Stone Cottage Kitchen Design Plan

As The Buffalo Stone Cottage designs have started taking shape, I am SO EXCITED.  Like, I can’t contain myself.  It’s shaping up to be my favorite house ever.  It already feels special with its small footprint and the meaning for us during this season of simplifying.  But it has so much character!  Renovating a smaller house leaves more room for little touches we’ve always wanted to do that just cost too much in a bigger house.

But I think that with each house we do, I learn more and more what I like and my tastes change and take more shape.  While I’ve loved every house we’ve done, each one feels more and more me.

Yesterday, I shared the layout for our small kitchen.  It will be the center of this home, as kitchens are for many of us.  It’ll also be the main focal point of this house, visible from the front door and framed by a wood beam to really make it stand out.  So, I’ve put the most thought into this room’s design of really any in the house.

First, let’s take a look at the inspiration.  When I started brainstorming this kitchen, I didn’t have colors or exact finishes in mind, but rather a feeling…

From top to bottom/left to right: Image 1 | Image 2 | Image 3 | Image 4 | Image 5

As I started saving images I loved, I realized they all had one thing in common.  They felt COLLECTED.  No gleaming, spotless kitchens caught my eye.  I wanted something that felt lived-in, like someone clearly is at home there, loves it, and cooks for their family.  I loved that there were pots and pans displayed, herbs growing, canisters of flour….all the things that make a kitchen useful were out and displayed.  I was so drawn to the country, collected feel of these like they belonged in some beautiful, old country house somewhere where meals prepared for the family were a labor of love and a big part of each day.

As I said in my design plan for this house, so much of what I’m envisioning stems from what this house means to us and how we’ll use it as a family.  I’ve fallen in love with cooking for and with our family.  I love trying recipes, baking, and as our kids grow, want to make cooking more of an event, rather than just the meal.  I want our kitchen to reflect that.  As I was planning this kitchen, I kept going back to a quote Jen Hatmaker used in her “Food” chapter in 7 (the book you ALL need to read from my story videos – the one that changed the course of our life).

Yes.  Using the kitchen and time there with family to “mold our families’ tastes and zest for life.”  That is exactly what a kitchen should be to me and what I’ve been craving!  While I don’t think you need any certain kitchen design or element to make this happen…I think you can do it in absolutely any space if you’re intentional, this idea did shape my vision of what this kitchen was to be for us.

So, this became my single goal for planning this kitchen.  COLLECTED.  And not collected in a design sense, but in a real way, as in these things we literally use in our kitchen.   I’m going for a functional room surrounded by things we use, things we love, things that invite us in and inspire us to create.

Then, I had to figure out what that looked like to me.  I wanted the design of the kitchen to be fitting of an old country house and to be the style I loved, so I started planning.  While I love colorful kitchens, I became drawn to an all-white base for several reasons.  Here’s the base we’re going with:

First off, we’re going with all-white cabinets.  This was a bit of a hard decision for me.  While we’ve had an all-white kitchen before and I LOVED it, I did love the green cabinets in our current kitchen.  But to me, collected says layered pattern, textures, and finishes.  All-white seemed like the right base to allow me to really play with layering pattern on top.  We’re going with a shaker style, but has a bit of a bevel instead of hard edges.  We did strict shaker in our current kitchen with hard edges and it was horrible to clean.  Everything just sits there.  The walls will be white shiplap.  I love the texture they provide and few things say old country house to me like shiplap.  I love that they’ll provide architectural value and texture while keeping with the all-white base.

For countertops, my first instinct was to go with my beloved white granite.  I love the look of white marble, but just have never been able to go with it.  I’ve heard bad things about its’ durability.  With kits and how we work in the kitchen and live life, I know it’s going to get a lot of wear and tear.  I want Rosie on a stool beside me learning to bake and me not worrying about how much she spills or having to frantically wipe it up behind her.  I loved the white marble-looking granite options I’ve found in the past.  In our last house, we used Pretoria White.  In The Buffalo Bungalow, we used River White because the current batch of Pretoria White was too gray.  Did y’all know that?  Granite is natural, so the slabs change over time.  Don’t buy it without going and seeing a slab locally!

We have LOVED both granites and I can’t recommend it enough!  The only issue with this kitchen for me is that they’re a little busy.  They have a lot of grey veining and while I loved the statement that made in both previous kitchens, I wanted something just a little cleaner and subtler with the other design elements I planned to layer on top of this kitchen.  Plus, they both have changed a lot since we used them.  They’re much grayer now and I wanted as white as possible. I went to our local supplier and looked at tons of options and Carrera Quartz won out.  It’s man-made, but definitely looks like marble to me.  The grey veining is really subtle AND it’s incredibly durable.  Plus, it’s slightly cheaper than the white granites now, so that’s a win-win.

We’ll be using a lot of white in this house…shocker, I know!  I love me some white walls.  We’ll be going with the same white paint we used in The Buffalo Bungalow on all the walls in the main area, the kitchen walls, and the cabinets: Benjamin Moore Chantilly Lace.  This is a lovely white that’s bright and not too creamy without being cold.

That makes up our white base.

Okay, now for the super fun part!  What am I layering on top?  I’ll be partnering with Wayfair on the details for this kitchen: taking a white base and giving it some serious eclectic style.  Well first, this inspiration image is key.

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I’ve long wanted to do some patterned tile and I fell in love with this shot where the patterned tile was just in a panel behind the hood.  Since the hood will be centered on that main wall and is the main focal point, this is the perfect spot for this!  I’m using a lot of blue/gray and tan/gray in this house, so I had those colors in mind when choosing tile.  Here she is, friends:

This gorgeous, patterned, old-feeling tile from Wayfair will be the focal point of our kitchen.  Like I said, it’ll be a countertop to ceiling panel behind the hood.  It’ll go about 18″ past the stove on each side and I’ll be bringing in some brass sconces on either side of the hood.  The rest of the walls will be shiplap.  While patterned tile is so popular now, it’s made after old, old, old tiles and I love the weathering on these.

Here’s a look at where I’m headed with the collected country details:

Tile | Rustic Brass Cage Pendant Fixture | Brass Sconces | Tinware Enamel Mugs | Delta Champagne Bronze Faucet | Enamel Platter | Vintage Rug (from eBay) | Pottery Teacups | Large Round Cutting Board | Blue Pots for Herbs | Pig Serving Bowl

I love that these items bring in a lot of the rustic, country vibe we’re going for in this house, but have a bit of a twist to them.  Enamelware with brass?  Those kinds of combos make my heart sing!  I didn’t include this above, but we’ll be doing another farmhouse sink, of course!  I love the idea of that farmhouse sink and brass faucet.  I’ll be bringing in a lot of herb plants and will be displaying our functional items wherever I can to make them handy.  

I absolutely can’t wait to see this kitchen come to life and then to enjoy cooking in it!