Kitchen Renovation with a Side of Political Economy

So our long-overdue kitchen renovation has begun. We have been in the house for more than 15 years without making any major updates so the project is a complete redo – demolition has already taken the old kitchen down to the studs and floorboards. I’ll be posting pictures of periodic updates, but as we have decamped to Shirlington, VA, I don’t expect to be back more than once a week or so.

In addition to a pictorial record, I’ll also be tossing in the occasional big-picture musing as befits the “arc” conceit of this blog. Rachael and I have stumbled into a world unknown to us – the organized scam of the wallet-lifting kitchen cabinet industry. More on that in another post as well as some thoughts about how the systematic looting of the state by the revolutionary conservative ascendancy has made this project possible for us via increased demand for housing in Washington DC, appreciation of home values and low, low interest rates. It turns out that refinance is a conservative stimulus policy!

But first, let’s go back to the beginning. Our kitchen, as old and cramped and dingy as it was, nevertheless was quite suitable for its basic purpose – the storage, preparation and cooking of food. I saw no reason to make any changes, but there was one small and growing problem:

This was the loose thread that unraveled the entire kitchen.
Anyone reading this probably has firsthand knowledge about how crammed full of stuff the shelves, cabinets and refrigerator were. Faced with the need to get everything out of the kitchen, I discovered sights that I had never seen before:
The hood on the old stove is a good example of how inured one can become to the state of things in one’s own house that nonetheless would be appalling somewhere else (I trust Rachael might wish to edit the pronouns in that sentence).
But enough with memorializing past glories – here’s how the kitchen looked after the first day of demolition:
So much more to come…

1 Comment

  1. The day after demo day is the most exciting day to me. Systems mysteries are solved (or troubles come to light) and the space is a blank slate of potential. Sometimes I miss experiencing it on the regular.

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About Me

Born in Baltimore and raised in Cincinnati, I have lived on both coasts and driven back and forth across the country a number of times. I now have the "midlife opportunity" to do so on two wheels.