This new kitchen and dining room needed some final touches to warm it up and finish it off.
The homeowner reached out to me via my Instagram subscriber group regarding suggestions for lighting. I felt like I could give her some ideas there along with a few additional recommendations I could make that she could work on, as she wanted.
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I love a good decorating Q&A, let’s see her pics.
The kitchen was recently redone, but she is now worried it is just a little too white.
I do like the wood toned island, the color of the floor and the black cabinet hardware.
The dining table is a similar color combo with warm wood and black on the chairs.
My Recommendations:
To me, the style of this kitchen leans modern farmhouse, so I’m not going to deviate too far from that.
I do feel like we can warm up this kitchen more by adding warm elements to the top half of the kitchen.
(I’ve written a blogpost about that, here.) >>> How To Make Your Boring, All-White Kitchen Look Alive
Woven wood shades, lighting with some textural shades and some black for delineation and to relate to the cabinet hardware could mix things up a bit.
Here’s a quick onlay of that color to see how it looks.
I didn’t want to get too “wicker” with the shades, as I didn’t see this as a coastal kitchen.
Although these pendants are a little pricey, I like the size, shape and texture these have.
I think the dining room can be just a black finish, medium sized chandelier but some warm toned linen shades could be added to this fixture if desired. Since this is the dining room and breakfast room, I wanted there to be ample ambient light.
I’ve written a thorough blogpost on how to select kitchen pendants and breakfast room lighting here.
Kitchen and Breakfast Room Pendant / Chandelier Pairings - With Tips!
I definitely think the addition of woven woods or grasscloth type shades on the doors and window would add a lot of warmth to the kitchen.
If the shades are added, then she could do a pendant something like this, below, as a less expensive option. She wouldn’t need the grasscloth textural look of the pendant shades so much, if she did the window shade.
I also think there needs to be some kind of wood furniture on the wall in the dining area. That wall is pretty blank.
I’d do a simple console with some art above. This piece looks to be in keeping with the style of the kitchen.
Here’s that look all on a storyboard together. I’d frame that simple piece of art in a black frame for a more modern look. I love the simplicity of the console with the little finger-pull diamond cut-outs. :-)
Modern Farmhouse Kitchen Storyboard - Finishing Touches, Option 1 | carlaaston.com
I also like the idea of even doing a tall hutch type piece on that wall, if they needed more storage. They could put some colorful ceramics or cookbooks here on the shelves.
Textural drawer fronts and warm wood work well on this tall hutch for the dining area. | carlaaston.com
Another suggestion I wanted to make was for the counter stools. Their dark leather ones looked heavy and were creating a dark mass visual there at the island. I thought it would benefit from some stools that were lighter in scale and had some light colored upholstery.
(Once these get dirty or stained it would be easy to recover these seats in a light colored performance fabric, for more durability.
I like the touches of black and the interesting look of these stools.
Here’s how this combo looks together.
Modern Farmhouse Kitchen Storyboard - Finishing Touches, Option 2 | carlaaston.com
If you want to check out my subscriber group on Instagram, you can subscribe on my profile. There’s a button that says “Subscribe” and it is $2.99 a month. You can ask a question about your interior every month, we do the Q&A typically on the first Saturday. :-)
Another way to get even more attention on your design dilemmas is Designed in a Click, my email design service. You get up to 4 questions and can submit up to 5 photos.
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This blogpost was thoughtfully written by me, Carla Aston, and not by AI, ghostwriters, or guest posters.