Kitchen remodels
Almost every kitchen remodel worth doing in a valley house of a certain age involves removing a wall. Whether that wall is carrying load decides the permit, the engineering, the schedule and a meaningful share of the budget, so it is the first thing to establish.
The wall is usually
the whole question.
Load-bearing, or just in the way
A partition comes out in a morning. A bearing wall needs a beam sized by an engineer, posts down to a footing that can take them, a permit, and an inspection before anything is closed up.
You cannot tell which you have by looking at it, and the answer is not always what the previous owner’s contractor said. We establish it from the framing and the load path before demolition, not during.
Everything in that wall has to go somewhere
Plumbing, gas, electrical and mechanical runs rarely survive a plan change untouched. Re-routing is normal work. Re-routing discovered after the drywall closed is not.
A kitchen that gains an island usually gains a circuit or several, and a house whose service was sized for one oven often needs the panel looked at before the appliance schedule is settled.
Ventilation is a structural decision
A serious range hood moves enough air to need a real duct route and a make-up air path. That route runs through a ceiling, a cabinet or a roof, and it is far cheaper to plan than to retrofit.
The same goes for a second oven, a steam unit or anything gas: the vent path and the gas line get designed with the layout rather than fitted around it.
Where old meets new
A new opening in a thirty-year-old wall either matches the existing plaster texture or advertises itself for the life of the house. The same applies where new flooring meets original, and where new casing meets trim that was scribed by hand in 1994.
That is the reason the plaster and carpentry licences sit with us rather than being handed off and hoped for.
What this covers.
- 01Load path established before demolition
- 02Engineered beam and header design where needed
- 03Plumbing, gas, electrical and mechanical re-routing
- 04Panel and service capacity reviewed against the appliance schedule
- 05Range hood duct route and make-up air planned with the layout
- 06Plaster texture and trim matched at new-to-old junctions
- 07Permit submittal and inspections through the right authority
- 08Interim kitchen arrangement while the room is out of use
Asked at every
kitchen consultation.
Do I need a permit for a kitchen remodel?
For cabinets and countertops alone, usually not. For anything structural, electrical, plumbing or mechanical, yes, and that covers most real kitchen work: a new opening, a moved sink, added circuits, a relocated range. The authority depends on your address, which is one of four in this valley.
Can you open the kitchen to the living room?
Usually. What varies is the cost, and that comes down to whether the wall carries load and how far the beam has to span. A short opening in a partition and a full-width opening under a roof load are different projects with the same description.
How long will I be without a kitchen?
Plan on the kitchen being out of use for the middle of the project, not the whole of it. We set up an interim arrangement, usually a sink, a fridge and a run of counter somewhere else, and we tell you the dates at the estimate rather than when the cabinets come out.
Will the new plaster match?
That is what the C-17 licence is for. We sample and match the existing texture before the wall is closed, rather than discovering the mismatch when the paint goes on.
The kitchen, in numbers.
- Permit
- Required for structural, electrical, plumbing or mechanical change
- Structure
- Load path confirmed before demolition, beam engineered if bearing
- Services
- Re-routing planned, not discovered
- Finish
- Plaster and trim matched at junctions
- Occupancy
- Interim kitchen set up, dates given at estimate
- Licences
- NV B‑2 #0091645
NV C‑17 #0092664
NV C‑3 #0092662
Related
Whole-home remodel
Primary suites and bathrooms
Finish carpentry
Talk to us
Tell us what you are building. We will tell you what it involves and where the money usually goes.
Or call (702) 913‑7007 · info@nxgbuilds.com