My Kitchen Renovation in Italy

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In a slight departure from my normal posts, today I am sharing the tales of my kitchen renovation in Italy. Any kitchen project is always a huge undertaking. As you can imagine, realizing one in a different country, language, and culture adds another set of challenges! In this post, I discuss how the renovation progressed, and what I chose for my countertop, appliances, and more. My experiences could be useful for those of you changing your kitchens, no matter where you are.

A Little Background…

For those who haven’t read my bio, I have been living in Italy since 2014. In Bologna, to be specific. We came to Italy for a year-long adventure and ended up staying. In 2020, we unexpectedly fell in love with an apartment we rented in Abruzzo. I will spare you the details, but the short version of the story is that we bought it! Nowadays, we reside in Bologna during the school year and spend our summers near the Adriatic in the region of Abruzzo. We recently did a kitchen renovation and I thought I’d share our experience.

On a side note, from a cook’s perspective, this arrangement is brilliant because I get to play with two completely contrasting regional cuisines! I have the opportunity to learn about different ingredients, traditions, and dishes. It’s incredible! In my recipe section, you’ll find plenty of recipes from both Emilia-Romagna and Abruzzo. At the end of my post, I will leave links to some. OK, back to the kitchen…

The Beginnings of Our Kitchen Renovation in Italy

Even though the kitchen that came with the apartment was cute and did what it needed to, we knew going in that it would have to be redone eventually. There was limited counter space, a tiny sink, very limited storage capacity, a crazy (even dangerous!) gas cooktop. Then, things started falling apart! So, it was time to start our kitchen renovation in Italy, ready or not.

My first step was to create a private Pinterest board to collect ideas. This ended up being incredibly useful. If any of you are about to embark on a kitchen renovation in Italy or elsewhere, I can’t recommend this enough. With this tool, I could see a variety of styles and trends, not only in the Boot but in other parts of the world. Also, I was able to gather organizational and storage ideas and see how others handled working in small spaces. Over time, I cobbled together a fantasy kitchen that would suit our needs. My ideal had a mix of both Italian and American styles.

How to Go About a Kitchen Renovation in Italy?

Interestingly, unlike in the USA, kitchens are things that people often take with them when they leave a home. When you buy a property there is no guarantee that a kitchen will be installed. (This blows my mind!) Hence, many kitchens are pre-fab and of a standard size that can be easily removed when you leave a home and then placed into another house or apartment. What a concept. I guess we were lucky to have a kitchen at all!

Our first step was to go to chain kitchen stores. We looked at many but didn’t find anything we really liked. After some time we came to the conclusion that it would be best to seek a store or interior designer in Abruzzo. This way we would have someone local on the ground for us. Considering that we were based in Bologna, this resource would be crucial.

In my search, I came across the website of an interior designer and architect in Pescara named Debora. Her site, Micro Interior Design, was impressive: well-designed, neat, easy to navigate, and comprehensive. It illustrated her previous work, described the process of working on a project, and was upfront about pricing. I was very excited and rather hoped that we’d like her in person. Thankfully we did! It was a very easy decision to work with her. After that, we could finally get to work with the goal of completing our project before the next summer arrived.

A Designer Can Save the Day During a Kitchen Renovation in Italy…

Debora had different services available. We could hire her to simply design the space within our budget, or she could both design and manage the project from beginning to end. This was also a no-brainer! Speak to everyone in Italian for us? Find all of the local workmen? Yes, please! Based on that aspect alone I would recommend working with a designer when doing a kitchen renovation in Italy. Removing the intimidating language element was such a relief. Importantly, designers also have relationships with electricians, plumbers, kitchen companies, and carpenters and have an understanding of how projects like this work. If we hadn’t hired her, our project would still be incomplete, especially since we were doing this from afar!

After reviewing our apartment with Debora, we determined that we would not only do our kitchen but the living room as well. Since it is all one space, this made sense. That would extend storage for the kitchen, and the room would have one cohesive design for the living, dining, and kitchen areas. Our living room looked like a college dorm anyway, so this was a welcome idea.

The Living Area

When it came to the living room, I knew that we needed homes for office supplies, the printer, a charging area for electronic devices, the TV, family board games, and books. We also wanted to hide things like our modem and other unseemly wires. I hadn’t the foggiest how to go about it. How brilliant to be able to simply let a pro figure it out! Hallelujah. Debora created a beautiful design that we fine-tuned together. It was a lovely and exciting experience.

We absolutely adore what she did. Debora created a room with storage and style that didn’t overwhelm the space. Practically speaking, she was also able to create proposals with pre-fab furniture versus customized. For the kitchen, we helped our budget by choosing standard cabinets. In the living room, on the other hand, we used a carpenter to carry out a custom design. The room would not have worked as well otherwise. I liked that we could pick and choose where to splurge and where to save.

It’s All in the Details

There are many features that I love about the living room. For one, I love how light and bright the space looks. The neutral color that we chose for the cabinets in combination with white, ties in really well with both the floor (which we did not re-do) and the rest of the room. Another detail that I never would have thought of was to have the radiator covered. The attractive cover is held in place by a magnet and is rather easy to deal with. It looks much better. In keeping with the current style here in Italy at the moment, we chose to keep the cabinets simple without any knobs or handles.

Another fun detail in the living room is a pullout coffee table on wheels that neatly tucks away when not in use. The previous furniture in the room had a little hidden table like that for the same purpose. The carpenter went with the concept and made a table with wheels on it which made it even easier to use. That was a nice surprise. In small spaces, you have to be ingenious!

One other thing that I would like to mention is the importance of getting extra outlets installed. Since the walls will be painted anyway, putting holes in the wall to get more outlets is no big deal. In Debora’s design, she had the electrician put outlets in the living room that would hide behind a large drawer. When the design came together, the carpenter put holes in the back of the drawers so that all of our electrical devices could be plugged in without any visible wires. For a neat freak like me, this was imperative.

Before and After

Below is a picture of what the room looked like with the previous owners. When we took over, some of the decorations went bye-bye, and the room looked rather empty. Now we have a light and airy room that has a lot of storage without looking heavy. Debora was able to create a practical and stylish living space where I could store extra kitchen equipment, serving ware, and all of the other things I needed to tuck away.

The Entranceway

Originally, when you entered the apartment, there was a dresser on the right. This eventually became a dresser-sized everything-drawer… I couldn’t stand it. Even though it was a part of the living room, I wanted it to be an extension of the kitchen that looked like it belonged in the living area. What we chose was a dresser-like unit built into the wall, elevated off of the floor. This made things feel less heavy. Then, we chose to have a cupboard above with glass doors for things like stemware and cups. As you can see by the picture below, it looks lovely!

In the top drawer, I store food storage containers and lids. In the bottom drawer, I put kitchen tools like my salad spinner, cheese grater, sieves, small rolling pins, and other non-electric kitchen tools. They are easy to get to from the kitchen and yet they are not taking prime real estate right by the stove. I like that I don’t have to reach up into tall cabinets to get to these items.

Another thing that was important to me in the design was to create an area for the toaster, bread box, napkins, and tea kettle. We had outlets installed above the dresser unit just for this purpose. It’s nice to have this little area for small electric appliances and other kitchen items without taking away from my limited counter space in the kitchen.

My Beloved New Kitchen

Ah, the kitchen… When we bought the apartment the kitchen was a concern. It wasn’t a matter of style, it was a question of size and layout. I’d never worked in a one-wall kitchen before. I really didn’t know if there would be enough space for me.

I used to be a personal chef in Nashville. That allowed me to cook in many gorgeous luxury kitchens. After being spoiled like that I never thought that a one-wall kitchen could work. It must be too small, right? It turns out that I was very wrong. The problem with working in a humungous kitchen is that you frequently need to walk longer distances to get to anything you need. It wastes a lot of time. Just because a kitchen is large doesn’t mean it functions well. When you work in a one-wall kitchen, everything is at your fingertips. You go from side to side to get the oven, fridge, stove, and dishwasher. It’s all right there! This was a revelation. It turns out to be an incredibly efficient and pleasurable way to work. Who knew?

Since the previous layout was working so well, we knew that we didn’t want to change the formation as much as maximize and extend the kitchen within the limited space we had.

What I Wanted in my Kitchen Renovation in Italy

My goals for this kitchen were:

• a larger sink
• heat-resistant and attractive work surface (we had Formica)
• bring the cabinets up to the ceiling for extra storage
• expand the length of the kitchen
• new faucet with a pull out and spray capability
• two different-colored cabinets (white and blue to go with the theme of being near the sea)
• enclosed hood with extra storage on either side of the hood
• small pantry (expanding the kitchen would enable that)
• better appliances
• two domino hubs/cooktops, one 2 burner gas cooktop and one flex-zone induction cooktop
• white subway tiles for the backsplash (my fantasy for years)

Thankfully, Debora was able to recreate my vision and include all of these features rather easily. Yippee!

The Cabinets

Since Debora was familiar with all of the local kitchen stores in the area, she knew where to take us to find the style and quality we wanted. When we looked on our own, we simply did not have that luck.

We decided on white cabinets for most of the kitchen with blue cabinets under the counter. Our apartment by the sea is modern and very bright. This color combo suits the space. There seem to be many kitchens with either blue/white or sage/white these days and I love the idea. We chose a trim on the blue cabinets to create a nice detail in a more American style. The upper cabinets are simple and have no hardware (more Italian). The side and base cabinets have handles, which again, is more of an American touch. We also maximized storage by bringing the cabinets to the ceiling. The cabinets above the counter are shallow so I don’t knock my head and the upper cabinets have more depth to fit more items.

We are thrilled with how the kitchen looks. It’s now more attractive and much more functional. I’d say it’s kind of a hybrid like I am – part American, part Italian!

The Countertops

One item for the kitchen was of utmost importance – the countertop. I think that from an Italian perspective, Debora couldn’t quite understand my hyper-fixation! For an American kitchen, the countertop is extremely important. Here, it seems less so.

What to get? Should we get Carrara marble to match our kitchen table (pictured below)? The combination of Carrara marble with subway tiles is a classic combo that I love. It was tempting aesthetically but, even though it was my dream look, our marble table was driving me nuts. As I mentioned earlier, I’m a neat freak. Even though I am diligent, this table was getting stained and marked even by glasses of water! I couldn’t cook like that, having to be terrified of ruining my counter every time I spilled lemon juice, tomato sauce, or some wine. I was going to have to get something more practical.

What should I do then? Based on my investigations, it seems like no counter surface is perfect. If there aren’t issues with scratching and staining, you are dealing with something that isn’t heat-proof. In my opinion, absolutely nothing is as beautiful as natural stone like quartzite or marble. Did I want to deal with the flaws though? Marble gets scratched, is very porous, stains easily, and can chip. It also needs to be sealed periodically. I had looked at other things like quartz and terrazzo mosaic countertops (which I loved) but wasn’t convinced. There were too many flaws with both.

Gres Porcellanato

Ultimately, we went with Debora’s advice. She strongly suggested that we look into gres porcellanato which is a porcelain countertop. I wanted to elaborate on that here because, although it’s prevalent in Italy, it hasn’t quite caught on yet in the US. From what I’ve read, I understand that it’s difficult in the USA to find an installer that knows how to work with it. Possibly this will change in the near future. If any of you are working on a kitchen renovation in Italy, you shouldn’t have any difficulties finding people who know how to work with it here.

There are many things to admire about a porcelain countertop. For one, it can look like a variety of surfaces: marble, slate, concrete, wood, stone, rusted steel, mosaics, tiles, terra cotta, and more. That’s amazing! In Italy, it’s used in bathrooms, floors, walls, outdoor areas, and kitchens. Other brilliant features are: it’s attractive, heatproof, UV light resistant, 100% recyclable, stronger than granite, scratch-resistant, very resistant to stains, easy to clean, non-porous, and therefore more hygienic! Due to how non-porous it is, you don’t even need to seal it. Unbelievable!

The main concern with a porcelain work surface is that it can chip. Frankly so can everything else. Appearance-wise, you need to keep in mind that the design is imprinted only on top. On a porcelain countertop, you generally will not see the design on the side like a natural stone surface. This could be an issue for some. For people who like fancy counter edges, there are fewer styles available. Considering the other benefits, I chose to cope with those limitations.

The Porcelain We Chose

Once we selected the kind of countertop, we needed to choose the design and finish. Ideally, I wanted a counter that looked like Carrara marble. According to Debora, two of the best brands for Gres porcellanato countertops are Dekton from Spain and Laminam from Italy. After looking at many samples, we went with Laminam. Their porcelain was the most attractive and closest to natural stone in look and feel. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a Carrara copy so we went with Statuario Altissimo with a soft natural finish that looked like honed marble. Although Dekton had a ton of styles, some of them close to Carrara, I simply didn’t like them as much.

Since we had to buy a whole slab of the porcelain, we decided to use the leftover pieces in the living room to carry the look across the entire space. It looks fantastic.

My Feedback on Porcelain Countertops

Having worked on this countertop since June, it’s been rather dreamy. The porcelain is extremely easy to clean. Half of the time a simple wipe will do to get off a stuck item that could potentially stain, even without a cleaner. The only type of marking I’ve had to work at all to get off is when metal leaves a little scrape mark. Even that comes off easily. I am pleased so far. On my marble table, I can’t leave anything on there for longer than a second without fear of staining. On the porcelain, I’ve accidentally left spills on there for hours and had no issues with permanent stains. I wouldn’t leave a wine stain all night just in case but I have had zero problems so far.

Do I swoon when I see it? No. Marble still has my heart but I am thrilled with our choice. When I cook, I want to work quickly and efficiently without being terrified of using my workspace. I’ll save the patina for our table and be a bit more relaxed while working on our counter! It may not be marble, but it’s still really attractive and easy to deal with. Win-win.

If you are considering gres porcellanato, keep in mind that quality varies. Always take a look at samples and do your research. In the future, if my positive experience changes, I’ll update my article to let you all know.

The Stove

Now let’s talk about cooktops! I need to start by saying that I have always preferred gas stoves. In my opinion, electric stoves are loathsome.

I’m here to tell you though, there’s a new kid in town! Induction! For years now on Italian cooking programs, I’ve seen chefs using what I thought were electric cooktops. I wondered what the heck they were doing with electric stoves!? Were they nuts? What I didn’t understand was that they were using induction which looks exactly like glass-topped electric stoves. Let me tell you, they are not the same thing! They are completely different in terms of functionality and performance. For those who don’t know how induction works, here is a link to Wikipedia on the subject. (I have blabbed too much already to delve into it!)

To be honest, I never would have investigated induction cooktops if it hadn’t been for another blogger named Emiko Davies. She did a kitchen renovation in Italy as well and I found her post about it very useful while researching. Emiko chose to get induction in her new kitchen which shocked me. Knowing that she loves gas stoves as I do, cooks as intensely as me, yet chose induction, got me very intrigued indeed.

The Benefits of an Induction Cooktop

That curiosity led us to purchase a portable induction cooktop to try one out. Let me tell you, it only took one use for us to become big fans! Here are some benefits:

• incredibly quick response time to temperature changes (faster than gas)
• faster cooking time in general
• brings less heat into the room (a boon for Italian summers)
• boils water in about half the time compared to gas (for us, with a stovetop coffee moka pot, this means faster coffee!)
• pot handles get less hot so often I do not even need potholders
• stovetop surface is less hot around cookware which is safer for children
• clean-up is a breeze
• while frying, there is less splatter
• while adding salt to pasta water, for some reason, it doesn’t boil over
• if you cook with doors or windows open, wind will not disturb your heat source, unlike a gas stove
• our gas bill has been greatly reduced
• more energy efficient/greener
• since the surface is flat, it can be used as an extension of the countertop when needed (cover with a kitchen towel to avoid scratches)

This list is personal and describes why we have fallen in love with induction cooking. We even gave a portable induction cooktop to my brother-in-law last Christmas and he adores it too. He now has the desire to cook in summertime again. Otherwise, it was too darned hot!

The Best of Both Worlds

One thing to know about induction is that not all cookware will work on it. As a test to see if your pots will function on induction, see if a magnet will stick to the bottom of the pot. If it does, the pot will work with induction. Otherwise, you can use a converter plate for many kinds of cookware (I use them for anodized aluminum pots). That said, you cannot use copper pots, stovetop pizzelle irons, glass, or terra cotta on induction, even with a converter plate.

It was because of this limitation that we decided to say yes to both gas and induction. I was unwilling to give up terracotta cookware and my stovetop pizzelle irons. How could I have both? Well, as I looked into cooktops, I discovered the domino hob – two-burner kitchen cooktops. You can buy them for both gas and induction! Problem solved. We ended up getting a two-burner gas hob and a two-burner induction hob. Our induction cooktop has flex zones that enable you to cook across the entire surface (useful for something like a long griddle pan).

For our family, this was the right choice. On those occasions when I want to use my terracotta for a long-cooked Ragù Bolognese or whip up a batch of pizzelles, I’m covered with gas. The reality is that both my husband and I predominantly use the induction. It’s so much faster and easier to deal with. (Even in Bologna where we have 5 gas burners, we whip out the portable induction unit every day to do most things despite the sacrifice of limited counter space!) The easy clean-up and the speedier cooking times make it too appealing to ignore. Incredibly, our gas bill in Bologna has gone down about a third!

The Appliances

For all of our large appliances, we chose Bosch. Both the kitchen store and Debora recommended them as a good mid-tier option. The Bosch line also has a good reputation for induction cooktops and offers domino hobs/cooktops. This was important. So far we have been very happy.

For the cabinets and appliances, we worked with a colleague of Debora’s at a company called Stosa Cucine. They helped during our order and installed the kitchen after Debora’s painters and electricians did any necessary prep work, including installing the subway tiles. At delivery time, they also coordinated the workmen and equipment necessary to get the material up to the apartment. There are no service elevators in many buildings in Italy so everything needs to be brought up by crane! It was hilarious. It’s so bizarre that there are no service elevators…

For extra light in the room, we installed LED lights under the cabinets. They are adjustable and lend a lovely light to the kitchen. At night, they come in handy to be sure.

Last Thoughts

I hope that this post is useful for any of you in the process of undertaking a kitchen project of your own. If you need help with a kitchen renovation in Italy, please note that Debora speaks only Italian. Thankfully she speaks clearly, and for our sake, slowly. If you are getting a kitchen renovation in Italy outside of Abruzzo, she does work with people remotely online as well. You would just need to be (or have handy) an Italian speaker. For the English speakers out there, I’m sure there are bi-lingual designers out there for you!

Thanks for reading about our kitchen renovation in Italy. The experience wasn’t without some glitches and delays, but we got it done! If you have any questions about anything I’ve discussed, I’d love to hear from you. Have any of you tried a porcelain countertop? Induction? I would love to hear about your experiences.

Also, I thought I’d leave a few links to some Abruzzese recipes from my blog since this has all been about my Abruzzese kitchen! For the pasta lovers out there, please check out my recipe for Spaghetti alla Chitarra with Tiny Meatballs. Legume and pasta enthusiasts will love this simple and rustic chickpea and pasta soup called Sagne e Ceci. Soup season is beginning after all! If you find yourself with no bread on hand, please take a look at this rustic, yeast-free bread called Pizza Scima that takes very little time to prepare and it’s absolutely delicious. Lastly, my Easy Tiramisù with Cantucci is a yummy twist on classic tiramisù with crunchy almond biscotti in place of ladyfingers. Enjoy!