White vs Red Small Kitchen--Late November 2013

 My sister Jodie in the kitchen that needs upgrading.  You can't see the wall to the left, but, they will be a space about 3 feet long that will get the color treatment. The wall behind her will stay white as is the door and new window treatment.

 

 

  Me in the kitchen on soap cooking day.  The wall that you really can't see to the right is the wall that needs the color.  It will cover around the window and the two backsplash areas beneath the cabinets on both sides of the window. 

We are probably going to be listing our house sometime in the coming years, so, I am naturally thinking about upgrades.  We live a simple life one without a lot of money for extravagant upgrades.  We have a small, older home without any of the bells and whistles that all those house hunters are typically looking for nowadays--the stainless, the granate, the open floor plan.  But, what we do have is a really well made house with a pool and a fireplace--the two things that we wanted when we were looking for a home. 

So, my tiny little kitchen...it was white when we moved in and it is still white.  We repaint it every 8 years or so.  But I just can't picture any other color on the cabinets since it is a little space.  We just took down the curtains and put up faux wood blinds...and that opened it up a bit.  But now that the color is gone from the room, I need to add more.

So, eventually I would like to trick out my backsplash--when or if I ever get a new countertop--but until then I want to repaint the backsplash.  Right now it has the same contact paper--YES, I SAID CONTACT PAPER!!!--that was on it when we moved in.  Can you believe it?  Well, in fairness to me, I liked the colors in it so I never changed it.  Plus the thought of peeling that stuff off was pretty daunting.  (Until I had to do it in the bathroom where the previous owner had wallpapered in contact paper too!  We discovered the reason why after pulling it all off--they must have had a lot of pets or never cleaned as the walls were covered with layers of paint with LOTS of hair painted in.  Yuck!  That took several days of sanding to correct.) 

So, I am getting closer to doing the work of getting rid of it and now I just need to decide what color to paint it when the contact paper comes down--red or white.  My husband is red color blind, so, I will have to check with him before I pick the red option.  I spent a couple hours looking through small kitchen images to try to imagine which would look best in our kitchen.  Here are the pictures which are closest to how it would look in our space.  What do you think?

 

And maybe I won't have to choose one color after all.  Here's an option with both colors.  Leave a comment with your favorite look!  Or who knows, suggest a totally different plan!!