A Luxurious Traditional Design and Remodel in Laguna Hills Orange County

Comparing the before to the after of this Orange County home would make it difficult to see that it was even the same home.

Before the APlus team started work, this Laguna Hills home featured a narrow, dark, closed in and incredibly small kitchen. The overall layout of the kitchen and living area was not just cramped, but was choppy and felt illogical. The kitchen was separated from the dining room by a complete wall, with only a narrow doorway leading from one space to the next. The kitchen was not only small but also lacking in functionality, with incredibly limited countertop space.

Decadent Custom Cabinets

The remodel allowed this Laguna Hills home to be completed transformed into a space that’s large, bright and high-end. This started with the custom cabinetry, designed by the APlus team and built in the onsite shop.

The cabinets are traditional in their style and color. The homeowners selected maple cabinets in the signature Victorian Ryan door style, and they’re paired with a matching edge band.

The color, which is so striking in this kitchen, is Manganese, a dark, chocolatey shade of brown that adds depth, richness and a feeling of sumptuousness throughout the kitchen.

Over the range is a custom hood, and there’s also a valance over the sink.

Built into the island cabinets is ample storage including a combination of shelving and drawers.

To the left of the double ovens is a custom, built-in banquette-style seating area, with storage underneath.

A standalone pantry was designed by the homeowners and APlus to serve as a creative, beautiful place to store food and additional dishes and kitchen supplies. The pantry features a combination of shelves and pull-out drawers and extends to the now-high ceilings.

The Island

The island is in and of itself a masterpiece in this kitchen. What was once a small space with only a few feet of countertop space has become an oasis.

The island features an expansive granite countertop that’s thick, solid and eye-catching. The granite features a cream backdrop with varying shades of brown, black and gray running throughout the slab. The island countertop is thicker than the granite perimeter countertops, which feature a 1 1/2 -inch waterfall edge. There is not only storage and prep space as part of the island, but also, bar seating on either side.

The island also features columned supports on the far end, with more seating and detailed trim additions.

A small basin sink adds additional preparation space, and over the island hangs ornate pendant lights adding Old World charm.

The Appliances

This is truly a chef’s kitchen, and the appliances reflect that. Along with the double-door massive stainless steel refrigerator, the kitchen also includes a Thermador double oven with soft-close doors and a large commercial style rotisserie, as well as two telescopic racks.

The Thermador 36-inch gas Pro Harmony Range features professional grates and a custom hood insert with blower.

Flooring and Tile

This kitchen features a backsplash with a horizontal pattern, and glass tiles in varying shades of gray and brown, reflecting the colors of the granite countertops. This backsplash adds depth and dimension to the space.

From the kitchen to the family room the choppy design has been reconfigured and smartly opened up, and very light, washed pine-style hardwood flooring with hints of gray undertones runs from in the kitchen through to the family room, tying the design together and uniting what was once a broken and ill-configured design.

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A Fresh, Transitional Kitchen Remodel in Tustin with Custom-Colored Cabinetry

In the previous design, when you walked into this Tustin kitchen you were greeted with a space that felt very traditional and somewhat dark, with cabinetry that almost entirely matched the flooring, leaving very little visual contrast or distinctive design. Essentially, there wasn’t anything that was really customized or that stood out about the original design.

We did keep much of the original layout since it worked well for the homeowners, but we created a transitional design where the focus was on the beautiful, custom-colored cabinetry. The cabinetry, which we brought to the ceiling and framed with a wide customized molding, features soft close details, and Craftsman 2 ½-inch door frames. The cabinets remain along the perimeter of the kitchen and are maple construction.

The truly unique feature of these stunning cabinets, however, is the color, which is completely unique to the homeowners’ design and is two shades later than classic Sage Green. The island is a darker contrasting color—true Sage Green.

The island features a Craftsman design with flat molding and hand-crafted posts located as supports for the seating area.

The herringbone tile backsplash is in varying tones of gray and white, and extends to the ceiling above the range and beneath the GE Monogram 36-inch wall-mount vent hood. This backsplash adds a touch of modernism to the design and feels chic and clean yet visually exciting.

The white countertops feature subtle marbling patterns, and the island is where the Kraus double-basin 16-gauge exclusive undermount sink is located.

This Tustin kitchen remodel also features a GE Monogram 36-inch cooktop, and a KitchenAid 30-inch electric built-in microwave and oven combination.

The cabinet and island designs were carefully planned to maximize storage, and a built-in pantry closet located along the side wall of the kitchen was revamped to match the color and style of rest of the kitchen cabinets.

The pendant lights above the large island are another added bit of modern design that reflects the overall transitional concept of this kitchen overhaul.

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An Airy Model of Kitchen & Home Remodel in Laguna Niguel

Before the start of this complete kitchen and living area remodel, the owners of this Laguna Niguel home found themselves with a kitchen that was not only outdated but also cramped, closed-in and with an awkward, inefficient layout.

The centrally-located kitchen island was small, leaving very little room for eating, let alone cooking or prep work. The honey-colored cabinetry wasn’t updated, and there was a lot of unused space—in particular from the top of the cabinets to the ceiling. There was also a pony wall feature separating the living room and the kitchen, which continued on to become a full wall.

There wasn’t a sense of flow present between the kitchen and living area, nor was there anything modern or distinctive about the design.

We worked to completely change the layout and footprint of the kitchen, adding more usable space and a better sense of flow and openness from the kitchen to the living area, which we also redesigned.

We placed the majority of the cabinetry, storage and also the cooktop and custom stainless steel wall-mounted range hood against the back wall of the kitchen, and created a more expansive bar where the once unusable pony wall was positioned. Along with a more seamless transition, this also created more seating and entertaining space.

The entire design centers around a larger, custom island, featuring hand-crafted posts and a contrasting gray color palette.

The cabinets extend to the ceiling and are highlighted by the presence of custom moldings. To add more creative and streamlined storage space, the APlus design team created not only standard upper cabinets but added a layer of smaller cabinets above them.

The custom cabinetry, which was designed and built by the APlus team, features a 3-inch Shaker door frame with a European construction and soft close features. Custom integrations in this Laguna Nigel remodel project include two included lazy Susans, a hidden trash pull, a spice pull and a vertical tray divider located above the refrigerator cabinet. The beautiful, light-colored granite countertop boasts the clean lines of a 1 ½-inch miter edge and is accentuated by the presence of a mosaic tile backsplash in varying shades of white and gray.

The carefully-selected professional grade kitchen appliances include not only the stunning range hood, but also built-in warming drawers, a 36-inch Thermador cooktop, and a Sub-Zero refrigerator.

An expansive window sits above the kitchen sink, which is conveniently placed alongside the dishwasher. The dark, espresso plank flooring is a sophisticated addition and adds a feeling of drama to the otherwise crisp, white kitchen design.

The perfect touch for entertaining is the 24-inch built-in beverage center, which holds up to 16 wine bottles and includes state-of-the-art technology like a passive cooling system and digital touch-pad controls.

The flooring carries on to the living area, where our focus was on creating a chic custom entertainment center with display shelving, hidden storage and a central location to house a flat-screen TV. This beautiful entertainment module is the focal point of the living area and serves as not only an aesthetically appealing element but also a functional one.

As part of this comprehensive remodel we updated the powder room with an elegant pedestal sink and a custom vanity-inspired cabinet, again featuring 3-inch shaker door frames, this time in a shade of gray.

The laundry room was another area we worked to recreate along with the homeowners. Here there is an abundance of storage in the form of custom Shaker cabinetry and lower drawers, as well as a vast countertop space for folding and other tasks. The laundry machines are tucked away in custom nooks, and there is additional storage located above them as well, ensuring every inch of available space is maximized. The look is completed with a modern subway tile backsplash and a deep farmhouse-style sink.

Finally, the last part of this remodel was the inclusion of a convenient butler’s pantry with gray Shaker cabinetry, including some glass-front cabinets, perfect for displays. Double levels of custom pantry cabinets were added, and there’s the continuation of the natural stone countertop found in the central area of the kitchen. Tile floors and a stacked stone backsplash add depth and texture.

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An Artistic, Contemporary, Open-Concept Kitchen Remodel in Laguna Beach

Originally walking into this Laguna Beach home, there was a sense the kitchen was outdated and needed a breath of fresh air. It was closed off from the living and dining area, and there wasn’t the feeling entertaining would be easy, nor was the space as functional as it could be, due to this layout.

The goals of this redesign were not just to open up the kitchen and create an open, airy sense of flow, but also to modernize the old space and create instead a home that reflected the owner’s love of art and contemporary design.

To begin, the layout was revamped to create an open-concept design, with clear sightlines from the kitchen into the entirety of the living and dining room. The next step in the process included the replacement of the light-colored cabinetry and tiled countertops, as well as the Spanish tile flooring in the kitchen.

The new kitchen design reflects a completely revamped footprint, where glass doors lead to the patio on one side, and on the other side, there is a casual dining nook set against the backdrop of vast windows which lead to a scenic deck.

The central area of the kitchen includes an island which anchors the design, and the primary wall includes ample custom Sophia Line cabinetry in Aspen Oak. The main kitchen wall is also where the vast basin sink is located, as well as the built-in microwave and dishwasher.

The island includes additional storage, and then, where there was once a wall separating the living and kitchen areas, there is now a long L-shaped bar area, a 36-inch Wolf cooktop, and a modern stainless steel range vent.

This Laguna Beach kitchen also includes a built-in Avanti beverage center and a Sub Zero built-in refrigerator.

The Sophia cabinetry has soft close upgrades, and the selected graining of the custom cabinetry alternates between a horizontal and a vertical pattern, adding visual interest and a distinctive visual element. The backsplash against the primary wall is iridescent with subtle multicolored arabesque tiles.

The countertops, with a 1 ½ inch straight edge, continue the contemporary design of the kitchen and feature a rich, emerald green color palette. The island top is eye-catching with agate gem details.

Recessed lighting illuminates the kitchen, as does the natural light from the many large windows and doors, and a light plank tile runs throughout the kitchen and seamlessly meets the hardwood flooring in the living room. A custom bench sits at the far end of the kitchen and is designed with the same Sophia Line cabinetry, adding not just a sitting area, but also additional hidden storage.

Another component of this large-scale Laguna Beach remodel was the design and construction of a custom buffet for the dining room, using again the Sophia Line cabinetry. There is a countertop space that’s part of the buffet, as well as hidden storage and glass-front cabinets, perfect for displaying some items. It ties the dining area together with the kitchen as well as adding an improved level of functionality.

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