Shrewsbury, MA — The description is an odd one: Rustic Elegance. It evokes a little bit country, a little bit Park Avenue. For designers Mariette Barsoum, CKD and interior designer Heidi Marika-Perez, of Westborough, MA-based Divine Kitchens, the challenge was to take their clients’ style – which Barsoum describes as laid back but with a passion for pretty – and make a truly personalized kitchen.

“They’re people who enjoy nature and the outdoors,” says Barsoum. “We used elements of that when we selected materials, but we were also conscious of the design of the rest of the home.”

Barsoum describes the décor as “informal traditional,” and notes that every step was taken to not stray too far from that style when reconfiguring the kitchen. “From the rich stained hardwood floors, the tumbled stone backsplash and painted cabinetry, the remodel turned it into a very different kitchen.”

Structural Challenges

“The major needs of the kitchen involved opening up the space to the living room,” says Barsoum. “The homeowners wanted to make the kitchen and family room seem like one space. The high ceilings and beams also needed to be addressed. The homeowners didn’t like the beams at all and wanted to paint them to blend into the background.”

The solution on which Barsoum settled was to close the 42" opening into the dining room and enlarge the 36" opening into the living room to 10'.

“Next we took down the wall separating the dining room from the living room and finished the opening with the same molding details that we used in the cabinetry in the kitchen,” says the designer. “This achieved the initial goal to have the space flow from one room to the next.”

To address the problem of the irksome visible beams, Barsoum and company came up with a solution to dress them up in a way that pleased the clients.

“We covered the ceiling with 5" wide Woodhaven ceiling planks from Armstrong that have a whitewashed look to them. We decided the beams themselves actually needed to be emphasized instead of hidden, so we stained them in a rich, dark shade. They popped beautifully against the planks on the ceiling,” says Barsoum.

Once the nuts and bolts were worked out, all parties were satisfied with the resulting airy atmosphere. “Prior to the remodel, the kitchen was lacking integration with the living room and surrounding spaces; once we opened up the walls, it really allowed us to give the clients exactly what they were looking for,” she notes.