It’s not often that we get to meet the talent behind our features (or the friends that we’ve ‘met’ on social media). But when we do, it’s a treasured moment. The designer behind today’s beautiful home tour, Chloe of Boxwood Avenue, has not only been a source of inspiration to me for years but she also recently attended the HAVEN Workshop where I finally got to enjoy real, face-to-face conversation with her (rather than in our IG messages or emails). Chloe is even lovelier in person and I’m so grateful to share one of her recent renovations with you all today. It comes complete with a patterned tile kitchen backsplash, a fireplace makeover that you won’t believe, a sweet little coffee station and more.
Can you tell us a bit about this project?
Getting to work with this family to remodel their ranch-style home in Reno, Nevada was such a treat. As my second project in my career, it was exhilarating to be handed the reins and allowed complete creative vision.
The family moved out of their home for 6 weeks while we took over and completely gutted the main living spaces. TFP Construction handled all of the project management and construction, and I couldn’t be more grateful!
The family really only had two requests: the first being patterned tile backsplash in the kitchen. The second: a coffee station where their home-roasted coffee beans could live. Other than that, it was up to us to create function and beauty within the home.
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What was the inspiration behind the design?
We started by selecting the patterned cement tile that would serve as the ultimate inspiration for the home renovation. This worked out perfectly because the family’s style was fun, energetic, and a bit modern.
From that point, we worked to create a cohesive design throughout the home. The home featured two separate living spaces. The first: an original formal living room, and the second: a former garage converted into a living room. Unfortunately, the added living room was rarely used by the family because of its tricky accessibility. The only way to enter this area was through a narrow hallway with 6’ ceilings, the problem being that one of the homeowners is over 6’ tall!
We did our calculations and found that the unutilized living room equated to the same amount of square footage as the formal living room, meaning the family was only using half of their available living space!
In order to give this space back to them, we opened up the kitchen and living room, creating one large open floor plan. With the new floorplan, we turned the narrow hallway into a bathroom, and doubled the kitchen size!
Did you run into any challenges with this renovation?
Do you see the tiny sink area in the bathroom? We had about 15” to work with between studs, so we had to get really creative with this small bathroom remodel! With a tiny vessel sink and a wall-mounted faucet, we made it work!
The homeowners treasured their dining table in sentiment, so we really wanted to preserve it for them. We noticed that it wasn’t quite large enough for their dining room, and was most often used for sewing projects. So with the help of my dad, we repurposed the table into a beautiful sewing table for the craft area of the secondary living room. When we revealed this to the homeowner, she teared up, and it was a very special moment for us!
We had very little budget left over for the laundry room, but we wanted to update it as much as possible. With a little paint and some fresh tile, we tied the laundry room into the rest of the home. You might notice the cute dutch door, which we custom made to allow the pups to stay a part of the family even when tucked away in the laundry room.
The entryway of the home was rarely used before the renovations, and we wanted to change that! So we replaced the door with one that allows much more natural light in. We removed the original closet and replaced it with a floating built in bench seat and hooks. This made the entryway feel much more welcoming!
The showstopper of this house is the beautiful brick fireplace makeover (click here to see the before!). I knew we really needed to update the fireplace, but painting it wouldn’t have meshed with the rest of the design. I pulled inspiration from the cement tiles in the kitchen and instead of painting the brick, we added a cement coating over the top of it! This finish is much more contemporary and feels more elevated than painted brick, yet didn’t cost very much to complete!
Aside from the updates above, we also replaced the flooring with wide plank engineered hardwood, added 8” tall baseboards, replaced the interior doors & hardware, and painted throughout. These touches add to so much of the design and make a huge impact on the finished product!
It was truly an honor to be able to design a functional and beautiful home for this wonderful family. I hope you are inspired by the improvements we made! For more ideas and inspiration, you can visit me at boxwoodavenue.com.
