This Victorian kitchen sports a wood floor and dark stained cabinets.
Kitchens in the 1880s were either Colonial or Victorian in style. Colonial kitchens from the first half of the 19th century revolved around a central fireplace and were furnished with rustic, handmade furniture. The Victorian era spanned the second half of the century and Victorian kitchens offered more modern conveniences. Both types of kitchens can be designed with today's modern families in mind without sacrificing their unique characteristics. Does this Spark an idea?
Instructions
Colonial
1. Install a fireplace or place your stove in an alcove with a mantel above it. Display antique cooking utensils on the mantel. Place a Windsor rocker close to a fireplace. Set cast-iron pots on the hearth and display pewter dishes and cups on the mantel.
2. Lay a pine plank floor. Distress it to evoke the wear that would have come with everyday use before you stain and seal it. Paint the floor with a checkerboard pattern or cover it with a floor cloth made of oil or dot with rag rugs for splashes of color.
3. Suspend copper and cast-iron pots and pans and other kitchen utensils like colanders from a rustic pot hanger. Install beams on the ceiling. Hang bunches of herbs, dried flowers and baskets from them.
4. Hang unadorned, Shaker-style cupboards. Paint them an authentic Colonial color. Install black iron hinges and pulls. Display crocks, pottery dishes and wooden bowls on open shelves.
5. Dine at a pine plank farm table. Cover it with a coarse linen table cloth or a cotton one with a quilt design. Surround it with bow-back Windsor chairs or ladder-back chairs with rush seats.
6. Select butcher block counter tops. Substitute an antique chopping block for a center island.
7. Store linens, crockery, food and glassware in an antique pie safe or canning cupboard.
Victorian
8. Buy reproduction appliances like electric or gas stoves designed to look like the wood and coal cook stoves found in an authentic Victorian kitchen. Cover refrigerator doors with oak to simulate an oak icebox or include an antique one and use it for canned and dry goods storage.
9. Lay wood floors. Leave them bare or cover with rag rugs. Opt for tile. Choose a vinyl floor covering to simulate the linoleum found in some Victorian kitchens.
10. Install bed-board wainscoting on the walls. Paint it white. Use textured paint or sponge paint the wall above it to look like plaster. Paint it a deep, jewel hue or choose wallpaper with a Victorian rose print. Cover the ceiling with decorative tin panels. Install crown molding around the top of the wall under the ceiling.
11. Furnish your kitchen with cupboards that take their cue from the ornate, dark furniture of the Victorian era. Choose cupboards stained in dark colors. Opt for those that resemble hutches or kitchen cabinets.
Substitute an antique or reproduction sideboard for a kitchen island. Hang a reproduced or refurbished electrified gaslight chandelier above it.
12. Put in a porcelain or zinc farmhouse sink. Choose granite or marble countertops.
Tags: cast-iron pots, cover with, furniture Victorian, look like, pine plank, Substitute antique, Victorian kitchen