Sometimes the Best Solution Is To Leave Things As They Are
We must distinguish between the oft-lauded creative destruction of what is obsolete and destruction in pursuit of fleeting fashion.
I recently received an insightful email from a reader who had come across my archives of free-lance articles and essays on home and urban design. I wrote dozens of articles for S.F. Bay Area newspapers from 1988 to 2006, and a handful are listed here.
The one the reader is responding to is Best Remodel Might Be None At All (2006). Here are the reader’s comments:
“I thoroughly enjoyed the articles you penned for the SF Examiner that you’ve linked to on your website, these being written close to two decades ago.
Especially noteworthy was your response to the homeowner inquiring about a kitchen remodel where you recommended that the best course of action might be no course of action. This was an wonderful response and it caught my attention because it belies the common sales oriented suggestions generally offered by those writing about remodeling, and especially about kitchens. Usually you see writers busy extolling the gutting and replacement of a kitchen with wild zeal talking about how wonderful it will be to pour coffee or to butter toast once the kitchen area has been refurbished… and how in the sheer pleasure of a new kitchen you might even choose to drink two cups of coffee just for the fun of it!
In the old craftsman style house or bungalow it would mean new plumbing and upgrading the electrical wiring to go with new appliances and new cabinetry.
In the era when that house was constructed the cabinets were typically built on site, matching the cabinetry to the design and work flow of the kitchen.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
