If you love a neutral but feel numbed out by white quartz or bored by beige granite, do not give up hope for your kitchen or bath design.
It's here! Our favorite time of year when we can look back on a year's worth of stunning kitchen and bath designs featuring recycled glass surfaces. From the beach to the city, talented designers are using crushed glass counters and mosaic tiles to create interiors with historic charm, coastal vibes and modern moods. (An amazing amount of style variety in this year's designs.)
Out on California’s Central Coast in Avila Beach, there’s a beach getaway with a design that’s stunning both for what it incorporates and what it omits. When designer Stephanie Rothbauer envisioned the total home renovation, which started off as just a bathroom (don’t they all), she turned to her surroundings for inspiration.
And in San Luis Obispo County that means foggy days and soft color neutrals of sand and shells and rugged browns of weathered wooden piers. More sunbleached driftwood than twinkling turquoise. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) The designer used it all to create a luxury, sustainable retreat with recycled glass kitchen countertops reflecting the subtle sparkle of the Pacific.
“I wanted a coastal feel, not screaming beach,” Rothbauer said “I chose tones natural to the local environment.”
Her interior which incorporates Vetrazzo’s Martini Flint recycled glass countertops in the kitchen, three bathrooms and a fireplace hearth, is all about mixing materials: concrete flooring, plaster and wood walls, wood veneer doors, recycled glass tiles and even porcelain tile on the stair risers, all in a sandy palette.
Historic may not be the first word that comes to mind when you think of Florida homes. Up until the last 80 years, the sunshine state was still virtually an untouched jungle with predominantly dirt roads and little in the way of notable architecture like that found in other southern states such as Georgia and South Carolina. And compared to areas north of the Mason Dixon line like New York and Massachusetts, Florida might as well be considered an uninhabited island. But St. Augustine aside, Florida still has some hidden history tucked away in the palm trees that adds to its coastal character.
