Alex Hinand, also known as @the_bareback_contessa, loves to host dinner parties — so much so, that it’s actually become a series called “Dinner with a Stranger” that he hosts with his friend who’s a queer life coach. The dinners are “an opportunity for eight strangers to break bread together,” Alex explains. And the space he hosts these parties in is important.
While Alex’s friend leads the conversation, Alex’s role is to create the bread that guests will be (metaphorically and literally) breaking. However, when he first moved into his rental apartment in Chicago, the 1990s kitchen wasn’t necessarily a space that cultivated gastronomic inspiration.
“As they say, the kitchen had ‘great bones,’” Alex explains. “It’s a great-sized kitchen! It gets the best natural light in the apartment. I love the ‘cl-office’ [closet office] off of the kitchen, and it has a pantry — with no built-in shelving. But with only maybe a square foot of built-in cabinet space, I knew I needed to make it more functional.”
With functionality in mind, Alex scoured Facebook Marketplace for years (he admits there was a lot of trial and effort before landing on the perfect setup) to find furnishings for the room. He bought an island first to increase the countertop space. Next, he purchased a cookbook cart for just $50 on Facebook Marketplace because he “knew he needed it,” but it took some time to come to that conclusion. “I had a handful of different storage pieces before settling on [the cart], and it has been the best addition.”
Although function came before style, that didn’t mean Alex was going to have a bland or boring space. After seeing the lemon wallpaper in Lone Fox designer Drew Scott’s home (Apartment Therapy actually toured Drew’s apartment; see it here!), Alex wanted to mimic that style in his kitchen.
Alex took the first step by embarking on a peel-and-stick wallpapering journey all by himself — a process he doesn’t recommend. It took him a few weeks to hang all the wallpaper, working two panels at a time to avoid frustration. “If the panel is hung slightly off, you have to pull the entire piece off to adjust it,” Alex explains. “It’s maddening, especially when working on highly textured walls like my kitchen has.”
Alex added more color to the kitchen by painting the walls with Benjamin Moore’s Cedar Grove to match the cookbook cart. The new furniture, paint, and wallpaper cost around $500, and made the space look entirely unrecognizable.
“Walking into the kitchen in the morning makes me smile,” Alex says. “Seeing the light coming in, the wallpaper, how could you not start the day out happy? I love that I made functional storage attractive and interesting. I love that I can use it to share my love of food with others.” To see more of Alex’s colorful home, visit the full House Tour on Apartment Therapy.