When the owners of this Silver Spring, MD, home decided to make the move from being perennial city dwellers to being suburbanites, they took the opportunity to give their new home a complete renovation. While the street it sits on is quiet, and the yard serene with lots of trees, the home’s interior now makes a confident statement with bold finishes showcased in a new kitchen and master suite.
The premise behind the kitchen’s renovation was to create a gathering space where the couple could host parties for family and friends. “The homeowners love to entertain and they enjoy cooking,” says Keith Long, designer at Glickman Design Build in Potomac, MD.
To accommodate their passion of both, Long reconfigured its interior footprint. “It was an older home that was broken into smaller rooms,” he notes of the residence that hadn’t seen any updates since the 1970s. To start, the designer removed a loadbearing wall between the former kitchen and dining room – adding a wood beam as support – to combine the two spaces into one area that provides plenty of room for food prep, cooking, baking, and of course, entertaining.
The former dining room now serves as the main entertainment/gathering/bar area, boasting plenty of storage in floor-to-ceiling Crystal Cabinets finished in Dark Sable. The island, topped with Montclair granite and equipped with a prep sink and high-arc Chrome faucet, gives family and friends a place to hang out while visiting with the cook. A double GE Monogram oven and a microwave highlight the baking center.
This space is tied together with the cooking area by 12×24 Grigio porcelain floor tile. This main food prep area features a GE Profile refrigerator and Bosch dishwasher, but a GE Monogram range and a gas wok range take center stage. Each is equipped with its own Faber stainless steel ventilation hood. “They shared different styles of cooking so we chose a double hood, one for the cooktop and a second one for the gas wok range,” he says.
A contemporary look is achieved with open shelving, as opposed to wall cabinets, to house cooking supplies and serving dishes. “It creates an open, airy look,” adds Long. Walls are sheathed in a clear green that is brought to life in complementary Hamilton Daiquiri backsplash tile.
“The beautifully updated contemporary kitchen offers sleek lines with contemporary cabinetry and open shelving,” he says, “combined with a layout that is ideal for cooking and baking as well as for hosting gatherings.”
Shuffling of spaces
Like the kitchen, Long reconfigured the master suite’s footprint to better accommodate the couple’s needs, with special challenges created by a variety of ceiling heights. “We expanded the boundaries of the original bathroom into what was the master bedroom,” he explains. “That decreased the size of the bedroom, so we took out another wall to combine two smaller bedrooms into one master bedroom. We also added a walk-in closet. There was really a lot of shuffling of spaces since, like the kitchen, it hadn’t been touched since the 1970s.”
The homeowners were more than eager to replace the outdated dusty pink tile and powder blue sinks/toilet with updated, contemporary elements, including a sleek 66” freestanding cast iron tub – equipped with a handshower – that fits perfectly in the space where a small closet once stood.
Dual undermount sinks are accented with single-lever faucets which feature 6” swivel spouts. An open look is achieved with a floating Montclair granite top. A separate toilet room offers privacy.
The shower features universal design elements, which are a specialty of Glickman Design Build. “We are multi-generational specialists,” he notes, “so we do a lot of accessible design.”
The curbless shower features Kiev Blanco tiles on the wall with Gobi tumbled tiles on the floor and Aspen Stria mixed with glass as an accent. The adjustable handshower slides on a Chrome shower bar to offer a personalized shower experience for each user.
Finally, Long laid the Kiev Blanco porcelain floor tile diagonally to provide a unique dynamic.