As many of you already know—whether from our podcast or the Instagram photo we posted—we recently completed our largest renovation to date: a full kitchen overhaul. It was a long project with plenty of highs and lows, and while we’re thrilled with the result we’re also very relieved to have it finished. (Unlike a wedding, there wasn’t nearly enough cake.)
Like our living room and dining room makeovers, which we completed before sharing, we chose to finish this renovation before posting. We learned from earlier projects that stepping away from live-blogging helps us focus on designing the best space for our family instead of chasing content or stressing about a public reveal. Living in the space for a while also lets you test and tweak things—sometimes big changes, sometimes small—without rushing for photos while the dust is still settling.
After living with the new layout long enough to call it “finished” (with big quotes—no room is truly ever done, and Sherry still rearranges the shelves every few weeks), we decided to break the story into several posts. There are so many details and lessons learned, but we’ll cover the main planning decisions and share finished photos along the way. Here are a few shots to start:
To back up a bit: today’s focus is on planning and the decision to completely rework the layout. The new floor plan is the unsung hero of this project and in many ways the hardest part to finalize. It was something we considered from day one of living here. For comparison, here’s how it looked originally:
Our Phase 1 updates—removing some upper cabinets, painting trim and paneling, installing new lighting, adding open shelves, painting and staining cabinets, resurfacing laminate counters with concrete, and replacing appliances when our dishwasher died—made a nice difference. But we still had several functional problems to solve.
Our friend, a kitchen designer, called the original layout “a perfectly nice, single-chef kitchen.” At first we considered leaving the layout and updating finishes, but as our family grew the need to use the kitchen simultaneously became clear. Making school lunches while someone else prepared breakfast, baking with our daughter, and general day-to-day activity highlighted how cramped and inefficient the space felt.
Beyond size, the room felt closed off. The long peninsula blocked the cook from the dining table and made trips between stove, sink, and table cumbersome—especially when juggling kid requests for orange juice, help cutting food, or refereeing minor sibling disputes. Even worse, the prep area felt miles from the living room where the kids usually were during meals. That wall created a separation that left whoever was doing dishes feeling like they were in “kitchen jail,” isolated from the rest of the family. That wall had to go.
We also lacked a practical drop zone for shoes, coats, and bags. Since we enter from the garage directly into the kitchen, we’d been walking through to the foyer to stash backpacks and coats while dumping shoes in a basket under the kitchen desk. That system worked for a while, but quickly became messy: a jumbled shoe basket, shoes left on the floor, bags on counters, jackets tossed on chairs, and a perpetually dirty stretch of floor that needed near-daily sweeping.
At one point we considered adding a wall to carve out a proper mudroom and shifting the kitchen closer to the living room. While that would have created a dedicated entry zone, it brought other trade-offs: awkward appliance placement, a too-small island that couldn’t seat the four of us, and the loss of a kitchen window—this room needs every bit of natural light it can get. In short, it felt impractical.
Instead we adopted a smarter idea we’d seen while working on our book: a hidden mudroom built into cabinetry. The concept is simple—floor-to-ceiling cabinets next to the door that look seamless when closed but open to reveal cubbies for each family member with hooks, baskets, and shelving.
Implementing that idea led to a plan where mudroom function lives inside cabinetry beside the entry. That solved the shoe-and-bag problem while preserving space for appliances and creating an island large enough to seat all four of us. Removing the wall to the living room opened sightlines and sound, and widening the doorway to the dining room improved flow. Once the kitchen expanded to fill the room, a standard 8-foot island looked dwarfed, so we explored larger options.
Most stone counters come in 8-foot slabs, and larger islands typically require a seam. Luckily, Cambria Quartz began offering longer “super slabs,” which allowed us to avoid a seam and create a nearly 10-foot island that fits the space, accommodates four stools, and includes extra base cabinets for storage. The result felt like the right balance of form and function.
Yes, the new kitchen is noticeably bigger than what we started with, but it functions so much better for our family. The main benefits we achieved include:
- Substantially more storage and prep space.
- Relocating the main prep and sink area closer to the table and eaters.
- Stronger visual and acoustic connection between kitchen and living room.
- Dedicated shoe, bag, and coat storage right at the entry.
- An island that provides seating, workspace, and a place for homework and hanging out for all four of us.
We were initially worried the work triangle—sink, fridge, stove—might feel too spread out, but it hasn’t been an issue. Thoughtful storage and organization have made daily routines more efficient. We’ll dive deeper into storage strategies and layouts in a future post.
For now, here are two final shots of the hidden mudroom we built into the cabinetry. It’s two identical, side-by-side floor-to-ceiling cabinets, each with two doors. The kids share the cabinet closest to the dining room (they each get a side), and we share the other. Each cabinet functions like a personal locker with a shoe basket, hooks for coats and bags, a top shelf for small items, and outlets for device charging. We even use the inside of the doors for photos, calendars, and reminders. It’s been a total game changer.
Next we’ll walk you through demolition and reconstruction with plenty of before-and-after photos, including some gnarly shots of the room stripped down and rebuilt. We have a lot of details and lessons to share, so stay tuned—more posts are coming soon. In the meantime, I’ll be enjoying not having to walk around a peninsula dozens of times each morning. Hallelujah.
P.S. If you’re curious about paint colors, rugs, lighting, or furniture used in any room, we created a page with those details and sources.