Room Reno #98: French Cottage Kitchen

Welcome back to Room Reno #98 here at The Sims Resource! Today we’re helping a Sim who wants to turn her basic kitchen into a French Cottage styled cuisine of her dreams. Let’s meet the Sim we’re helping!

Meet Sasha!

You might know Sasha from the last Room Reno, but if you don’t, here’s the story. Sasha moved from Copperdale because she recently inherited a house there from her great uncle. Her first request was a major renovation to the master bedroom so that it would be the preppy room of her dreams (with lots of space and setup for her to work at her job as a professional stylist, of course!).

Today, she wants to renovate the next most important room in the house: the kitchen. In her off time, Sasha loves to cook and entertain, and even just to hang out with people around her dining table while playing a game of cards or catching up. While her current kitchen situation isn’t super spooky or depressing, it doesn’t quite fit the vibe she’s looking for in her forever home – she wants to change it up! Let’s see what we’re working with.

The Before

This room is definitely not that bad, and very functional for what it needs to be. I like the round dining table, and the mini U shaped kitchen layout is a nice touch as well. However, the use of space is a little bit confusing to me. There is a ton of space behind the kitchen counter where the stools are – enough that it makes me wonder what that space could even be used for, since blocking the stools would create a problem, but there’s an awkwardly large amount of space to put a piece of furniture there anyway. The two tiny half walls don’t help the matter, as it seems like the counters should maybe butt up against a taller, longer half wall, or maybe be flipped around and rotated altogether to create a better flow of traffic in the room.

With these layout issues in mind, let’s get into the style that Sasha requested for her kitchen makeover. She’s looking for something that fits in the French cottage look, which most commonly features a refined take on the rustic aesthetic that features lots of natural materials and classic touches. Many of these rooms are white (or off white) and err on the side of light and airy, but not so much that they become minimalist. Lots of different shades of wood tones and small but meaningful pops of color help French cottage spaces to feel cozy instead of cold (a common issue with all white or almost all white spaces). Let’s get planning!

The Planning

Looking at this space, it’s got a pretty good layout. I actually ended up leaving the two mini half walls alone, though I may change that if I end up renovating Sasha’s living room as well. The first thought I had after that was to flip the layout of the room so that the kitchen and appliances were near the back door, and the dining table was closer to the living room. This serves two purposes: the flow of Sim traffic from the inside to the outside will make a lot more sense, and the potential for entertaining is much better with everything flipped. Now that the kitchen is near the back door, Sasha can enter from the yard and easily grab a snack or a drink from the fridge, or bring out prepared foods for grilling. When she throws parties, guests in the living room and guests at the table will be able to freely mingle without the kitchen blocking off the middle of the space.

It’s a pretty simple change all things considered – it could even be done without changing any of the furniture to save Simoleons for a whole new look. On the side of the kitchen nearest the living room is where I plan having an island, but I think I’ll be nixing the bar stools that were used at the previous island in favor of a larger dining table, which is a more classic look to suit the French cottage vibes. Let’s get building!

The After

I absolutely love how this renovation turned out! I was a little unsure of how much I would like the French cottage aesthetic when I started building (any design with a lot of white or cream starts to feel intimidating, especially when the look doesn’t feature any big pops of color) but I can absolutely understand how everything works in harmony in this style of room. One of the things I was most excited to try out was mixing wood tones – I have a hard time straying from matching woods, especially when most of the cabinet sets in the game all have matching swatches built in within each model. I stepped out of my comfort zone and went for purposely mismatched cabinets and counters, and I really like the result!

A big takeaway here is that you want to find woods in the same saturation, since they’re not the same color – mixing tones and saturations can be a lot harder. This method also avoids the issue of having swatches that just barely don’t match each other. I took the idea of a round dining table from the original room and carried it over to the new one, bringing a bit of the classic charm to the new room in a full circle moment (Get it? Circle?). I made sure to include an easel and some canvases of Sasha’s previous work in the space as well, so she has a spot to work on her favorite hobby in one of her favorite rooms.

Thanks for checking out Room Reno #98! If you liked this blog, check out Room Reno #97: Preppy Bedroom or our Barbie movie inspired lookbook. Looking for something else? Read about summer CC looks for the whole family or check out our Gilmore Girls inspired lookbook! Have a great day 😎