Kitchen

Color Style Guide: White Kitchen Ideas and Designs

When it comes to designing a white kitchen, you want to try and avoid creating a sterile look. The white kitchen ideas in this post will show you how to add warmth and texture to your space.

Add Warmth

A completely white kitchen can look a bit sterile. You can always add in some color through the feature and decor pieces. Blue and white, black and white are some good color combinations.

Here are some ways to add a pop of color into a white kitchen: hang up a colorful art piece (seen in picture (1)), use a colorful area rug, or hang up some colorful hand towels.

Another way to spice up a white kitchen design is to infuse it with natural materials, such as wood and stone. Look for bare wood cabinet doors, or countertops. The chairs you use could be wooden, bringing in shades of brown into the kitchen. Or how about using wicker and wooden storage containers (Kitchen Storage Ideas and Organization Tips). The window frames for the kitchen could be unpainted wooden ones, just like the kitchen in picture (4).

You can also add pops of green and other colors by placing potted plants around the kitchen.

Add Texture

See if you can add some subtle texture to your kitchen surfaces and walls. For example marble has a subtle grey texture to it. This can be used for countertops, backsplashes, tiling, or even shelving – check out the marble shelves in the post here.

Even using white subway tiles creates a subtle pattern on a wall.

Quick Design Tips

If you have a small kitchen look to get cabinets and countertops with glossy surfaces. Theses glossy surfaces bounce the light around the kitchen making the space feel larger
For a more modern kitchen look, try and avoid handles on the cabinets. Instead have cabinets that push pop to open, or have a groove handle carved out.

Here are some other kitchen posts to get ideas from:

image credits 1/2/3/4/5/6

April 26, 2016 in Color Palettes, Kitchen

Color Design Guide: Purple Kitchen Decor Ideas

Here are the questions you need to ask yourself when designing a purple kitchen.

How Much Purple?

You could go all out, and paint all of the walls and even the ceiling purple. Or you could create a more toned down purple kitchen by painting all of the walls white, and then decorate the space with purple feature pieces.

What Shade of Purple?

The shade of purple you choose for your kitchen will really make a difference on how the space will look and feel. A light purple paint color will make the kitchen feel bright, spacious, and airy. While a dark purple will make the kitchen feel cozy and luxurious.

Which Pieces Should Be Purple?

If you are going with a white base for your kitchen, here are some ideas for what decor pieces in the space could be purple to create the overall purple color scheme for the kitchen:

A purple tile backsplash
Purple cabinet doors – check out my post on DIY closet doors to find ideas on how to give your kitchen cabinet doors a make over.
A purple area rug can be placed under a kitchen table if you have one
If you have any curtains these could be purple
Even purple hand towels help style a kitchen purple
If you have any pendant lights or table lamps, these could have purple lamp shades

Here are some other posts to get ideas from:

image credits 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8

April 25, 2016 in Color Palettes, Kitchen

Color Style Guide: Red Kitchen Decor Ideas and Designs

The first question that you’ll want to ask yourself when creating a red kitchen design is “how much red?”. You can see in the mood board above that each kitchen has a different amount of red infused into the design. The red kitchen decor ideas in this post will help you transform your space.

How Much Red?

Just by having red cabinets you can create a red color palette for your kitchen. Have a look at the kitchen in picture (1). Everything else can be a different color (the countertop, the backsplash), and you’ll still have a red color scheme.

Or another option can be seen in picture (2) where just the backsplash is red, and everything else is a neutral color such as white.

Even just by having a completely neutral color palette for the whole kitchen (using either white, off white, or grey), you can have just one red piece in the room and you’ve styled the space red. This could be a red backsplash, or a red fridge (5). Your whole kitchen could be white, and then have a red kitchen door.

Red Kitchen Decor and Accent Pieces

Here are some ways to style a kitchen in red:

Give your cabinet doors a red make over (DIY Challenge: Give Your Closet Doors a Makeover)
Hang up some red curtains. Or if you have red walls, and want to break up all of that red then use another color, such as white or grey.
If you have a kitchen table in your space, this can be turned red. Either by painting it or by using a red tablecloth.
And you can always spice up your walls by adding some layers or textures to it. How about using wainscoting, this can be painted over red to match the walls (The Finishing Touch: Wainscoting Ideas and Designs). Or how about using a red wallpaper with a subtle pattern or design. Another option is to create an elegant design using paint – a brush can create a linen effect, while a sponge can create a marble look (Textured Painting Ideas). Then there is always the option of going with red tiles.

Here are some other kitchen posts for more ideas:

image credits 1/2/3/4/5/6

April 18, 2016 in Color Palettes, Kitchen

Color Guide: Grey Kitchen Ideas

A neutral color scheme (grey, white, off white) is always a good color scheme for a kitchen. These neutral shades create a timeless kitchen design. One option is to create a grey minimalist kitchen style, or add pops of color through the decor or feature pieces.

Here are some grey kitchen ideas that will help you design and style your space.

The Walls of Your Kitchen

When most people think of a ‘grey kitchen’, they’ll imagine a space with grey walls. This is one option, to paint all of the walls grey. But you could also paint all of the walls white and still have a grey kitchen.

If you paint the walls white, you can still style the space grey by using grey curtains, or a grey kitchen table cloth. Check out the ‘Styling the Kitchen Grey’ section below for more ideas on how to style a grey kitchen.

Luxury Grey or Light Grey

Whether you do paint the walls grey or only decorate the space with grey pieces (or both), the shade of grey you use will really impact the style and feel of the room.

A dark grey color kitchen palette, will feel more luxurious, and secluded. While light grey kitchen walls will make the space feel open, airy, and spacious. You can see how the shade of grade makes a big difference in pictures (1) and (6).

Color Style Guide: White Kitchen Ideas and Designs

Styling the Kitchen Grey

Here is a quick list of items around the kitchen that can be grey to style the kitchen:

Grab a can of paint and DIY yourself some grey kitchen cabinets (DIY Challenge: Give Your Closet Doors A Makeover – Ideas and Design Tips)
Or go with grey countertops
Look for grey curtains
How about using a grey table cloth or a grey kitchen table
Or grey seat cushions
See if you can get a grey centerpiece
There are grey light fixtures, lamp shades
Hang up some black and white photos/paintings in a grey frame
Go for a grey kitchen backsplash (21 Kitchen Backsplash Ideas and Design Tips)
Laydown some grey kitchen rugs
Or hang up some grey kitchen towels

Pops of Color

If you want to create a minimalist kitchen style, then stick with a grey and white kitchen color palette. This means taking out (or storing away) any items in the kitchen that are not white or grey.

You can always add colorful pieces into your grey kitchen. But I would stick to 1 to 2 colors. Any more that that and you start to take away from the overall grey color scheme of the kitchen. Some good color combinations include: