American Northwest Vintage Homes - Feature Article on Kitchens

Kitchens: Three Cinderella Stories
By Lauren Fritzen and Helen Solem
Photography by Oona Copperhill

"A good kitchen should be sufficiently remote from the principal apartments of the house, that the members, visitors, or guests of the family, may not perceive the odour incident to cooking, or hear the noise of culinary operations."

Mrs. Isabella Beeton, Book of Household Management, 1861

As ridiculous as this may sound today, Mrs. Beeton’s notions on Victorian-era kitchens were widely accepted in her day. Kitchens were considered nothing more than utilitarian spaces and were often relegated to small, dark and uninviting locations, such as basements and backrooms. Many middle and upper class homes had domestic servants, and their comforts were not a high priority. Some early kitchens were removed physically from the main house to minimize the fire hazards of an open hearth.

The industrial age and WWI brought an end to the heyday of domestic servitude, and once middle-class housewives were forced into the kitchen, a revolution began. Architects started to take an interest in designing pleasing, functional kitchens. For those of us today with early twentieth century homes, the revolution came a bit too late, leaving many of us with spatially-challenged, unappealing kitchens. Most of our kitchens have been remodeled at least once, often not in keeping with the period of the house.

Updating kitchens in a way that is efficient and engaging takes creativity and talent, and it’s always helpful to see how others have tackled the challenge. Here are the Cinderella stories of three kitchens each uniquely revived by the distinctive visions of their owners.

A Timeless Classic

Marilyn McCoy is a collector of old treasures. She considers this, along with her reluctance to throw things away, a hereditary trait and a matter of family pride, passed down through generations of the Boerhave family of Lynden. Her turn-of-the-century Victorian home is part of this legacy, having been built by her great-uncle, Nicholas Boerhave. Marilyn purchased the home from Uncle Nick’s children in 1984, and along with husband Patrick Jones, has been lovingly reestablishing and enriching it’s beauty ever since. read more...

A Resourceful Remodel

Karen Cotton is not only an inveterate bargain hunter, she’s also pretty handy with a hammer. When she and husband Bruce decided to completely renovate the kitchen in their 1915 Craftsman bungalow in Bellingham’s historic Eldridge neighborhood, Karen was up for the challenge. Deciding on a layout wasn’t too difficult; as a professional caterer and mother of two young girls, Karen knew exactly what she wanted out of her new kitchen. “Most of all, I wanted it to be bright and I wanted a much larger workspace.” read more...

Traditional with a Modern Twist

When Jan and Dan Larsen* decided to update the kitchen in their 1923 Colonial Revival home in the South Hill neighborhood of Bellingham, they had some very definite ideas about what they wanted, both in terms of practicality and in terms of overall ambiance. The existing kitchen was small, square and dark. It had been remodeled in 1949, retaining none of the character of the house and lacking what every other room in the house boasts -- a remarkable view of Bellingham Bay and the San Juan Islands. “The one tiny window over the kitchen sink was so high we had to stand on tiptoe to see out of it.” read more...

*not their real names

The various visions of each of our featured homeowners echo the evolution of the kitchen from utilitarian afterthought to emotional core of the family home. As Pearl Bailey put it so well,

"My kitchen is a mystical place, a kind of temple for me. It is a place where the surfaces seem to have significance, where the sounds and odors carry meaning that transfers from the past and bridges to the future."