APARTMENT KITCHEN

When we found out we were going to be moving, I was quite upset. One might have thought it was because we were leaving our home town, moving to a huge scary city, or having my first baby thousands of miles from friends and family. While I eventually did get upset over these things - my knee-jerk tears were over leaving my house. More specifically - my kitchen.

I spent the better part of the last 2 years making our kitchen to-die-for. We hand-picked granite, painted cabinets, installed stainless steel appliances, slaved over a subway tile back splash, and replaced the florescent lighting with a beautiful chandelier. You see? It was well worth the tears.

Moving to NYC, we didn't even see our apartment until the day we moved in! I was told our kitchen was an all white galley kitchen. So off to Pinterest I went. And that is where I found my inspirations above. There's not much you can do with an itty bitty kitchen in a rent space, but I got an idea for the coloring I wanted. I was going to bring in the natural wood/baskets and stainless steel as much as I could.

I wasn't sure how long we would be staying in this apartment, so I wanted to keep it minimal but still utilize all the extra space potential (although I was super tempted to wallpaper the back wall).

Here's what I came up with:

The trash can is from Costco, the shelving and canisters are from IKEA. Everything else on the shelves are the dishes we use most often. With limited storage and no pantry, I had to get creative.

Looking for extra space in an otherwise small kitchen? Find some walls - back walls or even under the cabinets. Not only does it look great, it doesn't take up space that you don't have (I wanted to put an actual piece of furniture shelving against the back wall to home-y up the space - but I quickly realized that our dishwasher then wouldn't open... and this momma is NOT hand-washing dishes for a piece of furniture. Hence the floating stainless shelving...)!

All in all, mission accomplished. There's not many outdated white kitchens that I feel are decorated well, and while this is far from a dream kitchen - it's crisp and clean and has a great neutral palette.

Enjoy!