A big upgrade to our little built-in

Late last year, the exhaustion from our DIY renovation finally started to subside, and we could rest and focus on other things. However, the truth is, even after the physical and mental exhaustion left my body, I never felt fully relaxed, especially at home.

I’m an introvert and a Cancer (not that I pay too much attention to astrological signs, but maybe it’s something), and what I’ve learned about being those two things is that, at my core, I am a homebody. I get energy from being home and occupying a space that feels like mine.

And that was the problem. Yes, we had a new bathroom, new countertops in the kitchen, and nicely refinished wood floors, but we also had half a coat of paint on the kitchen walls, unfinished trim all over the house, and tons of old broken door handles that regularly fell off—yes, I did get stuck in our bathroom at least twice. We were living in a sort of limbo.

After months of complaining and sideways projecting my ongoing anxiety about unfinished projects on Corey, we decided to make a change. January 2024 would be the month of finishing things. We would elevate our home from livable to pretty, cozy, and somewhere we wanted to spend time.

We hired contractors to help us with finishing touches, like painting our unit, turning the dining room doorway into an arched opening, painting the shoe benches Corey built last summer, and more. All of these things made a huge difference, and I’ll eventually share some photos, but the most significant change was deciding to upgrade our dining room built-in.

If you recall, she wasn’t fancy.

The house came with these cabinets under the arch in the dining room. At some point, someone must have added this as a “built-in.” We wish they had never removed what was likely an original wood built-in found in many two-flats, but like many old homes, someone unfortunately did.

Our unit is relatively small (2 beds, 1 bath), and this built-in is the focal point of our home. It’s the first thing you see when entering the unit and the most significant visual element in our living space. This bar wasn’t cutting it for us.

Adding and layering some texture!

We had seen a Jean Stoffer bar with a tile backing and wanted to emulate this style. Our home didn’t have much texture, so we felt like a tile feature would add some depth and character.

We stopped by our favorite tile shop in Chicago and found this dark, slightly textured subway tile. If you followed our bathroom renovation journey on Instagram, you might recall how stressful it was to decide on tile. Unlike those many weeks of endlessly thinking about tile patterns, this was the fastest decision ever! They had this tile in stock, and we just went for it.

Our contractors helped us source scrap granite from another project. What used to be some sort of MDF countertop covered in plastic became natural stone, immediately elevating the dining room.

We were a bit nervous about how the old and pretty cheaply manufactured cabinets would look next to a piece of nice granite. So, Corey decided to paint them himself (because he’s a bit of a perfectionist), and we hoped for the best.

Peel n’ stick. Oh, I have mixed feelings.

Happily, Corey’s paint job came out fantastic, and our tile contractor was able to finish tiling in a matter of hours. We just had to finish the wallpaper element… which was the most hilarious part of this project.

Neither of us had ever done peel-and-stick, and we had no idea if it would turn out looking cheap or if we’d completely botch the whole thing. This part of the project happened late at night and required us to maneuver around on top of the bar awkwardly. Always fun pictures to send your family at 11 p.m. on a Wednesday.

When we were halfway done and feeling pretty confident in our peel-and-stick skills, Corey looked at me and said, “Oh my god, the birds are going to be upside down on one side.”

Lesson learned: Pay attention to wallpaper patterns! We decided to let it slide because there was no way we were re-starting. Happily, no one has noticed the upside-down birds yet… or at least no one has said anything about them. Perhaps we’ll make it right (side-up) one day.

Our new and improved little built-in!

I’m happy to say this project was completely worth it. We added an LED light (we’re trying to layer lighting in our home as best we can) and used these simple cabinet pulls we still had from our tenant unit renovation. The look completely transformed our primary living space, creating a more compelling focal point in the dining room.

We still have to touch up the wallpaper and finish painting around the cabinets, but we are pretty happy with how this project turned out.

Here’s a broader view showing how it matches the style of our dining furniture and pairs against the Roman shades and new neutral wall color! Hello, ever-popular Edgecomb Gray!

So, the moral of the story is…

Small things make a huge difference, and we still enjoy DIY projects. Now that we can scale back and take time, we have more fun with it. We get to decide what we work on versus desperately trying to finish something on a timeline. It’s better. It’s much better. And now we have a lovely little bar we can enjoy for a long time!