This is the second post about the kitchen remodel. Have a look first, at Part 1 to see how the kitchen looked originally.
When I returned from California, having vacated the apartment for two months for the lavori pesante—the “heavy works” as my architect termed it—this is how the place looked:
So attractive to arrive to after 22 hours of travel! LOL
While I needed an architect for the kitchen remodel, I wanted to save money by installing the floor myself with my carpenter friend. Interestingly, both some expats and Italians expressed surprise that I would consider any other floor other than tile.
“Kitchens should have tile floors.” I was told definitively. I didn’t agree. Grout gets gross over time. Tile feels cold. The kitchen is on the north side, and has a high ceiling, and is a cold room in winter months (unless one is blasting the heat, and who does that with Italy’s energy crisis?).
I wanted laminate wood flooring. It is inexpensive, durable, easy to clean, and way easier to install than tile. It also feels warmer.
The problem is, I needed to order it before I left California so I could install it soon after my arrival in Florence, as the cabinets and countertops, stove and sink, etc. could not be installed until the floor was in. And I didn’t want to go for weeks and weeks and without a kitchen.
I was up at midnight, (due to the time difference) numerous nights in a row, on calls with Iperceramica in Florence, getting help with how to order the correct amount of planks, what padding I needed to include in the order, and how to get the correct width–the width allowance was limited because it needed to be laid over the existing floor.
All in Italian, at midnight.
Also, I had to choose a color only based on what I could see online 😮
Another issue came up with the delivery of the planks. As with everything I needed for the apartment, the planks would be delivered only to the street.
It was up to me to get them up four flights of stairs.
I was given a window of four hours when they would be delivered. That meant I had to hire my carpenter to hang out at my house for four hours, or I had to risk leaving the planks in the street until he could show up. They were in heavy bundles. Not something I could carry on my own.
As usual, lots to orchestrate.
Luckily the color of the floors was perfect. 😃
After I begged for many weeks, the cabinets were finally delivered and installed.
(A thousand euro extra for carrying the cabinets up the stairs 🤯 Things you don’t think about when you buy an apartment on the top floor😧)
The process of obtaining a countertop was uh, let’s just say “interesting.” originally I was supposed to order a countertop through the guy who made the cabinets. For the life of me I could not get him to give me a clear quote. I thought he would be able to give me quotes for the main materials from the budget friendly laminate up to the natural stone options.
He gave me some vague quotes but even though I tried twenty different ways to ask for clear quotes for each material, he simply was not, for reasons that remain a mystery to me, capable. My architect couldn’t seem to extract clear quotes from him either.
Finally, when I returned to Florence, I searched on Google Maps for “marmista“, and found a large marble workshop on the outskirts. I cut out the middle person by going straight to them, rather than involving a store. I took the metro to the last stop, walked about five blocks, and trailed after a guy named Gregorio through a large warehouse. He had some slabs of grey granite that looked good to me.
Because I’d gone outside of the architect and cabinet maker for the countertops, I now was orchestrating the installation of those on my own. Gregorio did a good job. It was a matter of prompting him over and over to make it happen, as was the case with all the workers.
I was VERY happy in the end that I had taken the ball into my own court and found attractive countertops at a good price.
A glimpse of the three-hour process of carrying the kitchen cabinets up the 4 flights of stairs
To accomplish next: The installation of the tile behind the stove, under the “cappa.” While Italy produces tile that I love, a vision of Turkish tile continued to return to my head when I thought of the kitchen. I finally found what I wanted on Etsy, sold by a guy in Poland.
Found my Turkish tile!
The Romanian guy did a SUPER job. So much better than the tile job that happened with the bathroom remodel.
Choosing tile, and having that pop of color, for any part of the house, was my favorite aspect of the remodel. Most of it I’d never want to repeat again, but choosing beautiful colorful tile, I could do that all day long 😃
What still remained, was the installation of the two overhead lights. One with a fan over the island and a hanging light over the dining table. A wire needed to be run along the ceiling beam, but the electrician didn’t do this before the cabinets were installed. But once the cabinets were there, the beam was almost impossible to reach.
Electrician’s Big Whoops!
The biggest WHAT THE F?
See the window in the photo? See what’s under it?
Outside the window is where the air conditioning box was supposed to be installed. I’ve never installed AC and I was relying on the architect to lead the process in a logical way. Turns out, he forgot that the “box” should be installed outside the window BEFORE the cabinets & countertops were installed. Suddenly, when it came time to complete the AC, he told me to ask the plumber if he would be able to reach outside the window to install the box with the countertop there. The plumber replied, “absolutely not” as if I was bat-shit crazy to ask. 🤯
Yup, I had to get BOTH the cabinet maker AND Gregorio, the countertop guy, to RETURN and UNDO what they had done.
After the plumber installed the box, I had to get cabinet man and Gregorio to come back again, and re-install.
Guess who had to pay for it? Me. 😬
I asked the architect if he would at least split one of those fees with me. He said he saw no reason to do so. He would not admit it was his F-up. 😤
It goes without saying, that’s what I hired him for. To prevent those F-ups. To lead the process in a logical way.
I guess it’s rare for no F-ups to occur. Plenty did during this 18+ month process. But that was the one that shocked me the most.
Space for a dining area too!
One reason I bought this apartment— the kitchen area was very spacious compared to the norm 😉
The first thing I noticed about your apartment was that gorgeous tile in the kitchen. The end result is a beautiful kitchen.
You could become a consultant or project manager for anyone doing anything of substance in Italy- it’s obvious you get stuff done, and well!
Yeah, true, I could be a project manager for this kind of thing in Italy but all I want is a break from it. It knocked me to knees so many times. I feel allergic to being around anything similar!