Your kitchen is the heart of your home. You spend hours there every day, so you want it to feel bright, inviting, and comfortable. And if you do any entertaining, your kitchen is on display for guests to see.

Updating a kitchen can make the space more your style, more useful, and something you want to show off. It can also increase the value of your home. Kitchen remodeling is one of the most popular interior design projects we help our clients with.

A full kitchen remodel averages $21,751, with a range of between $12,000 and $33,000. But kitchen remodeling doesn’t have to be a $30,000, month-long project. Omorfia designers can also help you with some smaller-scale remodels that will pack a punch without breaking your budget.

Here are some kitchen remodeling ideas that can be done alone, or in combination, to upgrade your space. Let us know if any of these sound interesting, and we’ll help you get your kitchen spiffy in a jiffy.

Is your kitchen saddled with a white square on the ceiling that looks like a piece of gum? How about one of those long rectangular fluorescent lights like they have at the dentist? Maybe your current fixture screams “That 70’s Show.” One of the quickest and most effective kitchen remodel ideas is to change out your lighting.

Without much cost or intrusion into your kitchen, you can upgrade your lighting to get a lot of bang for your buck. Adding some spotlighting, track lighting, under-cabinet lighting, pendants, or a central fixture that draws your eye will make your kitchen bright and stylish.

One of our consultants can help you navigate the lighting world and ensure your choices are affordable, durable, and will not overload your circuits. We can also help you add recessed lighting or task lighting to make your kitchen more usable.

Treat Your Windows to a New Look

New blinds, curtains, or a valance will add color and visual interest to your kitchen window and spruce up your kitchen. It’s an opportunity to coordinate with other color choices and pull the room together for a classy look.

Our designers will help you make choices between plantation blinds, Roman shades, natural woods or bamboo, cordless cellular shades, or solar shades. We can help with fabric choices for valances and coordinate towels, placemats, and other fabric accents for eye-catching flair.

Make a Splash with a New Backsplash

A stylish new backsplash behind your stove and countertops will update any kitchen and provide a focal point. Backsplashes also make cleaning easier, as they can be wiped down and often don’t show dirt.

Backsplashes are a great way to play with color and make a visual point in an otherwise neutral kitchen. You don’t have to install the backsplash throughout the kitchen. You can make an accent wall by only putting it behind your stove, for example, or use a different pattern there and a more uniform look elsewhere.

Replacing your oven hood is a good complementary project to adding a backsplash and can also make a huge change in your kitchen. Removing the under-cabinet oven hood that is in most kitchens and replacing it with a ceiling or wall-mounted stainless steel hood will open more wall behind the hood for a beautiful backsplash.

Installing a backsplash is also a good time to consider adding any wall outlets to your kitchen that you wish you had. Many older kitchens suffer from a lack of outlets behind the counter for small appliances such as toaster ovens and Instapots. Add these outlets now, before you put tile on the wall.

Wash that Old Sink Right Out of Your Kitchen

A new sink and an upgraded faucet will make your existing kitchen more useful and beautiful. Since you aren’t tearing out your cabinets or appliances, you’ll be restricted to roughly the overall size of your current sink, but there are big changes you can make even so.

Get rid of your standard, shallow stainless sink and replace it with a double-basin sink of various depths and duties, or a farmhouse sink. Choose among composite sinks, stainless, granite, or cast-iron. Improve the functionality of your sink with features such as built-in drainboards and vegetable sinks.

Depending on your needs, faucets with built-in sprayers, or that turn on with the back of a hand can help you be more efficient in the kitchen. A high-neck faucet and a deeper sink will allow you to fill tall pitchers and buckets, for example.

Changing your sink and faucet is also a time to consider adding a water filtration system, a garbage disposal, or other upgrades. Let our designers help you make the most of this kitchen remodeling choice.

New Flooring Makes a Huge Difference

If your kitchen is stuck in a previous decade with its linoleum floor or saddled with the design choice of a previous owner that isn’t your style, upgrading the flooring can be a great choice.

There are many options for a great kitchen floor that will suit your needs and budget. Our designers can help you understand the differences and select the right one.

Ceramic tile is a classic material that is durable and offers a lot of variety and style. Wood flooring can be great, especially if you’re extending a floor from an adjacent living or dining room. Laminate flooring is durable and cleans up easily if you have a family that makes kitchen messes. Cork flooring is comfortable to stand on and can relieve joint pain if you’re on your feet in the kitchen often.

There are also sustainable choices such as bamboo, and the new vinyls are much classier and more diverse than in previous years. Often you can have a vinyl floor that looks like wood or tile, saving you a bundle in materials costs but offering a luxurious look.

A kitchen floor remodel can usually be done in a day or two without requiring you to take everything out of your cabinets.

Other Ideas for Partial Kitchen Remodels

• Remove cabinets and add shelving or pot racks instead

• Remove cabinet doors and use open shelving for a brighter look and to show off pretty dishes or stemware.

• Upgrade your countertops

• Repaint your current cabinets and install updated hardware

• Add an island

• Update your appliances

Whether you’re looking for a complete kitchen redesign for better flow and use of space or a more modest kitchen remodel, we can help you go from ideas to reality. Contact us for a free 30-minute consultation and let us help you make your kitchen the place you want to be.