sales associate there, we had our fridge. KitchenAid KBFS25EVMS - 36" - 24.8 Cu. Ft. It's the first one on the right.

The finish on it was a tad darker than the others and we liked the flat front and square edges instead of more rounded doors. Another thing I loved and had not seen before was the filtered water dispenser inside. It's on the left at the door hinge.

We are waiting on the other appliances to see if we can purchase them at the BIG Albert Lee Warehouse sale in 2 weeks. Aaron was very helpful in helping us narrow down what we should be looking for to match the fridge.