Interior designer Charlotte Cooney of Domestic Arts shares experience collaborating with client on historic remodel.
We’re pleased to announce that our recent historic kitchen remodel in Ladd’s Addition has been selected by the Bosco-Milligan Foundation’s Architectural Heritage Center (AHC) for the 2012 Kitchen Revival Tour. The tour, in its 14th year, will be held Saturday, April 14th from 10am to 4pm. Tickets are $20/25. Here’s what the AHC says about the event:
If you are thinking of renovating your own kitchen or maybe you just love seeing inside some of Portland’s wonderful vintage homes, regardless of the reason, this tour will delight you. Eight homes have been carefully selected by our AHC Kitchen Revival Tour selection committee to display a variety, from intact original kitchens, to those painstakingly restored to reflect the home’s original style.
Last week, in “Ladd’s Addition remodel restores kitchen to historic roots,” we shared perspectives and quotes from the client, David, and Hammer & Hand’s supervisor for the project, Alex Daisley.
Photography by Mitchell Snyder Photography.
Today I had the pleasure of speaking with interior designer Charlotte Cooney of Domestic Arts about the project and about her experience working with the client.
“It was a dream job,” Charlotte told me. “I’m sure the clients were happy to get their kitchen back, but from our perspective the project could have gone on forever. This happens sometimes… something to do with chemistry. The ideas just flowed, and David is so creative.”
In our post last week David described how he had been planning the kitchen remodel for 13 years, ever since he and his partner purchased their Craftsman home. He clearly brought some serious design skills to the table.
“Even though Kevin Fischer (of Alice Designs) and I did a lot of detailing and design work, in some sense it was more a process of just getting out of David’s way,” Charlotte told me. “He had a really refined notion of what the space should become.”
The client’s passion for period was an inspiration throughout the project.
“David has such a great eye, and he and his partner have these great collections of things,” said Charlotte. “We all had fun incorporating those into the design – an old kitchen table, old shades for light fixtures, an old stove. Even though everything is brand spanking new now, the old stuff fits seamlessly. It’s a challenge to do that!”
To a person, the project team was devoted to creating a modern kitchen that paid meaningful homage to the home’s historic roots. Sometimes that meant a path of research and discovery that ended in simplicity.
“For the checkerboard floor we spent weeks researching patterns used in that period, some of them quite elaborate,” said Charlotte. “We worked on it for weeks and then the simplest checkerboard solution emerged. But it was great for all of us. We had time to explore, but the simplest is often the best.”
“It was just so fun.”
– Zack
(For more about our services, visit our kitchen remodeling page.)
