Morgan Hill kitchen with a walnut island, cream perimeter cabinets and a plaster range hood

Morgan Hill · Santa Clara County · 2025

The Walnut Island Kitchen

The commission

A magazine-cover kitchen for a Morgan Hill great room — a dark-walnut shaker island set against a cream painted perimeter, a hand-troweled plaster hood, and a herringbone marble backsplash run wall to wall.

This was a kitchen designed to be the heart of an open great room, so it had to read beautifully from every seat in the house. We grounded it with a substantial walnut shaker island — brass bar pulls, a marble top — and kept the perimeter quiet in a warm cream so the millwork, not the cabinet doors, would carry the room. A custom plaster hood floats above the range, and a glass-front pantry tower at the end of the run gives the owners display storage without breaking the calm. The herringbone marble backsplash is the one flourish, and it earns its place.

The gallery

Morgan Hill kitchen viewed from the dining area — wideSeen from the dining area — cream inset perimeter, walnut shaker island, and double Thermador wall ovens set into the run.

Range wall of the Morgan Hill kitchen with brass pulls — wide
The range wall — cream shaker cabinetry with brass cup and bar pulls, the walnut island held in the foreground.

Morgan Hill kitchen open to the great room with a glass-front pantry — in-contextThe kitchen open to the great room, with a glass-front built-in pantry holding display storage at the far end.

Glass-front built-in pantry with a window-seat bench — in-context
A glass-front built-in pantry and window-seat bench close the run beneath a vaulted ceiling.

Glass-front display uppers and a farmhouse sink in the Morgan Hill kitchen — detailGlass-front display uppers flank a counter-depth refrigerator above a beadboard-apron farmhouse sink.

Materials & specification

What this room is made of.

Every box, door, and drawer was joined and finished in our Gilroy shop. No outsourced carcasses, no flat-pack hardware.

01Hand-stained American walnut shaker, satin topcoat (island)
02Warm cream painted inset shaker, fully catalyzed finish (perimeter)
03Hand-troweled plaster range hood
04Herringbone-laid honed marble backsplash
05Unlacquered brass bar and cup pulls
06Glass-front pantry tower, walnut-trimmed display uppers

Built-in window seat flanked by glass-front display towers in a Los Gatos home

Next project

The Window Seat & Display Towers

Los Gatos · Santa Clara County →

Begin a project

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