Kitchen Nook Reboot is Handy Hub for Online School

This little kitchen alcove has lived many lives.

It stood empty for a long time after we moved in.

Then it held our vintage chalk-painted hutch.

And more recently, after we moved the hutch out of that space, it held a bench, that turned into a catch-all for everything from school diorama projects to knitting needles for beginners.

So when COVID struck and school went online, we needed a central place, basically a little school station, where the kids could take online classes and also store their laptops, headphones, school books and all the supplies.

That’s when we decided to transform the nook into this two-person computer/laptop hub, where everything school-related could be housed, plugged in and recharged.

And it’s actually worked out well.

It looks good, but more importantly it’s so functional, because everything is in one place.

No more searching around the house for chargers of any description, headphones, pencils with points or books that seem to grow legs and disappear into the void of a bedroom.

Oh no!

Confusion and clutter be gone! That’s the best part.

Plus, it’s easier to monitor online online activity when you have eyes on.

What We Did

Here’s how the space looked before we began, with the bench gone and the original ultra-thin skirting board pulled out.

A nice sorry mess, right?

We did a rough sketch of how we wanted the area to look and how it would function.

Then we adjusted the design until we had a pretty realistic picture of what we could do ourselves.

We knew we wanted cabinets above the desk area that would also match the rest of our kitchen cabinets, which we had painted white a few years ago.

We went to our local Habitat for Humanity ReStore and amazingly, happened to find an almost identical used kitchen cabinet for $35. It had been painted white and had moulding around the frame, which we removed.

We cleaned, painted and hung the “new” upper cabinets in the middle of the nook. We bought door handles that match the kitchen cabinets to give a uniform look.

Since we couldn’t find a lone bottom cabinet, we bought one.

We also bought a piece of wood for the desk, which we stained and anchored to this bottom cabinet.

We installed under-mounted L brackets on either end of the wood desk for stability.

When we stood back and looked at the area, we knew it needed open shelves on either side of the upper cabinet to give a sense of visual balance and to store some cookbooks and display some lovelies.

Hubby cut the leftover wood from the desk to size and we stained them the same color as the desk.

It’s been a great place to store cookbooks, display my homemade teacup candles and add a slanted cloche with tiny camper, which easily inspires wanderlust.

That’s the great thing about decorating. You get to use things that inspire or speak specifically to you.

We painted the side walls of the nook in a black semi-gloss to give the area some some visual depth.

And for the back wall, enter …

Peel-and-Stick Wallpaper!

I have to say I took a chance with the removable, self-adhesive peel-and-stick wallpaper for this project, but I’m ready to sing its praises.

Besides loving the black and white herringbone pattern, it went on easily and quickly, giving the space a completely different look and feel.

The hand-drawn herringbone pattern was very forgiving and easy to match up.

We used three rolls of this wallpaper and we had a lot left over.

It adhered really well and it’s still on there. And the best part is we can easily pull it off, if we get tired of it.

I’d never worked with peel-and-stick anything before, although I vaguely remember helping my mother to line shelves with contact paper.

I’m so impressed with it that I used it in two more projects – the downstairs bathroom refresh and the built-in bookshelves in the living room.

And feeling confident about how well the peel-and-stick wallpaper went, I tried peel-and-stick floor tiles in the downstairs bathroom redo.

That was also a success and is holding up really well in a high-traffic area. I’ll post details of these projects soon.

So we too a peel-and-stick wallpaper gamble and it paid off.

Lights, Computers, Action!

The nook didn’t have a light, so hubby installed two recessed dimmable lights overhead, which provides great lighting for reading.

We started off using two industrial metal stools with backs, which were comfortable for short periods of time, but not for very long. Sometimes what you already have works out, sometimes it doesn’t. And this was one of those times.

Soon we purchased these two gray fabric counter height stools, which provide much-needed back support and are very comfy.

Hubs also installed two wall outlets with USB chargers at either end of the desk.

This is a space we’ll all use in its present configuration for the foreseeable future, since we also use this space to recharge and work on our laptops.

Another project in the bag.

Next!