Pepper Design Blog

Building a Bathroom: PDB + Lowe’s = LOVE

A while back we received a surprise email from one of our favorite stores. Hint: it starts with ‘L’ and rhymes with ‘toes’.

And when I say we’re huge fans, I mean we’re huge fans.

Liv makes the cutest project cheerleader.

So here we are minding our remodeling business and working away on project after project when out of the blue we were offered a helping hand. As in, Lowe’s casually emailed, “would you like to review several Lowe’s products while building that future bathroom?” and we fell out of our chairs in speechless awe/excitement. Yes please!

Best email ever, no?

We are building this bath from scratch – the current location is three adjoining closets that sit plop in the middle of our hallway. The goal is to create a new full bathroom that compliments the Spanish style of the home all while being both eco-friendly and tastefully modern at the same time.

As you can see, access to the bath will be through our hallway (off of the kitchen) and through Liv’s room.

If we could throw any visual out there for what’s playing around in our minds, this might be closest:

Here’s a first look at the materials we have in mind for the space (we built this little inspiration board right on the Lowe’s shelf):

I was soooo excited that I offered a little sneak peek of the layout back in February, but we really weren’t ready to act on it until all of our research was complete, with the goal to begin slated for the end of March. And drumroll…. it’s nearly the end of March! I’ve been counting down the days.

Over the month of April we’ll be revealing all of the how-to’s on the design, tiling (heated floors, anyone?), installation and even our decision making process (on how to choose the best toilet, for example – you laugh, but there’s more to it than meets the eye ), all while covering the rest of the home that we’re slowing working on (such as the new guestroom/office, decorating the nursery and updating the living room).

Now back to pinching ourselves!

Guest Bathroom Sneak Peek

I’m letting the cat out of the bag a little early on this one… because I can’t stand the anticipation any longer.

We officially won’t break ground on our new guest bathroom until March, but that hasn’t stopped me from numerous trips to Lowe’s and plenty of mock-ups to design a brand new, sweet little modern bath for our visitors (and Olivia, it will officially be Liv’s bathroom as we plan to have it accessible via the hallway as well as her bedroom).

Sure, we still have the old-kitchen-turned-office to finish, the nursery-that’s-75%-done and the brand-spankin’-NEW-kitchen (oh poor new kitchen with its teeny tiny details that just won’t wrap up) – but why not dive into this amazing project that will leave us one bathtub closer to a clean and modern space for visitors to enjoy?

And we don’t currently have a bathtub as our current bathroom’s tub is broken (aka so old it has stopped working all together). And it’s been over a year. And I’m a bathtub person. And I’d so desperately like to sooth my tired body in one that I’m willing to halt all other projects if necessary (though it’s not and they won’t) to add one to our home.

Can you believe Olivia’s four weeks already!! Just for fun, here we are getting coffee with a friend.

I could stare at that yawn for hours.

Kitchen Reno Week 4: Counters & a New Backsplash

Back with another kitchen update! Progress has slowed a bit around these parts as Kevin goes back to school (he’s currently studying architecture full time) and daily dedicated renovating hours drops to a third of the time we used to be able to fit in. But nevertheless it continues!

We’re technically at day 28 of work, though it’s taken roughly 8 weeks to get us that far. (If you need a quick catch up, here is the first week (including great ‘before’ photos), second week, and third week – as well as our inspiration board.)

Let’s jump right into week four:

As soon as we had word that the fabrication of our quartz countertops was complete, prep work began on getting the cabinets ready to support those big heavy loads. Plywood and even metal rods (embedded into the plywood on the island where there’s an overhang) will help to keep the weight of the countertops evenly dispersed.

And then suddenly fall hit – as did big white clouds threatening rain and drizzle on the exposed house. Day 22 was dedicated to weatherproofing our raw walls to keep the elements out.

With our new heat-resistant, scratch-proof countertops in place, the kitchen was beginning to look, well, more kitchen like. This project, in addition to the major electrical work, were the only two projects where we pulled in outside help. Quartz combines natural quartz (one of nature’s hardest materials), with polymer resin and pigment to produce a durable surface that will last and last. We left the fabrication, measuring and installation to the pros. (Just in case you’re interested, we chose HanStone in Tiffany Grey).

With those big, beautiful slabs installed, we were able to begin playing with color and materials for the walls and backsplash. To be sure the paint color complimented the room at all times of day, and blended well with both the wood and backsplash, I lined up strips of randomly selected greens to observe for several days and slowly began plucking them down as they were crossed off the list.

We found the perfect rubbed bronze faucet in the 50% off clearance section of Home Depot – and matching pulls for the cabinets at our favorite local cabinetry shop.

Look at all of this wonderful counter space! Very excited to use it for cooking prep and projects. And below that, here’s the stainless steal under-mount (a must) sink we scored on Craigslist for a measly $75 bucks. The retail value is 3-5 times that amount and we were thrilled with the find.

Mixing finishes (aka the stainless sink with the rubbed bronze fixtures) wasn’t an issue for us. The dark faucet was very Spanish, while the stainless steel matched our appliances and provided that pop of modern.

Then came the big backsplash decisions – how to incorporate a modern design that fit an historic Spanish-style home seamlessly? After testing out a variety of materials (see a few collages up) we settled on subway-shaped tile in glass. (Ohhh there are so many choices… keep an inspiration board/photo and edit as your tastes change). And the winning backsplash design?

A solid subway motif for behind the counters! That’s my photoshop rendering above to test out the look. If you checked in to Monday’s post, you noticed that we were debating between four similar looks, three of which included small 1″ square tiles in the same color to create a pattern behind the stove. And after much consideration, the subway prevailed in all of it’s simple glory!

But before we could install we had to wait for our chosen tile to ship to our local shop… (Arizona Tile, Kiwi Glass Subway by Skylights)

So while we waited, the electrician popped in to add a few outlets to the island and finish up a bit of wiring, and Kev applied a ‘floor board’ of tile along the cabinet edges. We liked this modern look and we’ve heard it does wonders for cleaning the kitchen while preserving the all wood cabinets (mopping, etc).

Since the kitchen has already received a layer of primer, the new “Buzz Brown” (by Velspar) color was added while I was away on a business trip (yeah for no icky fumes for the babe!). The olive color was the perfect match for the maple wood, dark counters and kiwi tiles.

Once the paint was dry, up went the custom hood and vent system that Kevin designed and installed from scratch (the room had been previously used as a bedroom & den, after all).

Finally it was time to install the backsplash – I had long awaited this moment as it had become a pivotal milestone in my mind for kitchen progress (cue the angels singing) and the nearing of construction in this part of the house.

And how beautiful it looks! I was thrilled with the final layout and the clean design. Hopefully I’ll have some pictures with better lighting to post soon – these are all a bit ‘cooler’ in tone than the actual soft look of the kitchen.

This is where the kitchen stands today.

Our goal was 30 days of total work and the projects remaining include: grout floor and backsplash, install molding, haul in appliances (which now sit in the garage) and hook all up to electrical, water & gas. Sooo we might go over the 30-days-of-work pledge that we had originally set, but not by much!