Three ways we gained space in our kitchen reno without expanding the home’s footprint

As you can see from the before photos, the cottage kitchen was small and had an awkward layout with a door interrupting the flow of the counters and an inconveniently placed radiator. The door on the far right of the photo below led to the basement stairs. Because of this door and the radiator placement there was very limited cabinet and counter top space. We wanted to renovate this kitchen without changing the home’s footprint.

1. We moved a radiator

One of the first things we did is hire a plumber to move the radiator to an empty corner of the room, this change would eventually allow me to design a kitchen with cabinets and a countertop that wrapped around the back of the kitchen. You can see the moved radiator in the photo below (and you can also see that things got a lot worse before they got better!)

Though it is not ideal to have the radiator on an internal wall we added insulation on the exterior walls to make up for this move and its been very warm in there!

2. We removed a 1/2 bath

The house had an extremely tiny 1/2 bath just behind the stove. We had plans to take a back porch which had been poorly enclosed in the 1970’s and make it into two real, fully insulated rooms; a full bath and a laundry room/ mudroom, so we really didn’t need to take up kitchen space with this awkward little bathroom. When we removed it it made tons of room for a nice big fridge. Below is the before and after!

But there was still the issue of that pesky basement entrance. With the door and two steps down in that spot we lost precious space for cabinets and countertop…then we had an idea.. a wonderful, awful idea! Just around the corner in the little hallway between the foyer and kitchen was the coat closet. What if… What IF(!) we opened up the back of the coat closet and made that the entrance to the basement stairs and side door?

3) We Moved the entrance to the basement stairs.

When you opened the kitchen door to the basement there were 2 steps and then a platform which contained the side door of the house. We realized that if we opened the back wall of the coat closet we would only need to make two steps (and a support beam under them) to get to that platform. This small change would allow us to gain 6 feet of floor space, and also to have a wall of cabinetry which I knew would be essential for the kitchen design I was envisioning. I know, a house without a coat closet is not ideal. However the closet was narrow and deep and most of the coats were hung on hooks on the side rather than a rail at the back already, those hooks could stay, and even more could be added. Moreover , we had plans to make a laundry room by the back door with a space that could be turned into a coat closet long term.

In conclusion, getting creative with this expansion saved a ton of money in the long run and kept the historical nature of the house intact more than an addition would have.