Old House

How We Built A Custom Kitchen For Practically Nothing

It meant living in chaos for a while, but this kitchen is uniquely ours and doesn’t follow any trends

In progress: We lived in utter chaos for what felt like forever, but it was worth it. We painted half the kitchen at a time; the whole floor is blue now. (Photo by Michelle Teheux)

You can usually take one glance at a kitchen and instantly recognize the decade.

Good luck with mine! It doesn’t follow any aesthetic but my own. And of all the kitchens I’ve had, it is by far my favorite — but we had to live in chaos while we did everything slowly and by hand.

I learned to cook in a funky turquoise trailer kitchen.

The bottom drawer of the cabinet between the refrigerator and the stove was a metal-lined bread box with a perforated sliding cover on it, something I’ve never seen since and would love to have now.

My husband would make one for me if I asked, but he’s already got several lifetimes of projects to do.

We moved out of the trailer with the turquoise kitchen and into a brand-new ranch house when I was in junior high. My parents started building the new house when I was in kindergarten, doing everything themselves after work and on weekends as time and money allowed.

Other than some neighbors helping raise the…