It took three and a half years for blogger Vanessa Pleasants of Vintage Whites to perfect her dream kitchen in her Kalispell, Montana, home. “When my husband and I bought the house,” she said, “the kitchen was red, lined with cheap white cabinets, a linoleum floor, and had almost no appliances.”
They improved it bit by bit, as time and money allowed, doing almost all of the heavy lifting themselves, from DIY projects like installing kitchen cabinets to more involved projects like pouring concrete countertops. Lucky for Pleasants, her husband?not a professional handyman?is a good sport: “When we bought the house, he didn’t have much experience,” she said. “He learned as we went, mostly from YouTube.” Pleasants filled the space with almost exclusively salvaged or secondhand wares; patina is what she’s after?she’s the cofounder of Vintage Whites Market antique fairs and an expert in chic, country-inspired style.
Photography by Vanessa Pleasants, courtesy of Vintage Whites Blog.

Above: Pleasants designed her kitchen around “focal points, layered front and center, with everything else very minimal.” For her, the room’s main focal point is a long, low wood cabinet?a onetime car repair shop storage unit?which she bought for $500 and stripped and stained herself. She wanted two more focal points: a dark island at the center of the kitchen, and dashes of color on her open shelves.

Above: ...