Sever and Roxana Surdulescu in their pass-through from the kitchen to the dining room.   Before   After

The star of this Lake Norman kitchen is more than just a stylish, eye-catching centerpiece. It’s a stove-surround feature made of stone and filled with innovative spice storage and other handy extras that any serious cook would appreciate.

It wasn’t the inspiration for the award-winning kitchen, though. Rather, it was the culmination of a broader redesign for the whole house.

The house in the Bridgeport neighborhood off Langtree Road belongs to Roxana and Sever Surdulescu. They turned to Mooresville builder Bryan Golsch to update the 15-year-old waterfront home. Golsch referred the couple to Lisa Carlay of International Kitchen & Bath in Davidson.

Now that the dust has settled, the Surdulescus’ home features an updated exterior, new bedrooms and baths in what was an empty attic, and sleek new shelves and cabinetry in the living room.

Oh – and the kitchen has won design honors from the Lake Norman Home Builders and recently was named best kitchen renovation in the state in a competition hosted by the N.C. Home Builders.

The house was built in 1993. After the Surdulescus bought it, they decided to update the exterior and expand living space into the attic. “We ripped off a deck and added some stone outside,” Golsch says. “We added three bedrooms and three baths upstairs.”

The couple updated their living room, adding display shelves for their contemporary sculpture and other collectibles and cabinetry for electronic equipment. The living room is adjacent to the kitchen, so it only made sense to freshen up the kitchen, too.

Carlay and Roxana Surdulescu sat down to design a new kitchen that retained the old layout as much as possible. They wanted to save the existing hardwood floors and avoid the cost of re-plumbing the kitchen. “Other than that, it was pretty much a blank canvas,” Carlay says.

The blah white cabinets came down and were replaced by alder cabinets finished with aged ginger stain and black glaze. The alder takes stain well, Carlay says, providing a deep, rich finish. The cabinets were manufactured by Geppetto, a company based in Rutherfordton.

Because the 12-foot walls were so tall, Carlay stacked two levels of cabinets in most areas to add extra height. She added a top row of 30-inch-high cabinets – to be used for long-term storage – above the standard cabinets. “I’ve never done anything that tall,” she says.

To enhance the space for entertaining, she cut a pass-through from the kitchen to the dining room. The kitchen side of the opening is surrounded by new cabinets and wine storage, with racks for stemmed glasses across the top of the pass-through.

The sink stayed in the island, which helped keep those plumbing costs down.

Roxana Surdulescu wanted to incorporate stone into the kitchen. There’s new stone on the exterior just outside a kitchen window. There’s more new stone on the fireplace in the living room, visible from the kitchen. Adding the same stone in the kitchen would connect the spaces.

Carlay suggested moving the cooktop to a formerly awkward corner. “Stone is usually used to hide a vent, to sort of act as a chimney... So it makes sense for it to go against an outside wall,” she says.

The stone reaches from the floor to the ceiling, and its warm earth tones complement the rich darkness of the cabinets. Spice shelves and other innovative storage are hidden within.

Countertops are granite in boldly patterned gray and brown, borrowing colors from the stone. The backsplash consists of horizontal stone tiles, with a classic geometric pattern inset behind the cooktop.

Just outside the kitchen door, in a spot formerly occupied an an old wet bar, Carlay used the same alder cabinetry to create a stylish living room alcove for computer and entertainment gear. Special doors allow air to circulate around the electronics hidden in a base cabinet. The walls above the cabinet are covered with alder, and sleek shelves of the same wood support colorful sculptures.

In a corner of the kitchen, Carlay created a small stand-alone cabinet topped by a triangle of granite. It’s actually more table than cabinet, and perfect for entertaining.

Golsch installed the entire kitchen personally. He got into the construction business as a hands-on worker, he explains, and likes to install cabinets on his projects when possible.

Cabinet doors feature traditional raised panels and leaded glass. The pulls are sleek, contemporary stainless steel, a look borrowed from the stainless refrigerator. Chrome pendant lights over the island look commercial or industrial. The stone adds a timeless rustic touch.

Those details, along with the rich dark wood, combine to create a look that would complement an uptown penthouse condo as well as this lakeside home.

You could call the style urbane.“It is very sophisticated,” Sever Surdulescu agrees. Or, you could call it a winner.

More information:

• www.internationalkitchenandbath.com
• http://golschbuilders.com
• www.geppettokitchens.com