Design That Stands the Test of Time | The Lake Drive Home, Five Years Later

We are here in East Grand Rapids, Michigan at a home that's near and dear to our hearts because it's my brother Dave's house that he and his wife Christy and their four kids live in. We're here to show you what it looks like now five years later and it still looks great. Almost 110 years old and still solid as a rock. So you walk into the original vestibule and the original vestibule door I think is so so gorgeous. We decided to go with stone floors because of the way they live, the kids, and this has been fabulous for them. Yep so it's a limestone and it has a lot of variation in it. I think the I think it's called Bordeaux limestone and it it only looks better with time. I think I think the grout wearing and the stone wearing has really broken in well and I think it is the perfect choice for not only Dave and Christy but this home. You don't want to be burdened with materials that require so much work. Yeah. Because like this is a Carrara marble countertop on the other end which gets a tremendous amount of use. It is always filled with art projects, food, food, children. It looks pretty stinking good though. I mean you can you can see if you get down that there's a ton of etching etching but when you look at it from up here it's true it looks great. I love how the Carrara on the island is offset by the dark perimeter so that is a black granite which looks like soapstone. It does so much. Tell them about putting the countertop in front of the windows that are lower than counter height because that is something controversial I think. Because there's a lot of times where old homes have windows where the sill is lower than where we'd want a countertop whether it's in the kitchen that was original or if we're wanting to move the kitchen to a different spot in the house and so windows like this they're treasures. Yes. Like you don't want to say oh rip those out because we want to put our countertop to it. Yeah. And the way we did it is just finish the back side of the cabinet and put a little back splash on top of the counter so that nothing falls back there but embrace the fact that you have these very special windows because honestly this kitchen is pretty spectacular and that's a big reason why. I agree. Let's talk functionality of the kitchen. Double sink, double faucets and they're used all the time. Yep. The kids do all the dishes so there's two of them often working here and flanking dishwasher and trash. And it's nice to have the trash on that side because then you can use it while you're cooking here and when you're at the sink. So true. I love the proximity of the silverware and knife drawer to the dishwasher. I mean it's just a pivot turn to put everything away. Yeah and to set the you know to give the kids silverware as they're eating at the island. You know they have a lot of spices so right by the right by the stove. Here's all more spices and ingredients to use. And then all of the kind of unique tools for her doing sourdough and other other kinds of cooking. This is one of my favorite kinds of drawers. It's the large cooking utensil drawer and it's right by the stove. And then some more sauce pans and it's just really really functional. A cabinet that goes down to the counter is a great spot to put appliances that you use every day but that you don't want setting out on your counter. And we love to do it where it has the bottom is open to the countertop so that the countertop goes straight in. And you can see this has their toaster and their Vitamix. And then close the door. Just the island boy does it work hard. Lots of prep tools here. Mixing bowls and things that you're also prepping with down here. Junk drawer we won't show them then. Yeah it's actually more organized than I thought it was. More organized than mine I should say. And then this is such a great insert for platters and lids and cutting boards and we call it angled lid storage. And the fridge is right here. Very accessible to everything. But the freezer is not even in the kitchen proper. And and they were like yeah it doesn't need to be. And so I love where it is. I think it makes so much sense for them. So around the corner there's the dining area and then over here is the working coffee bar with an additional oven. And the freezer is right here. Yep. And there was a few inches of extra space. And why not use it all? Yep. And here's another one of the finishes from Stouffer Home Cabinetry. Iron hook. Yeah. It's just that kind of deep charcoal. Yeah. I love how there's Kensington Taupe, the natural oak paired with the iron hook over here. Everything together is just, it's the perfect palette. The powder room is just a great little spot because it's a couple steps down tucked around the corner. Used to be another way out of the house but the space seemed to be perfect. Just enough out of the way but also accessible enough. And it's kind of neat how it also has the original brick wall. Yeah. As part of it. I love how it turned out. My brother is a sauna guy. Oh yeah. He has his own business where he builds and delivers saunas. And this exit takes you to the sauna and that is used every single day in this household. And there's a couple spaces to hang out here too in a lounging type way. It's kind of fun that the kitchen is now open to this. Yep. Which makes it possible for Dave and Christy to engage with their kids or their guests if they're not actually in the kitchen with them. But there's all, there's a little separation. Yep. It's still, the room is still defined. We did add something to this room architecturally though which is kind of now I think one of its coolest features is is the bar. I love it. I mean if you have a little bit of space this is what this looks like 60 inches right? Two, four. And then you have the depth for cabinetry. This is kind of a no-brainer off of the living room. I do think the mix of materials with the the brickish kind of tile and the wallpaper and the shape. And a little bit of color too with the eden green. Eden green. And this is just honestly where they hang out. Behind the camera we won't show you there's a lot of toys. Yeah. Books. Books. Fireplace. Uh-huh. And another set of gorgeous windows that are original to the home. Yeah. But I think that the room that has maybe the most windows at least for the size of the room is this porch sunroom. This has an original floor for this beautiful terracotta type floor. And the brick was already painted in here kind of and it was yellow. Yep. When they got it. So we painted it Bradbury green which just kind of gives it a very cool feel. And then looking out over into their yard. They put in a whole turf field in their front yard so the kids could play soccer. Yeah. It's really fun. Right. And there's one more space to show you. It is Dave and Christy's primary suite which is very sweet. It's very sweet. Yeah. Okay this room the primary suite had a major transformation. We changed the entrance and then moved the closet to a different spot. We raised the ceiling to take advantage of all that attic space which made a massive difference in how this room feels. Every time I think of this room I think it feels like a tree house. Yeah. Because every which where you look there's a tree and leaves and it's just it's a beautiful space. This is the only bedroom that has these type of leaded original windows so why not make it the primary suite. I'm just thrilled with how this turned out. And it's connected right away to the bathroom. There's matching Paddington vanities in our Bromwich. These drawers actually have quite a bit of storage in them. The toilet's tucked around the corner. I love to hide it if at all possible. I do love how um organic the feel of this leash tile is. Yeah. It's um you know you can see a lot of the ins and outs because no tile is the same. And then this is very interesting because the rest of the bedrooms upstairs are up four stairs and I think that this actually was the original nursery. So we decided to capture that space for their walk-in closet and they even have a washer and dryer up in there. That's so great and it's nice to come back five years later and say it worked. It's working. Okay the other thing I'm so excited to see is that you know painted finishes people get concerned about on cabinetry but all the finishes throughout this house five years of wear and tear. Yeah yeah. Everything looks branded. Yeah it's because of that absolutely catalyzed baked on finish in our shop and yeah it really is the best. It's the best. It's hard but it feels like velvet. Yeah. And so it lasts and lasts and I'm just thrilled with it. I can confidently say yeah this is a lasting finish. You don't have to worry about this at all. Okay although Grace you and I have been back here so many times since we filmed with the show this is our first time bringing you back. If you're interested in seeing the whole process you should watch season one episodes one and two of The Established Home. Every detail from before to the whole process of how everything worked till the end result which we kind of saw today a five year later version of the end. Totally and if you like videos like this and you want to see more please like and subscribe we'll keep doing it. Should we go sauna? Liz check it out.