The idea for Homi Hardware came to life after years of working in real estate and renovating our own homes. In late 2021, we purchased a house that needed some serious love. Our main focus was reconfiguring the kitchen, the heart of the home. Built in 1953, the house had lost much of its original mid-century charm due to previous modifications. My vision was to create a bright, airy kitchen that would breathe new life into the space. Here are some pictures of the before's.
My biggest regret was painting the ceilings. They were in such bad shape so I felt it only made sense to paint over it but after a severely bad paint job from a hired painter, the regret set in.
I had my heart set on GE Café’s new matte white appliances with gold hardware—they were stunning, and I knew they’d be perfect. But, as fate would have it, we were in the middle of a global pandemic, and those appliances were backordered indefinitely. With a tight budget and timeline, I had to settle for a standard Frigidaire appliance package.
The appliances worked well, but they didn’t quite have the style I was dreaming of.
A few months later, it struck me: why weren’t there more options for customizing appliance handles? Surely there can be a way to make one that's interchangeable. Universal is not truly always universal but maybe we could just create a handle that's more versatile for common appliances.
My gut feeling was to start with the refrigerator first. So, off I went with ordering a lot of parts and after several trials and error and the best possible machinist I could have worked with, we finally got a working prototype!
We faced some challenges with bottom curved drawers since our bracket was flat on the backside! But..... we got a great solution so stayed tuned, we can't wait to share it with everyone!!
Ok, so that's great but now we had to make one for the oven and dishwasher! So the research and development stage continued!
I wanted the ability to use the existing mounting studs that the manufacture initially installed on the appliance but stoves and dishwashers are usually fitted with a machine screw.. So we decided to have the bracket interchangeable with an adapter. This made the most sense so the handle could remain constant while the adapter would vary dependent on the appliance. I still wanted to keep the parts minimal though because, really.. Who likes complications...
Now we're cooking!! And, as you can see, we got our appliances vinyl wrapped. I paid someone who wraps cars to do mine because I knew I would make it a catastrophe..
We got the brackets powder coated a white and our first handle order was brass, duh!!
Our first phot shoot 🥰
The journey wasn’t without its challenges, but I was fortunate to collaborate with an incredible team who believed in the vision as much as I did. Together, we brought Homi Hardware to life, offering customizable appliance handles that allow anyone to create a kitchen that truly reflects their style.
Xoxo - Megan
