Kitchen Remodeling
This one was a fun project. The homeowners had been living with a closed-off galley layout for years — a pantry wall and a corner partition were chopping the room into pieces — and what they really wanted was an open concept kitchen that connected to the rest of the house. The bones were there. The light was there. It was just walled off from itself.
By the time we wrapped, you could see straight across from the cooktop all the way to the French doors out to the deck, and the back of the house finally read as one big space instead of three small ones.
Going from Closed-Off to Open Concept
The biggest move on this Vienna kitchen was structural. We took down two walls — the old pantry and a corner partition — to open the kitchen up to the adjacent living area. Neither was load-bearing, which we confirmed before quoting. That made the demo cleaner than these projects sometimes are.
Open concept kitchens look effortless when they’re done, but the layout work behind them is anything but. Once those walls came down, almost everything in the room had to move: the refrigerator landed in a new spot (which meant running a new water line for the ice maker), the hood relocated entirely (we capped off the old downdraft and gas line where the cooktop used to live and ran new ventilation through the wall), and two existing wall vents had to be repositioned to clear the new cabinet layout.
The island became the anchor of the new open layout — centered in the room, seating for three, and giving the cook a real prep zone facing the living area instead of staring at a wall.
The Two-Tone Cabinetry
Anyone designing an open concept kitchen runs into the same problem: when the kitchen opens onto the rest of the house, you can’t hide a wall of identical cabinets the way you could in a closed room. The cabinetry becomes part of the living space, visually.
The clients went two-tone to solve that. We used Medallion Gold Line cabinets — semi-custom, all-plywood construction, solid wood door and drawer fronts, soft-close everywhere, and a limited lifetime warranty backing it all. Mission Flat Panel door style in maple, two finishes:
- Maple Magnolia Classic on the perimeter — the soft gray you see throughout the room
- Cherry Peppercorn on the island — the warm, darker tone that lets the island read as a piece of furniture rather than just more storage
This two-tone treatment is having a real moment in open concept kitchens specifically, and we don’t see it slowing down. It breaks up the visual weight of the cabinetry, gives the room a focal point, and prevents the “I’m staring at a Home Depot wall” effect that can happen when everything matches.
The uppers run 54″ stacked all the way to the ceiling. No soffit, no wasted space, and visually it makes the ceiling feel taller — which matters more in an open concept layout than in a closed kitchen, because the sightlines are longer.
Hardware is Jeffrey Alexander Boswell in satin nickel — 177-128SN on the large drawers, 177-96SN on the regular doors. Clean and modern without trying too hard.
Quartz Countertops and a Big Island
MSI Quartz in Calacatta Mirraggio Duo runs across the entire perimeter and the island, with a 12″ overhang on the seating side. Pencil edge — basically a softened square — because the rest of the kitchen is doing plenty of visual work and we didn’t want a busy edge competing with the herringbone backsplash and the two-tone cabinets.
The island itself is one of the things that makes the open concept layout actually work. In a closed kitchen you can get away with a small island or no island at all. In an open concept kitchen, the island is the bridge between the cooking zone and the rest of the room — it has to anchor the space, provide seating, and give the cook somewhere to actually prep without turning their back on whoever they’re talking to.
This one delivers on all three. The Cherry Peppercorn finish makes it the visual centerpiece of the room without overpowering it.
A Backsplash That Goes All the Way Up
The clients wanted herringbone, so we did Mar Iceberg Double Herringbone with standard white grout. Ran across all three kitchen walls between the countertop and the upper cabinets, and then — this is the move — took it all the way up to the ceiling behind the hood and the floating shelves on the side wall.
That vertical run is what makes the hood feel like an architectural feature rather than just an appliance bolted to the wall. In an open concept kitchen, the hood is visible from across the room. It either earns its place as a design element or it stands out as a chunk of metal stuck above the stove. This one earns it.
We finished the tile edges with Schluter trim in brushed nickel to match the rest of the metal in the room. Skipping Schluter on a job like this and trying to bullnose the edges instead is one of those shortcuts that always shows. Worth the extra step.
Flooring That Reads as One Space
In an open concept kitchen, the floor is usually the first thing that signals whether the rooms are actually connected or just adjacent. We did porcelain tile across the kitchen and laundry — Happy Floors Timeless White, 12×24″ rectified matte — in a 1/2 offset pattern.
Half-brick is the only offset we’ll run on rectified 12×24 tile. Anything more aggressive shows lippage on tiles this long, and rectified edges don’t forgive much. Done right, it reads as a calm, continuous surface across the entire back of the house.
Cement board underneath, 4″ white wood baseboard, grout color selected on-site with the homeowner once the tile was down so they could see it in context against the cabinets.
Electrical for the New Layout
When you open up a kitchen, you don’t just move walls — you essentially rebuild the electrical system to match the new layout. On this project that meant:
- New dedicated circuits for the hood, induction cooktop, refrigerator, combination wall oven, and beverage cooler
- 11 GFCI-protected outlets repositioned and rewired
- 10 new 6″ LED recessed lights laid out for the new ceiling plan, with a new switch
- 8 LED undercabinet lights wired in on their own switch
- Removed the old pendant over the dining area; walls patched, sanded, and primed
Undercabinet lighting is one of those upgrades clients always thank us for after the fact. Cheap to add during a remodel, transforms the room at night, and makes the kitchen functional for evening prep without flipping on every light.
Plumbing and Appliance Hookup
We disconnected and reconnected the sink, dishwasher, and disposal, and swapped in a new InSinkErator Badger 5 — half-horsepower with SoundSeal. The Badger 5 is our default disposal recommendation for kitchens at this level. We’ve installed thousands and they just work.
All appliances were hooked up by our team: dishwasher, induction cooktop, combo oven, the 400 CFM hood, beverage cooler, and the refrigerator. We don’t sub the appliance hookup out. Too many small details that have to go right.
Paint
Walls and ceiling in Benjamin Moore. The wall color is a custom match to a chip the homeowners picked — that warm blue is theirs, not ours, and it works because it pulls the open concept layout together. Ceiling in Kitchen Flat White. We always specify true kitchen ceiling paint rather than reusing the wall finish; the formulation handles grease and steam better, and the flat finish hides ceiling imperfections that gloss would amplify.
Thinking About an Open Concept Kitchen of Your Own?
If you’ve been staring at a closed-off kitchen and wondering whether it can actually be opened up — yes, almost always. The questions are: which walls are load-bearing, where does the plumbing and electrical have to move, and what does the new layout actually want to do.
We’ve remodeled hundreds of kitchens in Vienna, McLean, Great Falls, Oakton, and across Northern Virginia. Most of our open concept kitchen remodels at this scope land in the $60K-$120K range, depending on cabinet line, counter material, and how much structural work is involved.
Come by our Vienna showroom on Church Street and we’ll walk through what’s possible for your space — or visit our Herndon or Alexandria showrooms if those are closer to you. Free in-home consultation, 3D renderings before we break ground, and one team handling design and build from start to finish.
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- Date: May 18, 2026
- Layout Open Concept Kitchen
- Design Code: #2123478137423
- Created By: Nomi Saruul
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We specialize in custom kitchen remodels across Northern Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. If you’re thinking about updating your space, we’d love to hear your ideas.
