At the beginning of the year we started to talk about building the extension we’ve always dreamed of, since we bought the house in 2011. The idea is to knock down an existing lean-to conservatory (that leaks and is cold for most of the year!), knock down the existing external kitchen wall and build a brick extension giving us an open space to redesign a kitchen that actually works for us, including space to put a decent table. It was such an exciting idea when it was all in my head and even when we got the architectural plans drawn up. But now we’ve started to talk logistics, it’s definitely more daunting than I thought. Our tiny terrace cottage has terrible access for building work, making things both physically awkward and expensive. Potentially too expensive.
So we’ve had to start considering the possibility of not doing the extension. Sad as it makes me, perhaps there was a reason the previous owners stuck with a chipboard conservatory. But if we’re not going to do the extension, perhaps there is movement to have the existing kitchen redesigned. The space we have is rather small, but the existing kitchen is so badly lain out that it makes the size all the more noticeable. The more I look online the more I can see that small kitchens don’t have to be ugly or awkward. Small kitchens just have to be clever, something ours is definitely not!
In fact, that’s the same in pretty much the rest of the house. Little or no thought has been put into the design of any of the the rooms and space is being underused everywhere. On my digital travels I’ve also been looking a small living room ideas. We complain all the time that we have no surfaces, but our walls are practically bare! Don’t get me wrong, I know the importance of white space for the eye, but surely we could be using this space better? I think we need to stop focusing on what we don’t have, and start making the most of what we do have!
Either that or we’re just going to have to bite the bullet and move somewhere bigger!