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At the barest minimum, every home has a bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen. And every kitchen starts with a refrigerator, stove, and sink. But the end design of that room reflects the owner and household more than any other space in the house. Do gourmet chefs live there, or do they go out for every meal, starting with coffee at Starbucks? Are kids doing their homework on the kitchen table? Is there a dog sleeping in the corner? Does the cat cruise the countertop? If you want to know the mindset of any homeowner, you can start and stop in the heart of the house: the kitchen. Here we have a young mother, a homebuilder on his second remodel, a highly organized new bride, a bachelor who never cooks, and a woman who found her dream kitchen in a Diane Keaton movie.
Farmhouse Chic
Designers: Julie Baur and Margot Good, Baur Good Interiors
Architect: Paul Fendler, Fendler & Associates
Contractor: PK Construction
Margot Good was thinking she would have to go cold turkey to break her obsession with interior-design magazines. She had completed her house; she just didn’t need all those publications. “Then I thought, ‘This is silly. This is what I love to do,’” she says.
Both she and her friend Julie Baur received compliments on their own houses. Then friends started asking for help. So two years ago they started Baur Good Interiors. For this project, the house was gutted and rehabbed. The current kitchen didn’t exist. The designers came up with the concept of a farmhouse version.
“[The homeowner] loves tailored casual,” Mrs. Good says. “It is a young family with three young boys. We wanted to keep it in the spirit of the house, which is a little bit casual.”
The homeowners also wanted it to be an open, family-friendly area, with a very large island.
“Originally [the wife] was thinking she wanted dark countertops, and we sort of steered her away from that to light marble countertops that would frame the rest of the furniture, so it wasn’t so stark,” Mrs. Good says.
The white cabinetry was built by Lurk Custom Cabinets in Ste. Genevieve. The hardware is traditional finger pulls; the countertops, honed Danby marble; the backsplash, long, narrow, slightly crackled subway tiles stretching to the ceiling. The designers picked a Schumacher linen for the shades; Vaughan drum chandeliers hang over the island; and the ceiling is painted in Farrow & Ball’s Pale Powder.
The kitchen opens up to a bar on the left and a breakfast room on the right. A long window seat covered in a white indoor/outdoor fabric runs nearly the length of the space. “It looks pretty, but you can hose it down,” Mrs. Baur says.
“We wanted it to feel young,” Mrs. Good says. “We didn’t want it to feel like your grandmother’s kitchen. We wanted it to feel happy. [The wife] loves Michigan, they spend their summers in Michigan, and we wanted it to have that feeling.”
But the two designers also wanted to ensure the result stood out from the rest.
“We are also developing a niche,” Mrs. Baur says. “You tend to see a lot of the same things, whether it’s traditional or contemporary, in St. Louis. We do quite a bit of traveling, and we spend time in other cities, so we really try to find things that you don’t see everywhere else… We just try to show things that are new and fresh.”
Highly Vaulted
Architect, Designer, and Builder: Chuck Schagrin, Amherst Corporation
This is the second—and last—kitchen remodel in Chuck and Shelby Schagrin’s Clayton home.
The revision started with the ceiling. A flat surface has been replaced with a barrel vault, and according to the Schagrins, that single change made a huge difference. “It defines the space,” Mr. Schagrin says.
The appliances are all new, but in approximately the same places as before.
“The layout is similar, but the cabinets are different. The materials are different,” he says. The cabinets (designed by Mr. Schagrin and fabricated by Crescent Planing Mill Company) are curly maple. The hardware includes olive knuckle hinges in nickel, icebox latches, and finger pulls. “Many of the details are traditional details used in a somewhat different spirit,” he says. The island is mahogany, with a stainless-steel top, and holds an oven, a dishwasher, an icemaker, and a farmhouse sink. “I finally got my really big sink,” he says. “I can finally wash all my pots and pans at one time.”
The countertops are honed Danby marble, with a backsplash composed of white tiles with Minton tiles carefully interspersed. “There is a whole series of these illustrated tiles,” Mr. Schagrin says. “Some are Shakespearean plays; some are Aesop’s fables.” A master collector, he secured his first from a remodel in Ladue. “There were Minton tiles around the fireplace,” he recalls. “The owner wanted a totally different look and did not want the tiles. I salvaged them, and that is what started the interest in Minton tiles. I’ve hoarded them for years, just waiting for the perfect opportunity.” And that’s not the only Schagrin collection on display. There’s Fiestaware on the cabinet, carnival art on the wall, and, in the butler’s pantry, an astonishing array of dishes designed in the 1930s by British ceramic artist Clarice Cliff.
Mr. Schagrin loves to cook, and his is an industrial-strength kitchen an Iron Chef would love. But very little is squirreled away behind cabinet doors.
“Current trends are going to hiding everything,” he says. “This does not go in that direction. I like to cook. Hiding everything wasn’t me.” He points to the big stainless Wolf range, the restaurantworthy Sub-Zero refrigerator, and the water sprayer large enough to clean a car.
But the out-in-view rule doesn’t apply to the microwave. “Of all the appliances I have, the most visual trouble is with the microwave,” Mr. Schagrin says. “The microwave is back behind the doors. It makes it a little less convenient to use, but we really only use the microwave for warming up, rather than cooking. It’s out of sight and out of mind, and that’s a good thing.”
From the Gut
Designer: Carolyn Peterson, Carolyn Peterson Design
Architect: Lauren Strutman, Lauren Strutman Architects
Contractor: Terbrock Building Company
When Carolyn Peterson’s then-boyfriend—now her husband—was house hunting, he found a two-bedroom, one-bath house in Warson Woods. “You need to buy that house,” said Mrs. Peterson.
He did. They got engaged, then wed, and within six months of the bells ringing, the house was gutted. Builders took off the roof and added a second floor; removed walls and opened up rooms; traded out windows for French doors.
The kitchen was key.
“I love to cook—love to cook,” Mrs. Peterson says. The appliances are all top-drawer, including a Sub-Zero refrigerator and Wolf range. “Everyone gathers in the kitchen, so I wanted a big island to accommodate that, but I didn’t want chairs that were intrusive in the space,” she says. “So I designed an island with the cabinets built in and an overhang to slide the chairs underneath.”
The countertops look like a half-foot of marble. Don’t be deceived.
“They aren’t that thick,” she says. “It’s called bookending. The sink is the thickness of the marble—1¼ inch—and it is a 4-inch drop. That lies right on top of the cabinetry. It was a feat in itself to get that in, because they couldn’t carry it by the end. It was so delicate because of the drop. Six or eight men carried it in.” The marble came from Global Granite & Marble.
Adjoining the kitchen is a butler’s pantry where Mrs. Peterson has a second dishwasher (there is a dishwasher drawer in the island) and displays her white plates. “Behind the doors, I have drawers where I have all my stuff that used to be packed away for years and you had to pull out whenever you wanted to use it,” she says. “I have it all organized, and I just love it, and I use it every day.”
Before anything was built, Mrs. Peterson detailed exactly what she needed. “I went to architect and kitchen designer [Archway Kitchen and Bath] and I said, ‘OK, in this drawer I want my knives. This drawer? My pots and pans. This drawer is my baking drawer.’ I had it all organized,” she says. “‘This is where I want to put the bread drawer with the toaster in it.’ Just so I knew where things were going so at the end of the day, I’m not going, ‘Oh, I wish I had done this’ or ‘Why didn’t I think of planning for that?’ I walked around this house for over a year planning it in my head. The most fun about it is, I woke up one day, and it was done, and it was what I had envisioned.”
Stark and Sleek
Designer: Dana Romeis, Fibercations
Architect: Helen Lee, Tao + Lee Associates
Contractor: Tom Carron Construction
When architect Helen Lee was first summoned in 1998 to work on this house, the interior was 1960s traditional, the predominant color…mauve.
Welcome to the 21st century. Now the house is a study in classic minimalism. The kitchen was added on to the house, as another room in a layout where one area opens to another…and another…and another.
“The whole layout of the house is one where you get a glimpse of one room and there is always the idea of the room beyond,” says Ms. Lee. “And we wanted to reinforce that with the kitchen, where you are going through a series of rooms to get there.”
But this kitchen, unlike others, is not built around an island or to accommodate appliances. The focal point is the courtyard and the art outside.
“The whole kitchen was designed around that sculpture,” Ms. Lee says, glancing outside at the massive work of art created by Pietro Consagra. One wall of the kitchen consists of five floor-to-ceiling windows, “so it is inside out, coordinating the garden with the house. [The homeowner] really loves being part of the backyard. He spends a lot of time in the kitchen.”
The room’s components—cabinetry, island, and table—were manufactured by German company Bulthaup. “The system came in pieces, and we had a fabricator from Bulthaup come in,” Ms. Lee says. “He assembled it in three days.” The chairs are by Holly Hunt; the porcelain tile floor by Ann Sachs. The appliances are from Miele; the range hood, by Thermador. The refrigerator and freezer drawers are hidden behind Bulthaup cabinetry along one wall.
The room is rich in subtle detail. The doors leading to the rest of the house fold into the wall so you barely notice they’re there. The vent on the appliance wall is a mere black slit, fitting with the sleek décor.
The kitchen is a chef’s dream. But the homeowner doesn’t cook. “It looks good,” Ms. Lee says with a shrug. “It’s a good showing.”
Off the Big Screen
Designer: Edwin Massie, Frank Patton Interiors
Lighting Designer: Ken McKelvie, McKelvie Lighting Design
Architect: Carl Safe, Carl Safe Design Consultants
The phone rang. Ken McKelvie picked up, and the homeowners on the other end delivered an assignment. First, the homeowners told him that after already redoing the landscape and several rooms, they were tackling their kitchen and asked him to do the lighting. “Then they said, ‘We want you to watch this film. Go out and buy Something’s Gotta Give,’” Mr. McKelvie says. “‘See the kitchen. That’s the kitchen we want.’”
Actually building that dream room was one mean feat. The house on Wydown Boulevard in Clayton was built in the 1920s. When the current homeowners took over in 1996, it was “a disaster,” the wife says. “The kitchen was the worst part.”
The traditional triangle had evolved, with the refrigerator in one room, the stove in another, and the sink in the butler’s pantry. For a husband who loves to cook and a wife who loves to bake, it was not at all ideal.
To make the kitchen larger, the exterior wall had to be removed, a new foundation poured, and an entire four-story wall built. The husband, a contractor, oversaw the project.
The couple didn’t add a hearth room because the house already offers a number of wonderful nooks to watch TV and read. “If we had added it, we knew we would never go anywhere else,” she says. They did want the kitchen to flow into the rest of the house, so a seven-piece cornice was added to the ceiling. The hardware—icebox latches and finger pulls—suits the home’s age and design.
There are two islands: a larger one for primary cooking and a second one next to the oven for baking. They have interchangeable seating. The appliances are Wolf and Sub-Zero. The Wood-Mode cabinets came from National Kitchen & Bath in Webster Groves, and the walls are painted in Benjamin Moore’s Saybrook Sage.
The lighting was key. “I understood that gourmet cooking happens here,” Mr. McKelvie says. “They needed good illumination to be able to read cookbooks, to prepare food, but also have it look attractive.” And to get inspiration for the perfect kitchen, you can often rely on the movies.
By Christy Marshall, Photography by Matt Hughes and Alise O’Brien
