Kitchen dress up

Rennie Heuer

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Constantine, MI
The ceilings in our home are rather low and though it makes it easy to change light bulbs there are drawbacks - such as really small very dark areas above the kitchen cabinets.

Now, I know that walls are never plumb, corners are never square, and circling are never flat, but mine are really bad. In one part of the kitchen the ceiling dips over 1/2" and then back up again in less than 5'. Crown molding would have been a real bear and finish carpentry is already nearly as low on my list as plumbing.

So, in order to deal with the dark spaces I milled some maple and rabbited one edge to overlap the cabinet top and give me a shadow line. They're attached by drilling up through the face frame and using a pocket screw to pull them down tight. The I put a small molding along the ceiling line.

This helps the ceiling feel higher, eliminates the dark space, and makes the cabinets look a little custom.

The before shots
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And the after shots
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That looks really good and you're right brightens it up a lot (way more than I'd have thought).

I don't think that would fly at my house as a solution because I'm pretty sure various "things" would have been stored up there already :D
 
That looks really good and you're right brightens it up a lot (way more than I'd have thought).

I don't think that would fly at my house as a solution because I'm pretty sure various "things" would have been stored up there already :D

The space was really small, between 4" and 3.25" (like I said, really bad ceiling) so no storage. In fact, it was so tight we could not even paint up there. it was just a dark dust collection space. It's been on the honey-do list almost from day one.
 
i agree that was worth every penny for the outcome..

Thanks Larry - it was actually cheaper than crown molding and a lot less stressful! I had some old Ipswitch Pine Minwax stain in the shop that got pretty close in color. Topped it off with 3 coats of Minwax wipe on poly gloss. Came close enough to keep Jan happy!
 
Keep this pace up and Allen will have a match on his hands.
I am amazed at what an improvement that filler is. You did a real great job. Dont know why you shy of finish carpentry seems to me you got it nailed.
 
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