For those of you in the Bloomington or Spencer Indiana areas, I thought I would revisit some of my past projects through a series of before and after articles.  It’s always fun to see how different things are after a project is finished.  Photos only begin to tell the story.

A couple years ago, I opened up the wall for this client between their dining room and kitchen.  This is a very common project that people consider.  I’d say that they often overestimate how much it costs to remove a wall.  It’s probably  the most dramatic change you can make for the dollars you spend.

This particular project did not involve a load-bearing wall, making it simpler to deal with.  However, a load-bearing wall isn’t as problematic as you might think most of the time.  I removed the wall and had a large wood countertop installed to act as a serving bar.  A countertop like this isn’t cheap.  If price is a concern we could just use painted trim or perhaps a laminate counter.  There are many options to consider.

There are many places where opening a wall or removing it altogether might make a dramatic change in how you use your home.  If you’d like to discuss some ideas, let me know here.

(Read more about this project at this post).