French la Vie

When my friend bought the Cantina in Italy, it wasn’t just a building she bought, it was an idea, a feeling she wanted to create, a world suspended in time. She didn’t want to change it, to force it into something else. No. She wanted you to step inside and feel as though you’d been transported back, not just to a different place, but to a different time.

The tile we found was like looking for Easter eggs, hoping to find the ones we wanted piece by piece we couldn’t find the entire pattern so we re-created what we we found into something for the kitchen backsplash.

We found some rusty old hand, forged nails with stuck into a piece of wood that was already in the stone wall. We’re going to hang pans there.

We were fortunate to find some pieces in the basement and attic. Some pieces need to be painted, and we’ve ordered marble for a few of the countertops. I absolutely love the shelf—it was a perfect fit. We considered painting it, but in the end, we decided against it.

We’re building a counter with an old slab of marble, similar to this one on the other side, it will be longer with a shelf on the bottom, plus with an old farmhouse sink and exposed copper faucets, the kind you see in old kitchens.

These heavy wooden beams that are hand carved we’re going to use them to make a stove hood.

The vision was clear: a big, inviting table, a space that felt like home, like you could sit forever, knead dough, smell coffee brewing and never want to leave. A kitchen that made you feel like putting on an apron. A cantina not for show, but for truly living in it..

There’s still some things to do—details to attend to—but every plan is already sketched in our minds. We’re going to take old planks we found in a field, and have them sanded, waxed, to make a table top for the table base we found.

We tore up the broken cement floor, resurfaced the walls, exposed the arches, chipped back to the stone, and added a brick wall— we found a tile floor that looks like stone that’s one of the things that is new.

It’s a place that, in its imperfections, feels completely whole. eventually will add the feather fluff the little things that add charm. But as you know, it’s one step at a time.