Last week we made great progress in the kitchen to living room pass through project. It was a lot quicker than we expected (it only took an hour and a half or so) and we’re very happy with the window so far. Of course we still have a long way to go until it’s done – redoing the wiring, retiling the kitchen, adding the trim&frame, and then of course the doors – but in the meantime we’re enjoying the extra light in the kitchen. Being able to watch TV while you cook is nice, too. I’ve created a time-lapse video of the demo for you guys, but here’s a more precise explanation of what we did.
- We started by drilling out a hole in (more or less) the middle of the window. This way you know exactly where that falls on the other side (i.e. the kitchen). We approximately knew the size of the window we wanted but we didn’t know how that would fit with the cabinets we have on the other side of the wall. And because of the floor plan the easiest way for us was to drill a hole somewhere in the middle, make sure that our idea fit with the cabinets on the other side (we had to make a little bit smaller than we thought) and then continue. Be careful not to drill into the electrical wires!
- Now, measure and mark the edges of the pass through. Use a level and a pencil for this. It’s always a good idea to step back a little and check whether it looks centered, big enough, etc.
- Once the pass trough is delimited, start chiseling and hammering away. We used the hole we had drilled as a starting point and worked our way towards the edges. Again, be careful with the wires.
- Keep hammering & chiseling! If your walls are thick and made of bricks like ours it’ll take a while.
- Continue to make that hole bigger, and be especially careful when you get near the edges. Try and make the corners as square as you can.
- You’re already done with this part of the project. Now you can clean up all the mess. Of course we had protected the floors as well as we could, with towels and paper on top of them in case a big piece of brick fell, so that it wouldn’t dent the hardwood.
Before and after pics… or should I say before and progress. The window looks smaller in pictures than in person. But it’s not like we could go any bigger though, because of the cabinets.
And here’s the video:
So as you can see, it was pretty easy, we just had to make sure the hole didn’t conflict with any existing cabinets, wires, … the worst part actually comes now, because we have to redo all those wires. I’m already looking forward to making the doors though! We’re thinking of barn-style doors with a flat track system, similar to this one from House Tweaking. We’ll be DIYing our track system though, since they don’t sell those here. Do you guys have any experience with sliding doors? I hope they turn out okay, it’s our first time using them!
I bet the clean up was the worst part. I can’t wait to see it done! The sliding door is really cool =)
Yeah it definitely was, there was dust everywhere. We had to vacuum a few times before everything was gone.
I am so impressed! This will look amazing when you’re done.
Glad you like it Annabel!
I love the window already!! I’m always so impressed by how handy you two are!
Thanks Kristen! This time we asked for my cousins’ help, because last time we had to break bricks (when me moved a few outlets around) I wound up pretty tired. I bribed them with lunch and cookies, hah.
The video was the best ! And it made me want to put some walls down, just for fun.
It was the first time we ever did anything like this and it was fun! Though I didn’t do much, I was too slow with the hammer.
Yay! This is exciting! You two are definitely very handy! And you’re getting really great at videos!
Thanks Christine! It’s been fun doing videos.
What a difference that makes. Love it. I am excited to see the doors you are going to put on there. And I am also interested in how you will re-wire all of that…
LOVE the video
Yeah it’ll be interesting… we have tv, phone, and electrical wires for both the kitchen and the LR, so lots to redo!
How exciting! It’s looking so great already!
Thanks Ashley, glad you like it!
Wow.. how am I just seeing this? Great video, you pick perfect songs for this stuff. That process didn’t look too bad at all. I like the House Tweaking barn door idea, I think that will look awesome!
Thanks John! I like doing videos, hopefully I’ll be able to do more in the future.
I loved the video. I think it’s going to look amazing! We have a fairly open kitchen, but there’s one corner of a wall that blocks the view of the TV that I’ve love to get rid of. It would mean getting rid of one cabinet and we’d be left with a weird missing corner on the counter top, so I’m not sure we’ll do it. We’ll see
Oh that sounds like a tough decision! I’m not in love with our kitchen but it was already installed & new when we bought the apartment, plus there’s nothing really wrong with it, so it’s staying.