Last week, I received a WhatsApp message from my clients in Kfar Saba with a screenshot of ‘Tip of the Week’ from my friend and colleague Karen Bar. In the post, Karen recommended using real or laminate parquet and not faux parquet, due to the different feel it provides:
Contrary to Karen’s recommendation, we actually floored with faux parquet porcelain and were very satisfied! Karen is also a friend of my clients and she is the one who recommended me to them. Don’t worry… they obviously didn’t mean to start a quarrel, but what was especially amusing was that Karen was exactly at my house, and thus an interesting discussion developed about the use of a material that mimics another material.
Yes, yes, I am also a bit of a perfectionist and always prefer the real thing, but sometimes the advantages of the imitation outweigh the original. In the apartment in Petah Tikva that I want to tell you about in this post, we used quite a few imitations and, as you probably already understood, I am in favor. In my opinion, there is room to use imitations, sometimes for budget reasons and sometimes for practical reasons. The imitation must of course be of high quality and perfectly mimic the original, but if it’s a successful imitation – then why not?!
Take porcelain granite for example, it is a material that can look like so many materials: wood, stone, marble, and even metal… with one difference – porcelain granite is durable and does not absorb water or stains. For this reason, it is excellent as a work surface. You can place hot pots on it, spill messy foods on it, and even scratch it with cutlery and nothing will happen to it. Especially convenient when it comes to an island with a stovetop instead of a sensitive butcher block.
By the way, the kitchen is not completely new, it is an old kitchen that we replaced the fronts and added the island to, nice, isn’t it?!
Another point where I really recommend going for the imitation and not the original is patterned tiles. True, the concrete tiles are so beautiful, but apparently, not practical at all. Even with sealer on them, they still absorb stains and they are not suitable for every client, especially not for a client who gets up in the morning and goes to sleep with a mop. (No, Mrs. Cohen, I did not mean you personally… I have many more clients who wash the floor twice a day; -))
As you already know me, in this project too there were a lot of IKEA HACKs, some of which you might be able to recognize yourself… we painted furniture, replaced handles, and upgraded all the regular items that everyone has into something unique just for this home.
And finally, if I could, I would share with you pictures of my clients – the tenants. I learned a lot from these clients, they are people who know how to be content with their lot and at the same time strive forward, full of good energies and joy of creation and doing… Since it is still less acceptable, I will share with you some pictures of other tenants who live with them in the apartment and influenced the design just as much.
All the photos in the post were taken by the talented and wonderful [Shira Ganny](https://evenyaru.com/).