Striking Gold:

Veteran designer pumps light into sophisticated kitchen and wins top provincial honours

October 16, 2004

Chuck Mills admits he has a weakness for ambient lighting, often washing walls in bedrooms, kitchens and living areas with streams of cascading light.

It's a passion that garnered the Ottawa custom builder/renovator glowing reviews at this year's Awards of Distinction organized by the Ontario Home Builders' Association.

Last month, the owner of Chuck Mills Residential Design and Development was awarded first place in the province for a contemporary kitchen renovation in Kanata's Beaverbrook community.

"I'm a little bit of a light freak," says Mr. Mills, who combined recessed potlights, hidden rope lights and a trio of pendant fixtures to transform Lori and Garth Scully's once-dark kitchen into a sophisticated gathering place.

"It's the centrepiece of that whole house," says Mr. Mills who opened up the 1970s kitchen by tearing down the wall to the living and dining rooms and forfeiting the eating area to make room for a curved island topped with gleaming black granite and a floating glass bar.

The original white melamine cupboards were replaced with natural cherry cabinetry with industrial hardware from Deslaurier Custom Cabinets.

Chuck Mills relied on soft lights, gleaming granite and four commanding columns to turn an outdated kitchen into a stunning showpiece. CREDIT: Rod MacIvor, The Ottawa Citizen

With the old wall removed, four columns were symmetrically spaced between the kitchen and main living area to divide the two rooms without visually obstructing the view.

A restaurant-style gas stove, with a shapely stainless hood fan, anchors the back wall of the kitchen with a backsplash of rich slate backlit with small lights. A burst of sunshine filters in through a glass block window installed on the diagonal in the centre of the mottled tile.

Chuck Mills relied on soft lights, gleaming granite and four commanding columns to turn an outdated kitchen into a stunning showpiece.       CREDIT: Bruno Schlumberger, the Ottawa Citizen

"It's a signature detail of mine," says Mr. Mills of the soft glowing uplights rimming the tray ceiling above the centre island.

"It's something I like to do for ambience. It tends to find it's way into everything I do."

For extra sparkle, twinkling lights were also installed inside two double-sided glass cabinets used for displaying crystal and collectibles between the kitchen and dining room.

Built by Amsted Construction, the new kitchen was part of an extensive renovation to the interior and exterior of the west-end home.

"We're just absolutely thrilled," says Mrs. Scully of the newly renovated kitchen.

"We were really hoping to open up the whole main area and make it more contemporary. Like I said, we're just thrilled."

And even though the family of four -- the Scullys have two teenage daughters -- had to live in their basement for five months, washing their dishes in the laundry tub and preparing meals in a makeshift kitchen, while the work was being completed, Mrs. Scully says they have no regrets.

"It was an adventure, but I would do it all over again."

The Kanata home will be vying for local design honours at the National Gallery next Saturday night when Mr. Mills will be among 89 finalists at the 2004 Design for Excellence Awards hosted by the Ottawa-Carleton Home Builders' Association.

The Scully home is a finalist in three separate categories: best custom kitchen over 200 square feet, custom bathroom and renovation between $100,000 to $250,000.

"When you get a job that you think is worthy of consideration, you enter it," says Mr. Mills.

This is not the first time the veteran designer has been recognized by his provincial peers. In 2000, he won best renovation in Ontario for the remodelling of Ottawa realtor Bill Renaud's Centretown home.

This year, more than 390 entries were submitted from some of the province's leading builders, renovators and designers.