In this post I’m going to share before photos of the soon-to-be DIY coffee bar station, what I’ve done with it so far, and a mockup of my design plan.
DIY Coffee Bar Station
This idea for a coffee bar station started when I decided to refresh my kitchen. I purchased a thrifted hutch and wanted it as cabinet storage.
To make that happen, I removed existing upper cabinets in one section of my kitchen and moved them across to room to a blank wall. Around the same time, I had found a beverage fridge at my local restore for a steal and a free dresser on the side of the road. I decided to take all of these super budget-friendly finds and make them beautiful.
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I was going to create a coffee bar! Because the hutch and appliance garage was in the spot our coffee maker had been, it seemed like the perfect solution! It would be an extension of the kitchen and it would maximize function giving us even more storage and space!
The space that this coffee bar would be created in was always dead space. The only function it had was a spot to hang our calendar.
Because we don’t have that calendar anymore, I created a DIY magnetic acrylic calendar for my fridge and I LOVE it!!
Before photos of the space
Let’s take a look at what this space looked like before!
If you look behind my cute babies (who I can not believe look so little in this picture), you’ll see the wall where the coffee bar will be located.
Fun fact, when we bought this house, the wall was this color:
It was not an easy wall to paint and I did two coats primer and two coats of paint by myself without getting on a ladder! Not to shabby right? Here’s another look at the wall while it was being painted – it’s the wall on the left side of the photo.
Coffee Bar Progress Photos
Now, back in November when I did my kitchen refresh project (I painted the cabinets, did marble epoxy on the counters, got new hardware, and installed the hutch) I planned on doing the coffee bar too.
I greatly underestimated the size of this project and it was a little too much for me to do on my own just a week or so before hosting thanksgiving. The coffee bar got started but no where near finished.
It’s honestly a good thing. I’ve done research and having some things to fix before moving forward. I also have had a lot of time to think about the design and what I wanted to do.
The free dresser that I grabbed happened to be the same height as the beverage fridge. I loved the ideas of drawers, giving us a better solution for our Tupperware and possibly a pull-out dog food station!
I placed the dresser and beverage fridge against the wall in the kitchen and added a butcher block counter.
We moved our coffee maker and all the items (like boxes of tea) that will eventually be stored in the top drawer. I also moved over the uppers from where the hutch was installed in our kitchen.
Currently, it looks like this (please excuse the mess- there’s no storage right now haha!)
One of the big things I need to fix prior to doing more work on this area is the fact that the fridge is not vented in the front. I don’t want to risk it over-heating so I need to pull the beverage fridge out to see where the vent is and make a plan for that.
I’m hoping just flip-flopping the dresser and fridge and then cutting a hole in the MDF to allow for ventilation will be a good fix!
Let’s talk about design ideas.
Design ideas for the DIY coffee bar
I was fixated for a while on tiling the backsplash of this area. However, after not being able to find a tile that I LOVE, I decided to do a shiplap backsplash.
This is a super budget friendly option that can also be easily removed later on. I eventually would love the whole kitchen to have tile backsplash and I want it all to match since it’s one room. I don’t want to spend time and money installing a tile I don’t love and then more time later demo-ing it when I’m ready to tackle the whole kitchen.
Shiplap will look nice, I’ll only need 2 pieces of it, and I’ll be able to easily remove it later on when it’s time to tile!
Here’s a mockup of the design idea:
I originally wanted to re-build the drawers in the dresser but after thinking about it for awhile, I’ve built drawers many times! I’ve never repaired old broken ones though and I want to challenge myself to learn that skill!
I’m going to paint everything to match the cabinets and add new drawer pulls. I’ll add trim around the top so everything looks built in (and a little bit taller) – eventually I’ll be building all the cabinets up to the ceiling but this will be a good look in the meantime!
The shiplap backsplash will be vertical and I’ll add some minimal decor to compliment my Keurig Cafe coffee maker!
Be sure to follow along on Instagram where I’ll be doing this project in stories! If you miss it, it’ll be saved to the Coffee Bar highlight!
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