I think you'll love it! My husband and I are doing our kitchen on a budget and we were stumped over what to do for our island counter top (36x70). We went with a Boos Block countertop and we couldn't be happier. We were worried about the DIY laminate that we were considering, and butcher block ended up being cheaper and a whole lot nicer. People really like it when they see it, it's so warm and home-y. One thing I found is that it was so thirsty when it came in, we couldn't keep it oiled enough! Then I found Howard's Butcher Block Conditioner on Amazon. This stuff is amazing! It's got Bees Wax and Mineral Oil in it, and it's thick so I just put it outside in the hot sun for a bit, then rub it in, with the grain.
Good luck with your remodel, and I hope you love your butcher block as much as I do!!!

Okay, here it goes. The white is just the cabinet shops standard bright white. The green is a color match of Benjamin Moore Soft Fern.

Green cabinets all go in the fridge / pantry alcove.

Close up of the rustic white oak floors finished with Provincial, 2 coats Waterlox sealer, 2 coats Waterlox satin.

Me admiring my beams while laying on the floor adjusting cabinet feet.

The green pantry cabinet that is yet to be installed. It's not quite showing the color right, but we're very psyched with the muted grayish green.

I like it!

I'd be curious to know if that isn't the same thing as parawood. A google search for mirvana wood produces no results at all.

The mirvana definitely isn't rubber wood, it's really heavy unlike every parawood / rubber wood piece of furniture I've seen.

Here's what we've gotten through so far. I'm still waiting on an end panel, some crown and the fridge cabinets need to wait for the counters to be done so that the pantry can be set on that and the others lined up with it's top.

Thanks, brickton. I just thought the grain pattern looked like it might be.

(FWIW, the parawood furniture that I have weighs a ton, but it's not very hard.)

Your cabs look wonderful with your jaw-dropping beams and gorgeous floor! I love your lighting, too. Wish we could see the sagey green cabs better (I love that color)! Your BB looks like a very dense, close-grained wood that should hold up well. I can't wait to see more pics--your kitchen is going to be stunning!

Really nice. Can't wait to see the reveal.

As an update to this.

I built my apron and legs for the countertop overhang. The cabinet shop was willing to do it, but the price was way more then what I wanted to pay. I'm sure their version would have been great, but at this point in our house build I'm so happy to not have to pay for something if I can. So I grabbed a 4x4, some left over 1x PFJ from our trim, beveled the ends of the posts ala Allison's crazy amazing island and jigsawed up an apron.

I had to quick put together one of our new Ikea stools in order to test the height of the apron, which thankfully works fell for me (big guy) so it will work fine for the not so big ones who will likely use it the most.

The butcher block also came in. I put a coat of poly on the underside (it's currently upside down in the photos to dry) and that's why the blue painters tape. I will flip it, screw it in and finish the top soon. The block is gorgeous, but needs some finish sanding.

Nice apron, dude! (sorry, DS loves that word now). I remember your comments on my thread about aprons as you wondered of little legs would get squished under it. Glad to know legs will be safe.

Your counter is on my radar as a possibility for a wood source. Please post more pics of it when it's done.

The whole kitchen looks wonderful so far. I'm really looking forward to seeing it finished.

Your kitchen is beautiful, it looks very much like what I am planning for the home we are currently building. I'm interested in how your countertops turn out finished. Are you putting poly on the top and bottom, or oil on the top? Was the wood fairly dark before you put the poly on? I really like how they turned out, nice job!

Brickton, your kitchen looks so good! Are you happy, so far, with the Mirvana?
I placed an order, last week, with Perfect Plank. It was for Alder countertops for my whole kitchen, but they called this morning to tell me that they don't have any 12' length in that wood.
I like the look of the Mirvana, but am concerned that it may be too soft? (it is no listed on Janka Hardness scale) I can't find any info on it online, so I'd so appreciate your thoughts on it :)

Here is a shot of the unoiled top before we installed. The shiny spots on the end are planing marks that we will sand out later ( or more likely not because we plan to cut on this board and we're not worried about stains / marks / whatever ). The light part over the eating area can be seen here, but it is much more pronounced after we oiled it.

So we installed the butcherblock. We did one coat of poly on the underside and edge that abuts the wall, and then just mineral oil on the top and other 3 sides.

There is a light section that runs over the eating area that is right next to the darkest part that we don't love, but it's not untenable.

And oh yea... they dropped off our cut-to-size soapstone. It's not installed, just sitting on the counters, but I couldn't resist oiling it. It's pretty. Darn pretty.

Fridge/pantry unoiled:

To the right of the sink oiled:

Over all, again not installed yet so the seam is just two pieces sitting next to each other.

The soapstone is Porto Allegro (PA) from Central New England Soapstone. Their cut to size price was great and they did a dry fit and are going to come back to make adjustments all included in that price. Seriously, so happy with the stone and with the company.

Beautiful kitchen. I still haven't renovated my kitchen, but I have butcherblock on my island, and the designers all told me that it was "dated". Interesting!

Do you mind me asking what kind of cabinet is on the inner corner of your peninsula? Is it a blind corner or is that some pullout mechanism?

This is looking really great, brickton. Love the mix of the SS, wood and cab color. And those beams...just gorgeous.

I've been following your kitchen reno and I am loving it!! Looking at doing something similar in my own kitchen.

That woodtop is beautiful. I keep going back to look at it.

And cindyinct - if butcherblock is outdated, then like brickton I too am I out of date. We finished our kitchen a year ago, we have a peninsula like brickton although ours has a corner prep sink in it and is just over 5' long, however the 18" overhang is a wood butcherblock dark stained and the rest of it is granite. The butcher block and granite abut one another.

Thanks all. We're really excited with all the progress.

The corner cabinet is just a blind corner. No fancy pull outs. Not very functional. We may add a pullout later. I might build something, maybe buy something. For now, we have more cabinet space then we've ever had so we're not desperate to maximize the utilization of every bit.

I always think proclamations of dated materials are kind of funny. Some people love vintage / reproductions, some people like classic, some people just love a material regardless of time frame appropriateness. My wife loves some ugly colors. She knows they're ugly, and she loves them all the same. I love me a good hack / diy / solution, even if it doesn't fit a space seamlessly or look perfect. If you are one to care about dated / trendy / time period appropriate / even good taste, I am not the person to talk to. Heh.

We do need to sand the edges of the butcherblock, but I was also toying with the idea of routing an edge onto them so I have done anything yet. For now I think we will just sand them. I might route in a funky edge later if we find it too plain. Okay if I find it too plain, I know my wife will love the thick chunky square edges look.

Wow! Your kitchen is really coming together. Looks absolutely beautiful! I love the contrast of the beams and floors with the white cabinets. Thanks for sharing.

Don't get me wrong, I love the butcherblock. Just figured I pass along what kitchen designers have been telling me. Guess you just have to go with your gut when making decisions and take what designers say with a grain of salt. Georgeous kitchen renovation!

Is it too late for me to ask what brand of range hood that is in your kitchen? Everything looks beautiful, BTW!

Wow, glad this got popped back to the top, I missed it the first time. Amazing work you've done.

brickton - you're funny. We too love it when a DIY project comes together. What exactly are your peninsula legs made with? Are you adding anything or leaving them simple? They look great! Also, what sink is that you have? Thanks for all the inspiration!

It's just beautiful. I love your beams and the bar area. You said it looks a lot like oak, what kind of wood is it?

Yes, thank you for bumping this up! I liked seeing how the two surfaces came together without fully raising up the peninsula area.

I also missed this the first time around. I think this could be my dream kitchen! My living and dining room are painted Soft Fern - I love it. And the combination of wood and soapstone is just gorgeous.

Wow thanks everyone. We're still working on the last detail or two (our soapstone window sill, some trim) but we've been in the house since Oct 1st.

The hood is Bosch DPH30352UC, it's 450 CFM and we ended up using a 6" pipe in order to fit in the cabinet and make it around the wall studs. I wish I had finalized our design earlier in the build so that we could have done the framing to make venting easier and to use larger pipe. It isn't too loud (can hardly hear it on low) and seems to work very well but we don't have a pro stove or anything like that.

Our peninsula legs are doug fir 4x4 from Lowes that I sanded (only a little cause I'm impatient) and mitered about 1/2" off the bottom all around on a 45 degree angle. Our cabinets are so close to white white that when I painted them with our trim paint (off the shelf white Olympic paint) it was so close you couldn't tell they weren't finished by the cabinet shop. We're not adding anything. We like them nice and square and simple.

The sink is an Alfi sink 32" double with half divider. It was cheap, but so far, so good. We love it.

Nicole, the key for us was that the difference in height was enough to make it look purposeful and not leave an awkward bump, but a more substantial ledge between them.

I will hopefully be posting the finished kitchen post in a few weeks but here are a few more recent shots.

I agree that the key is the exact difference in height you have and I could not have pictured it without your photos. Beautiful kitchen and you've helped my counter decision dilemma and my husband will thank you because it will likely mean less work for him! LOL

I love the way the kitchen is coming along. I love the style of the doors, the crown molding on top of the cabinets, the hardware, the countertops, the microwave off of the counters, and all your windows.

On my monitor, all the cabinets appear to be a creamy white with only that pantry closet a barely grayish green light color. Am I correct or is my monitor not seeing all the light grayish green cabinets. I am so happy for you how your kitchen is coming along.

You mentioned IKea. Are these Ikea cabinets since they look like custom cabinets? If they are Ikea Cabinets, which style?

Hooray for more Brickton kitchen picks! I keep watching out for them. I love how it's all coming together. The corner shelves are very charming with the corbels. And the wood counter still looks awesome with the soapstone!

Please post more pics soon. I adore your kitchen!

Are you doing a backsplash? Just curious, as I totally didn't even think about it when looking at your pictures. It doesn't look like it needs it, I was just wondering. Thanks!

Lynn- All of the cabinets are white (not off white, not creamy white, seriously white) except the pantry which is BM Soft Fern (color matched). They are all custom cabinets, no IKEA parts or anything. The Ikea mention was in regards to the butcherblock, Ikea was our original thought but they were out of stock everywhere for the longest time so we switched and bought it online from PerfectPlank.com

Breezy- Thanks, I'm glad to see your project is moving right along too. It looks great.

LG - Nope, no backsplash for us. I have some ideas for behind the stove, but for now we're really happy with the clean simple look.

lookin good !! love the soapstone and wood together, and those beams are delicious!

Brickton, thanks for letting me know the cabinets are white so my eyes were not deceiving me and only the pantry was the BM Soft Fern color. They sure did look custom so my guess was right. Your kitchen is beautiful! Thanks for sharing

I can't believe I've missed this thread previously, when I've been so eager to see your kitchen come together.

I'm so envious of your floors and I love the green cabinets, especially. The whole room is looking as great as I expected. The details really came together just right... the lighting over the sink, and the change to the design of your stove wall.

Can't wait to see more.

How is that oiled mirvana top holding up? Considering BB countertop and have looked at black walnut, but open minded about other species with a depth of color. Will use it on a sink run and an island.

It's held up great. We really are very happy with the butcherblock, it has a dried out a bit, but that's mostly our fault for not oiling it enough and because our woodstove dries out the house in general. I am not sure if I would used just an oiled butcherblock countertop around a sink though, most people recommend sealing wood that's used around sinks. Here's a bit more about the kitchen and how it has held up.

Hi brickton - your kitchen is gorgeous! I just ordered maple butcher block from Perfect Plank and I was wondering if you have any close-up or overhead pics of your butcher block countertops to share? I am obsessing (slightly ;) ) over whether I will like/dislike the surface finger jointing, and was wondering how obvious it is or whether it bothers you? I noticed a picture of the sample Mirvana from your earlier post, and it had the surface finger jointing, hence my inquiry. I can't tell from these pics whether your installed butcher block actually has the surface finger-jointing. In any event, any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks :)