A manifesto against the tyranny of luxury kitchens.
Before the internet, you only had to keep up with the Joneses… They were real people who lived next-door and probably drove a Corvette.
And even if you might have liked their car for yourself, you knew for a fact that they wore too much cologne, misused the word Machiavellian, and were just generally unlikable people who let their dog poop in everyone’s yard.
You used to have to subscribe to Town & Country or Architectural Digest if you wanted to feel bad about your house… But then the internet came along—eradicating every shred of reality and replacing it with Christopher Peacock.
Now you can discover for FREE, any time of day or night, that your kitchen, your bathroom, your entire house… actually, your whole life is so subpar that it’s amazing you haven’t flat out died.
The internet has given the entire home-luxury-design-industry access to the inside of our minds at all times. This is extra convenient for them because they can constantly remind us that anything less than a kitchen filled with glamour and elegance and a wine refrigerator is just sad… so, so, so sad.
And the sadder your life looks, the fancier the faucet you will buy – advertising 101.
(Incase you are wondering where on the sadness-scale my life falls, apparently it is here. I am pretty sure that faucet would make me a better person.)
But eventually I will have to replace that faucet… Because it will go out of style. Because all of this is a trend.
A TREND.
The most expensive trend ever—white, white, white, white, splash of soapstone for contrast, white, white, white.
But someday Christopher Peacock will be the equivalent of the ubiquitous oak cabinetry from the 80’s. Remember country kitchens?
DON’T YOU REMEMBER?
Soon there will be a whole new trend. (Once they figure out how to make something more expensive.)
I personally think it should be THE-KITCHEN-I-HAVE-IS-FINE trend. We should all STOP redoing our kitchens. It is MADNESS people. Do you have a stove? A refrigerator? A place to rinse stuff and chop it? Then you HAVE A KITCHEN.
This is my message for the day—acceptance. Accept the kitchen you have. A new one will not bring you health or happiness. (Except, maybe the one below.)
Let us band together and KEEP the kitchen we have. Let us embrace oak cabinetry from 1980.
Let us rise up against the tyranny of stainless steel.
There is nothing wrong with your taupe electric range.
And Formica!
Let us bring Formica back!
I mean, I personally am not planning to do that. I write a blog about restoring our house… therefore I am legally obligated to bring new meaning to whimsy and creativity and a mindbogglingly giant range hood.
Infact, I will probably be required to travel to a small town in Italy to mine the marble slabs myself.
When I get home, I will do a peppy post about DIY-mining your own marble. And I will include tips about where to find delicious artisanal (gluten free!) pastries made by villagers who have been growing specialty grains for over 900 years.
I will be sure to annotate the pictures for Pinterest with captions that are overlaid with squiggles and dots and three different fonts. (So that it will appeal to both four year olds, and women who are shopping for kitchen counters.)
May 28, 2014 @ 2:02 pm
Hear hear!
May 28, 2014 @ 2:06 pm
What a great “contentment” nerve you have hit! Love the post and the comments! I have had the granite counters with requisite wood block touches here and there, white farmhouse everything…and loved it! Then, down-sized to sturdy honey-oak cabs and purposefully kept them to live within limitations and see what I could do. Created a lovely kitchen with black iron bin pulls on lowers, restaurant shelf all around underneath the uppers, neutral small tile backsplash, display of only white ironstone on open shelving. Even kept the black appliances until they live out their days. Always have sprays of leafy branches and herbs from the yard and love the natural palette of green with brown, black, and white, AND the satisfaction of living abundantly on less.
May 28, 2014 @ 2:09 pm
…nuf said. you said it all.
100% agree.
my life is so so so so so sad….
but….
somehow I can get up everyday and somehow smile as I was dishes in my porceline sink and plastic faucet. :o)
May 28, 2014 @ 2:13 pm
I was right there withya…until I saw the St Charles of NY kitchen-my heart be still I want that sink, and counter and cabinets and…
ps I didn’t know they made $2400 faucets
May 28, 2014 @ 2:32 pm
I Love white marble and put it in my kitchen when I finally could afford to redo it. (many many years of pulling out the refrigerator to get to the cupboard that held the good dishes, only counter top was a 24″ square table that I pulled out of my Grandmother’s potting shed and laid a piece of butcher block on) What I want to say about marble counters and wood floors is “Let It Live” seal it and let it live. How do you think all that beautiful old marble got that patina? Why do so many people think everything needs to be and stay perfect? My mantra “Let It Live”!
May 28, 2014 @ 2:32 pm
What I don’t get is all the gray we’re seeing in decorating these days. I keep thinking it’s trendy and going to go out of style any minute and yet it is still out there! It’s so cold and dirty looking, like dust is everywhere. And all of these women putting in gray grout, etc., are going to be stuck with huge headache when the trend is over and they’re stuck!
May 28, 2014 @ 2:37 pm
Hear hear! Honestly, I never feel guilty about my kitchen because it came with the house we could afford. One day we will spruce her up, but for now, she is white, I HATE WHITE, but she is functional and I have a wonderful view of my pretty backyard.
We covet. All of us. But the reality is, those above kitchens have staff and are not really “lived in”. They are lonely spaces at times who don’t know what it is like to have sauce spilled on their expensive imported marble or to have people laughing as someone spills some wine. It does not get to “live” as other kitchens get to live and that is okay. Also, my brother works or an interior designer who, ahem, works on very very pricey homes. He has seen five year old and younger kitchens get ripped out so someone can have their “vision”. Freakin’ shame.
Now, that faucet….
May 28, 2014 @ 2:38 pm
i think that as long as you do something as durable and timeless as the antique home you are living in, to replace atrocities of the more recent past, you are doing something important and worthwhile. in fact, as an antique home owner, it is something of a moral imperative that you do not give in to trends, but give the home a kitchen that truly suits it and has the potential to withstand another century of use, standing up to both the physical wear-and-tear and to the stylistic test of time (its style should age in tandem with the house itself). i think this means durability is a priority above fanciness, but since your home is victorian, you can rightfully pull off an appropriate degree of fanciness!
just remember a lot of those photos you’re drooling over, you haven’t touched or used, and could very easily be shoddily constructed. i’ve seen a LOT of this fake-fancy in newer construction, especially homes of the super wealthy, where it’s all a facade: no beautifully grained solid wood, no exquisite joinery, a bunch of cheap modern hardware made of steel and coated with very fake looking “patinas” (even if they look real, they’ll scratch off & look terrible in short order). in a lot of the photos you see can’t tell you this, but trust me, it’s more common than not. you’re best off spending a limited budget getting quality materials (even if that means somewhat less ornate cornices than you originally pictured, or saving room for them and installing them later from a separate budget) b/c they’ll age gracefully. but you obviously already know this. and hardware/plumbing fixtures, look for antiques. they cost the same as high end new stuff (or less) but they’re of significantly higher quality, and you won’t look like you picked your home out of a magazine (you’ll create a far more dignified look).
and now for a PSA: if you can at all afford to do away with formica (or any other particle board furnishings), anyone, anywhere, you must do away with it. it is neither timeless nor durable. it is a toxic abomination filled with one type of toxins when new (formaldehyde & other adhesives & solvents) and full of others (mold & mildew & miscellaneous odors) later on.
May 28, 2014 @ 2:47 pm
I love our kitchen, faux oak, warped formica and all. It’s roomy and practical, with a great view, and I cook as well here as anywhere. Admittedly, I also love love LOVE these high end luxury all white spa like retreats, very pretty. For the price of one though, if we had the funds, I’d opt instead for a heated lap pool in a sunroom with automatic shades built into the windows. As for that faucet, I replaced the crappy one here with a gorgeous Moen for $300, and have a lifetime replacement guarantee.
May 28, 2014 @ 2:56 pm
We shall follow you like lemmings, Victoria! Of course we wouldn’t expect you on the front lines of the battle against spectacular kitchen tyranny. We would, however, appreciate an advance screening of your Italian Marble DIY…
May 28, 2014 @ 2:56 pm
Precisely what my brain thinks every day. The internet is making me want to paint everything white in my whole house, it is madness! One thing no one is talking about is how hard white is to keep clean. Our Moen bathroom faucet is leaking and we need to replace the cartridge. I called Moen yesterday and they’re going to send us out new cartridges for free and we don’t even have our receipt or warranty! Gotta like that for customer service for a change.
May 28, 2014 @ 3:23 pm
I pinned these kitchens. Ah the irony of irony. And to further depress you, I have a new, massive, white, luxury kitchen. And yes. I am still pinning. Apparently we need to get back to mud huts and sustenance farming before the madness of materialism overtakes us.
May 28, 2014 @ 3:49 pm
Agreed. My friend has a cottagey-looking kitchen that has probably been there since they put in running water, and it NEVER goes out of style.
May 28, 2014 @ 4:35 pm
Okay! Who the heck is Christopher Peacock and why should I care what he decorates? He’s probably never cooked in a kitchen because if you’re cookin a kitchen does not look like that. AND now that I’m on a roll, I cook — a lot — I don’t want a football field for a kitchen. When I need something I want it close by, I want the sink close by, I want the refrigerator close by, I want the stove close by plus all my utensils, and last but not least I don’t want to travel a mile to go to the bathroom because I’ll be sipping my water. Rather than a fancy schmancy kitchen I want a fantastic stove and fridge. I want a deep sink so I can wash my stock pots. I want cutting boards that don’t scoot on me I want a place where I can relax and work and not worry if I’m going to mess up the “decor”. Christopher Peacock — your last name describes the kitchen style 🙂
May 28, 2014 @ 5:43 pm
Remember country kitchens? I still have mine. Formica? Mine is pink. Yes, pink. And oak cabinets from the eighties? Well…mine are from 1993 when we built our house. We also have our original, builders-grade linoleum that ties it all together: the pink countertops and the former country blue carpet, which we (thank heavens) actually did replace many years ago.
Our home is steeped in nineties charm, but its ours. We picked everything in it when we had it built. We had the wallpaper in the kitchen installed – which, believe it or not, I still like it – and we just barely missed the garden window phase. But we debated it. I remember.
While our stuff is outdated, we are still surrounded by things we love. Old crocks, vintage signs from the local dairy that bring back memories of our favorite mint chip ice cream, crockery bowls, mis-matched pieces of dishware from my grandma, the cake stand my parents received as a wedding gift, and even some great things that we’ve made ourselves.
We would love to update, but in the meantime, we embrace this home and the memories it holds. Our kids grew up here. In less than three years we will be mortgage-free. Maybe then we’ll finally be able to start crossing things off of our Pinterest board of “unextreme home makeovers.”
I applaud you for the “be thankful for what you have” reminder. It hits home for me.
June 4, 2014 @ 9:44 am
I love that you focused on the fact that you are surrounded by the things that you love in the kitchen. Those are the things that we add to the decor that represent US in our own homes. Those are the things that people have conversations about as nostalgia and history are passed along. Those are the things that say we are living as ourselves in this crazy world that thinks everyone has to be the same. Well said!
May 28, 2014 @ 6:05 pm
I, for one, will be glad to see many currant trends die, starting with the d*mned white subway tiles, which look as though they belong in public restrooms or other places where unsanitary things take place.
Stainless steel appliances can go along with the subway tiles; the combination is very cold to me and again reminds me of places that need to be easily cleaned….morgues, for instance, or locker rooms. All that’s missing is the drainhole in the middle of the floor so the place can be hosed down, ugh.
White marble just adds to the funereal effect to me, reminding me cemeteries in New Orleans.
We have dark cherry cabinets and green granite countertops, equally dated but much less sterile.
May 28, 2014 @ 6:17 pm
“I will be sure to annotate the pictures for Pinterest with captions that are overlaid with squiggles and dots and three different fonts. (So that it will appeal to both four year olds, and women who are shopping for kitchen counters.)”
Thanks for making me spit out my aspartame-filled Diet Coke! Still laughing! Honestly if I see one more picture of someone’s family meal on the themed porch sporting little chalkboard markers for every dish, I think I will quit the internet. Do they really think their family/guests don’t know those are frickin’ deviled eggs?
May 28, 2014 @ 6:21 pm
My question is how many of those luxury kitchen owners actually use them? I think they are probably too busy working so they can pay the mortgage on the stove…. let alone the cabinetry. Or… they hire someone to cook there…. lucky person.
I, like others here, would be happy with a kitchen that met the needs of my family. And pretty wouldnt hurt.
May 28, 2014 @ 6:23 pm
wholly fuck balls…..$2400 for a faucet??? OMG
I did, however, just get the most amazing craiglist find (at least, in my part of the world, ie- California- where we don’t have amazing old stuff like you do on the East Coast and our craigslist is filled with the aformentioned 80’s cabinets) for my upcoming kitchen remodel- the Kohler Harborview sink, complete with the legs and all the chrome piping and faucets, for only $700
http://www.us.kohler.com/us/Harborview%22-top-mount-or-wall-mount-utility-sink-with-2-faucet-holes-on-left-and-right-backwalls/productDetail/Utility-Sinks/421485.htm
May 28, 2014 @ 7:27 pm
Good thoughts Victoria – as usual! I often think that what is trendy right now is what looks good on a computer screen. Look at your background, google’s background, all the other blogs that are white (and gray) with bits of color thrown in…….. and then look at the kitchens. Hmmm……..