Posts in Room Reveals

ONE ROOM CHALLENGE - ANN ARBOR KITCHEN MAKEOVER - Honing Kitchen Counters

If you’re here for the first time, welcome! I’m Jana Bek, an Ann Arbor based interior designer with an emerging lifestyle line of home décor, textiles, & lighting. I have a love for bright colors, bold prints, and designing spaces & home décor that help transport you to your dream destination.

I’m so excited to be participating in my fifth season of One Room Challenge & and a huge thanks to Linda of Calling it Home for organizing!

Here’s a look at my most recent past ORC’s (and you can tour all of them in links below):

Home Office / Breakfast Nook & Great Room/ Atlanta Apartment / Living Room

This round, I’m taking on our kitchen, it currently has a dark 90s dated look, that's completely out of sync with the airy spaces that surround it.

I’ve yet to mention, that one of my husband’s and my favorite things to do is cook together so this renovation is long overdue! I found this photo when looking for interesting “before” photos, it makes me so happy, we have fun:

Now for the major progress we’ve had in the past week!

First, we are about a third of the way done installing our gorgeous Fireclay backsplash and it’s looking incredible, so much lighter & brighter!

A side-by-side to illustrate:

The other game-changer was honing the shiny granite counters, we are thrilled that we pulled the trigger to refresh the granite!

When we started this project, we thought that with all of the other updates, we could live with the sheen. However, we knew it would not look quite right, and that it was ultimately necessary for a ‘finished’ transformation.

I had become enamored with the idea of getting them honed on-site when I stumbled upon Amanda Hessar’s kitchen renovation a few months back and learned it was possible. Here's a look at here own killer kitchen transformation, be sure to check out the full reveal here.

Luckily, my research led me to a highly recommended master fabricator, Brian Keller, with enough experience and skill to be up for the task.

There is little information out there so I hope my learnings may be helpful. Many craftsman are not comfortable doing this on-site; this was actually Brian’s first time honing on location. The process entails a series of wet sanding with various grades of diamond pads; slowly grating off the sheen while ensuring the surface remains level. From the start, Brian admitted he was extremely detail oriented (sometimes to a fault) and I do not know how one could be successful in this task without that quality. The prep work alone – protecting our lower cabinets and portion of newly tiled walls – took great time & care. The price initially sounded expensive ($1,500 for our 60 sq. feet of counter) but it’s very time consuming. Brian spent 16-17 hours on the process and with the amount of tools required, we learned that the price is reasonable, and it proved to be an awesome resolution for our dated counters! When you think about the comparison for replacing, it’s money well spent.

Before:

a look at the process and the matte "after" (which really doesn't show how beautiful it looks):

That’s really it for this week! I am excited to delve into the fun details (new lighting, stools, paint picks) next Thursday and hope you’ll tune in for our progress updates!

In the interim, you can find my scheming on Instagram & pinterest.

Be sure to follow along with the Wednesday group below with my fellow linking participants!

Room RevealsJana BekApril 19, 2017 Comments

One Room CHALLENGE - Ann Arbor Kitchen Makeover Tile Talk

I’m so excited to be participating in my fifth season of One Room Challenge & and a huge thanks to Linda of Calling it Home for organizing!

Here’s a look at my most recent past ORC’s (and you can tour all of them in links below):

Home Office / Breakfast Nook & Great Room/ Atlanta Apartment / Living Room

This round, I’m taking on our kitchen, it currently has a dark 90s dated look, that's completely out of sync with the bright and airy spaces that surround it.

The granite counters are staying, so the new tile for the backsplash was key to our kitchen’s success. It had to be light & beautiful. The wrong pick would just be another 90s version of what we already have.

I immediately knew I wanted to incorporate Fire Clay Tile into the design! They have the perfect line of stunning tile, and a great company story.

Justina Blakeney's Master Bath featuring FCT Deep Blue Hex tile

Each tile is made by hand and that level of craftsmanship really shows. They strive to be as sustainable as possible by consistently using recycled materials & local resources; & their customer service is absolutely top notch (with a great trade program to boot)! They also offer free samples, which not surprisingly resulted in the trickiest decision: choosing between so many beautiful options.

I was able to narrow my selection to a few pieces that fit well with our space, but since my photographer assesses color all day, Marta's opinion was the deciding factor. We went with Kiwi; a pale, yet vibrant shade of green that will beautifully complement the tones in our granite counters.

The original plan was to paint all of the cabinets, but the tile selection proved to be the real game changer leading us to replace the upper cabinets with floating shelves.

Now the tile will go all the way to the ceiling!

It’s going to be a ton of work, but it will be so bright, & make for a complete transformation. Here’s an inspiration image of the look we're trying to achieve:

Coffee Bar in FCT prickley pear glass tile, photo by Malcolm Fearnon

We’ve already made a lot of progress, the demo is complete, the drywall has been repaired, and we're starting to build the floating shelves. The kitchen already looks brighter!

Another awesome bonus about FCT? Since they hand craft each tile, you have the option of glazing or bull-nosing the tile edge so you can forgo a separate trim! My choice: a 3”x6” tile, in a classic subway pattern with a glazed edge. This will be a clean and elegant look.

I know I’ve gotten you pretty hyped up about Fire Clay Tile & you are in luck! They’ve just partnered with two other awesome companies (Joybird & Twyla) in an incredible $5,000 giveaway! Head on over for a chance to kick start your own room makeover!

I hope you’ll come back next week to see my plans & progress! In the interim, you can find my scheming on Instagram & pinterest.

Be sure to follow along with the Wednesday group below with my fellow linking participants!

Room RevealsJana BekApril 13, 2017 Comments

One Room Challenge - Ann Arbor Kitchen Makeover

If you’re here for the first time, welcome! I’m Jana Bek, an Ann Arbor based interior designer with an emerging lifestyle

line of home décor, textiles, & lighting. I have a love for bright colors, bold prints, and designing spaces & home décor that help transport you to your dream destination.

I’m so excited to be participating in my fifth season of One Room Challenge & and a huge thanks to Linda for organizing!

Here’s a look at my most recent past ORC’s (and you can tour all of them in links below):

Home Office / Breakfast Nook & Great Room/ Atlanta Apartment / Living Room

I didn’t think the timing would work out to participate in this season, I literally found out today that it would, and I could not be more excited!

You see, we have wanted to update our kitchen for the longest time and we are finally tackling it. It is the only space in our home that needs real help and it has become the black hole of our abode.

It’s a complete disconnect from the light and airy spaces that surround it:

I’m pretty pumped as I think it’s going to be a total transformation without a major kitchen reno budget. Also, everything is happening very fast, starting with the demoing this weekend. We have AIRBNB guests April 28th so we have to be finished by then!

I hope you’ll come back next week to see my plans & progress! ! In the interim, you can find my scheming on Instagram & pinterest.

Be sure to follow along with the Wednesday group below with my fellow linking participants!

Centsational Girl | Chris Loves Julia | Christine Dovey | Dwell With Dignity

The English Room | Glitter Guide | House of Brinson | House Updated

J+J Design Group | Lark & Linen | Abby Manchesky | Nesting Place

Old Brand New | Old Home Love | The Pink Pagoda | Rambling Renovators

Erica Reitman | Sketch 42 | Suburban B’s | Erin Williamson

Media Partner House Beautiful | TM by CIH

Room RevealsJana BekApril 6, 2017 Comments

One Room Challenge - Living Room Reveal

If you’re here for the first time, welcome! I’m Jana Bek, an interior designer with an emerging lifestyle line of home décor, textiles, & lighting. I have a love for bright colors, bold prints, and designing spaces & home décor that help transport you to your dream destination.

I’m so excited to be participate in my fourth season of One Room Challenge, this go-around I’ve made over our living room.

You can view my initial planning here:

Week I Week II Week III Week 4 Week 5

I could not be more thrilled with how my ORC came together & I’m delighted to share our updated living room with you!

If you recall, my main goal for the space was to make it more inviting. It was an amalgamation of random pieces and it felt as such, an afterthought of a room.

Let’s remember the before:

And now:

The game changers that made the space more relaxation-ready were the properly sized rug, and beautiful, comfortable, leather ottoman & bobbin chairs.

The new paint & addition of window treatments really warmed up the space as well.

When the design was near completion, I was delighted, but everything felt so new (not surprisingly, as the majority of the items are!)

So it was kismet to learn that my friend & stylist guru, Olga Naiman, would be in town and happy to help give the space a more lived-in vibe.

Enter wonderfully curated vintage finds & unexpected art:

To round out my dream team, special thanks to Detroit’s rising star photographer, Marta Perez; and my dear friend, Michelle Adams for letting us borrow last minute pieces from her beautiful abode, & her soon-to-launch shop, The Maryn!