Simple Sophistication By Kitt Walsh | Photography by Diana Todorova/Diana Todorova Photography
Love at first sight isn’t just a romantic myth. Just ask Laurie Walter. Surfing the web one evening, a condo for sale in Naples’ prestigious Pelican Bay caught her eye and she made a beeline to the open house being held the next day. “Though there were three couples at the event, all considering buying the place, the minute I walked in, I found the Realtor and told her, “I’ll take it.” An offer above asking price sealed the deal and Walter had bought herself a condo. “The original owners were nonagenarians (90 years old) and had been snowbirds since the 90’s,” Walter relates. “They were headed back to Wisconsin and I was headed right for the phone to set up my Contractor Brian Raymond of Naples Kitchen and Bath. My son got dragooned into helping pull-down drywall and window treatments. I challenged everyone with a four-month completion deadline, a tight window during the best of times, but during Covid, it smacked of the impossible. But we made the deadline and I moved in the day after Hurricane Ian.”
The Kitchen Before: The backlit ceiling with its large cove and the slatted cabinets were all the rage when the condo was first built in the 1990’s. The kitchen counters and backsplash of dark speckled stone, along with the column that separated the space from the dining room, had the effect of making the kitchen seem smaller. The floral wall tile and the beige floor tiles struck a discordant note.
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