Kitchens in South Kensington

Last week I finished a nice little decorating job in South Kensington. A lovely woman wanted a new kitchen put in to her town house just off of Cromwell Road.

When I arrived to go over what she wanted and give her a quotation, the kitchen looked pretty good to me! Lovely marble work tops and solid wood doors. Not your average Ikea flat pack job – not that there is anything wrong with those, in fact I have one myself, and my wife loves it, I think. Anyway, this was a really nice, hand crafted, bespoke kitchen that she wanted to have ripped out and a new one put in because it looked ‘dated’.

Now, being the kind and honest knight in shining armour that I am, I gave her a quote for doing so. However, I then told her that I would unfortunately not be willing to do the job specified in my quotation.

When asked ‘What? Why?’

I then proceeded to go on a 10 minute rant about how she couldn’t destroy such a work of art… that’s right, I’m all of a sudden an interior designer too! Before swiftly drawing out all sorts of squiggles and diagrams of how we could simply sand everything down and re-stain the wood, or paint it, and we could take out one cabinet that would make more space for a huge american style fridge, and then replace the light fixtures with halogen spot lights, and re-tile the splash back, and floor, before painting all the walls a different colour.

I think I may have actually used the term ‘shabby-chic’ for the first time ever… My wife would have been proud. My mates would of hung their heads!

Anyway… surprisingly the customer didn’t chuck me out of her house… in fact she loved the idea, and we got to work straight away.

By the end, it looked like a totally different kitchen, and was well under half the price it would have cost her for a new kitchen.

I guess what I am trying to say here, is you can really think with what you already have in your home, how to work with it, rather than replace it all. This way your home can always look new and up to date, and stay affordable and worth doing!