This particular adventure began because of that ridiculous 90 degree coupling you see about two-thirds down, on the left, of this first image:

This is looking west from inside the Casita into the clothes closet, which also houses a utility service space for the air handler for the HVAC system, (to the left).

That 90 degree coupling – seen above – encapsulates the 10-guage Romex conductor for the 30 amp circuit connected to the cooktop on the opposite side of the wall, (i.e., the Casita closet backs to the Kitchen on the other side of that wall). Oh, and before I forget, please note the slight bow in the “panel” off to the left, (…nope, not gonna call it a door, ‘cuz it ain’t one).

That silly-looking panel on the left hides the air handler. Can’t see the bow? …take a peak at the floor over to the left – yeah, plain as day.

Pretty sad, isn’t it? Yeah, complete crap. Who in their right mind would think it was OK to cut portions of a load-bearing 2″x6″ stud away with a circular saw, then attempt to paper over their sin with 2 pieces of 1″x6″ composite trim, leaving a gap to pass the, (now sheathed), Romex from inside the utility closet out to the clothes closet, only to turn 90 degrees a couple of inches later and proceed to go through the wall into the Kitchen cabinet beneath the cooktop?! The abject laziness simply astounds me!

I seriously doubt it. So, I peeled that miserable excuse for a door off, heaved it into my [growing] pile of refuse, (I call it “flipper debris”), and proceeded to come up with a step-by-step remediation plan. First, I properly relocated the 30 amp circuit, (using new Romex conductor, new sheathing, and a new coupling at the junction box), then I re-framed the utility closet opening by recycling those 2″x4″ studs. Third, I trimmed the opening out, then patched and painted the entire closet, and lastly, I installed our favorite closet storage system – Elfa Classic!

We will ultimately replace all of the interior doors, the baseboard, and, (in all likelihood), the engineered flooring. We’re leaning toward a single-panel, Shake-style, (solid core) door, while the replacement baseboard will be a simple 9/16″x4″ rectangle, and both the doors and baseboard will be painted to match the wall color.

The jury is still out on the specifics for the flooring, so stay tuned!