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Outdoor Kitchens

Kitchens today are the family rooms of yesterday. Many have keeping rooms with fireplaces, and cozy nooks for reading, television viewing, and sharing a cup of coffee. Make the most of the heart of your home with some of the tips and suggestions here.

Brighten the backsplash! Tile is the most often selected material for durability and maintenance, but you can also use mirror, stainless steel, and even just paint. If you have old unattractive tile, you can even paint over it.

Tidy the clutter! Consider using baskets as easy storage solutions for those piles of mail, bills, and coupons. Be sure to get a bulletin board for trading family notes and posting the latest pictures.

Expand your space! Hang a pot rack. Most kitchens never seem to have quite enough storage. Expand yours by adding a pot rack over the stove. Yes, you will have to be more vigilant in cleaning both the insides and outsides of pans, but it is also a great excuse to invest in some new cookware.

Accessorize with function! Towels, pot holders, mitts, even canister sets now all come in such a myriad of patterns and colors, they are a wonderful and fast way to add interest and flavor to your kitchen. Be sure to keep extras on hand for display. There is nothing less appealing than grungy towels on the oven door handle, or a crusty mitt on that hook on the refrigerator.

Be bold with appliances! No longer are we stuck with white or stainless, but instead a rainbow of options is now available. Make a statement with color, bold or subdued, trendy, or classic.

Dress the cabinets! If you've got that typical 12"-18" gap above your upper cabinets, dress it with a collection and some silk greenery. Make it practical, think of plates and pitcher, glass bottles, colorful ceramics, and such. Be sure to add rope lighting as a cost-effective way to make it all glow.

Add some glass! Is your kitchen feeling too dark, a bit heavy with so much wood? Consider adding some glass insets to selected cabinets, removing the wood panels. If you don't want to showcase the contents, make it frosted or patterned. There are a host of options available today adding interest and lightening it up.

2005 Melissa Galt

Melissa Galt

Defining Melissa Galt is like capturing wind in a glass box. She is fascinating like her famous mother, the late Academy Award winning actress Anne Baxter, innovative like her great grandfather, architect Frank Lloyd Wright, and has an innate sense of style like her well known godmother, Hollywood costumer, Edith Head. But she has made a name for herself as owner of Linea Interior Design, without borrowing on the glory of her gene pool.

Recently renaming her company, Melissa Galt, Inc. Melissa works with lifestyle design clients throughout the Southeast. Focusing on the tastes and desires of each client, she creates interiors that are a seamless mix of old and new, crafted to be a comfortable, collected environment that works with the client?s life style.

Originally from the West Coast, Melissa received a Bachelor of Science degree in hotel administration from Cornell, and began her career in the hospitality industry. She quickly rose in the industry moving from one large hotel to another, ending up at Callaway Gardens in Columbus. Frustrated with the lack of creativity, she decided to pursue a design degree at Southern Institute in Birmingham before moving to Atlanta in 1992 to launch her design career.

Having taught adults for over a decade at Evening at Emory, she is now addressing audiences nationally on how to use design as the catalyst for ?creating the life you?ve always dreamed of?.