The kitchen is coming on; I’ve spent the last week tiling and grouting what will be the dishwasher and sink area before laying a laminate floor and I’ve started putting together a housing cupboard for the former. Added to this is some further tongue and groove and some work on a leaky upvc door.
In this post, though, I’m going to talk about the dishwasher area. Regular readers know that I aim to put our kitchen together by using salvaged and upcycled pieces of furniture as much as possible. This has meant breaking down pieces of furniture with pleasing details to reuse elsewhere, adding additional details with wood appliqués and adapting pieces. I’ve discovered it takes time, and on the way to being satisfying, seems to be a method that regularly detours into the location of frustration.
Whilst working on the cupboard like structure to house the dishwasher I primarily wanted to use this sideboard to do it…..
This was the cupboard that came with us from our rental when we moved to France (it’s the one on the bottom). In the above image it’s painted yellow, which was my original colour scheme. I’d bought it in a brocante for less than €30; the price was so low because it was huge and therefore unsuitable for a good many homes. Originally it was used to hold our tv, but wasn’t suitable for the location in our new home. So I thought I’d use it as a kitchen island, then I was going to put a sink in it; but the necessity to change the location of the range oven to the back wall meant that it wasn’t feasible to keep it in its entirety.
As I’d already bought an additional cupboard to use as an island, I gradually stripped it of useful parts, and now the remainder is being use for the dishwasher. The main parts I wanted to use are the side struts with the carved details on them. However it was still being bookmarked for the island when we had the electric work done, and so it was going to be set with plugs sockets. As a result both sides had an oval shape removed from the wood to insert electrical points and they needed to be disguised.
In addition to the holes on the side of the cupboard it didn’t have sufficient depth for the dishwasher. Having tried different things I eventually came up with using the central door panel and facade of the drawer to give extra detail to the cupboard side and cover the hole. Here’s what this looked like in its preparation stage, with the panels glued on. I’d had to weigh it down by….well, everything.
It was fine to use the alternative side to extend the piece as I only needed the front, detailed corner panel as I planned to fit that directly against the wall.
The ‘cupboard’ also needed additional height. I found these lovely blocks of wood leftover from replacing beams in one of the garages to stand the cupboard on. As they weren’t quite long enough for the left hand side, nor wide enough to cover the front, decorated part of the cupboard, I had to adapt them. Here’s what they looked like after a first coat of varnish….
With only one coat of varnish the addition is obvious. However I’ve now added more and you can barely notice it, particularly with the panel details distracting the eye. But you’ll see that when I post the end result.
The additional wood has been attached straight away to the cupboard post end, which is to be attached to the wall; but I was yet to attach the other side.
I painted the main part in chalk paint. I always use chalk paint for salvaged furniture as if there’s any type of irregularities, like the seam where the two pieces of wood are added together, I can add a thicker layer of paint, then sand it back to a smooth finish. You couldn’t do this with latex paint.
In the image below is the strut that I’ve placed on the wall which will have the left side panel attached to it. I added strong glue to the side that will be attached to the wall, put the cupboard side in place and then held the strut firmly against it so it was in the right place. Then I marked where the strut was prior to removing the cupboard side carefully. The mark enabled me to ensure that it had kept the position.
Here’s the housing cupboard attached to the struts…
Here’s the exterior of the cupboard…..
….and here it is with the worktop attached and dish rack above. I’m going to do a post about the worktop next as there’s been a knock in effect with the added cupboard depth which needs resolving. But here it is in it’s current form…
I think that seam from the additional piece of wood is hardly noticeable now. Obviously all the T&G isn’t painted; I work on an area and then move on. This is because if I can’t adapt a piece I may end up reviewing how to get what I want, and this can have an effect for additional work. So, as they say in France, petit par petit l’oiseau fait son nid!
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