Kitchen Design: Layout, Location and Flow

   Kitchens... such a simple word.    

Kitchens are places we used to sit around as kids while Mom whipped up some of the fondest food memories of our lives.

Kitchens are also places you could run into right from the school bus, throw your back-pack on the counter, whip open the fridge hoping to find something better than the left-overs of last night's "fondest food memory" (Let's be honest, even Mom got it wrong sometimes)

Kitchens.

Now, as a homeowner, kitchens are... well, they're a nightmare.

Everybody wants the perfect kitchen, you know, a place where your close friends can hang out when you have those impromptu casual Friday night dinners? Where they all can't stop complimenting you on how open, spacious and inviting your kitchen is? And how wonderful all the food you prepared looks under the perfectly dimmed lighting of the seemingly limitless counter space you have? And how your kitchen was obviously built to prepare the finest Cuisine... not 'Quiz-ine'... 

(Please stand by for a word from Wiki-Focal-pedia)
                                                                                     
Quiz·ine  
/kwiˈzēn/

Noun
1. A style or method of cooking whereby guests are mystified as to what it could possibly be.
2. Food cooked in a certain way, usually lacking intention, skill or the necessary tools to prepare it with.

Synonyms:
mystery meat - frat house fricassee - sh*t-on-a-shingle  
                                                                                                                                   

(Now back to our blog)

Well all of that comes at a price and when it comes to renovations, kitchens are usually at the top of the budgetary food chain. So how do we take our kitchens to the next level? And how do we do it without completely breaking the bank?

We start with the layout.

A big mistake I see a lot of designers and contractors make is feeling the need to move EVERYTHING around. Now, in some circumstances that might be the correct answer but often things make sense right about where they were originally intended to be, give or take a couple of inches.
Let's take a look at a project that we here at Focalpoint Renovations just completed. The original kitchen wasn't really bad it was just... (here comes my favorite word)... Dated.

Take a look:

Here's another view looking through the kitchen into the adjoining living space.The hardwood flooring was actually installed in the opposite directions as the two rooms met making each room feel even more separated. That bothered my sense of flow from the beginning and as those who know me will tell you, "Know your flow!"

There is a bank of cabinets on the left there that was half a desk area combined with an awkward wine bottle display above. Let me show you that.

Lord knows I understand sitting down to pay the bills could drive a person to drink but, I wasn't quite sure exactly what was happening here with this half desk/half wine cabinet area. What I did know was that we had some dated white thermofoil cabinets, Corian countertops and walls that were painted... um, I don't know. What are we calling that color, Blandberry? Mauve-itov cocktail? 

This kitchen spoke to me, but it spoke in the Microsoft language of Windows 98. It said things like, " Re-elect President Clinton" and "What's this new eBay thing I keep hearing about?"

In any case, the homeowner actually really liked white cabinets and wanted to stick with that look. 

So here was our challenge:  

Update the space without making it feel like we rebuilt the same kitchen... all over again. 

Oh, and we needed the budget to stay as trimmed as possible (that always seems to be the case, doesn't it?)

Step 1: Figure out what the customer wants and how much of the existing layout we can work with. 

Customer requests:

1. Bigger island for entertaining
2. More cabinet space
3. Relocate Cook-top area
4. Update lighting design
5. Update fireplace

Existing locations:

• Sink: Yup, that bugger sits nicely under the window looking onto the enclosed deck. You stay put.
• Dishwasher: To the right side of the sink. This works great for the water & drain hook-ups and that's exactly where we will leave that little guy.
• Oven: We have an updated, electric double oven that isn't very old, if we can utilize the relative location, we'll have our power requirements pretty much where we need them.
• Cook-top: Sorry... you're in the island and we don't like you there anymore. You take up too much space and you have to go.
• Refrigerator: You're in a tight spot too to the right of the double oven. If only we could find a new home for you so that everything wasn't sitting on top of each other.

The last request was to address the cobblestone fireplace in the adjoining living area. She never liked it because she felt it was bland, had a massive limestone mantle & hearth and she really wished she could somehow get a flat screen T.V. up there.

Beyond just the cabinet design, it becomes obvious they've set these two rooms up independently of each other. There is even a breakfast table with hanging light smack dab in the middle dividing the two rooms. Even though these rooms have no walls separating them, it sure seems that someone drew a line in the sand and never wanted the two to play together. If we could somehow stretch this kitchen towards the living area and make the living area feel more like an extension of the kitchen... well then, we just might have something!

 Here's where we begin to see opportunity

We have two entrances to the enclosed deck, a 6' sliding glass door in the kitchen and a 36" french door around the corner in the living area (you can see the slider in the second picture posted above). If we sacrifice that sliding glass door, we could extend our kitchen cabinets along that wall towards the living area and even get that bigger island she wanted. That would probably give us even more room to create a new Cook-top area somewhere along the wall instead of the island where it was. Heck, why don't we just relocate the fridge as well while we're at it?? 

Well, we did. (Notice I cut right to the chase, no drama. I'm no Steven King)

With the help of our friends at Cyr Lumber we utilized DeWils Cabinetry and here's what we came up with:

A beautiful built-in, Thermador stainless steel refrigerator and a gas cook-top with a cabinet enclosed hood vent. (We can't mention the cook-top without thanking our good friends at Tech Welding/Mad Mounts for punching out the custom stainless steel flange adapter to pop that puppy in place).

What about that sink area? We left it right where it was with a couple of fancier options such as instant hot water, water purification and in-counter mounted soap dispenser to clean away the memories of the previous kitchen design.

Not everything got bigger, with the additional cabinetry, we were able to shrink the wine display area down to a more appropriate size, lose the desk feature and tie it together with a marble backsplash and beverage refrigerator below. Using varying depth sizes in the upper cabinets made the areas more interesting and got away from what I call, 'the bowling alley effect' where everything follows one continuous visual line.

Finally, this area says 'Entertainment' not 'Sit here and pay your insurance bill'.

Another upside of having moved the refrigerator is that we were able to slide the double oven a few feet to the right of its original location, incorporate a microwave into the upper cabinetry and open up even more counter and cabinet space.

All of these changes allowed us to build the real Focalpoint ™  of the kitchen (like what I did there?):
Our massive 4 seat, 10' 4" x 30" island. Fantasy cream granite offset in an antiqued black finish give this kitchen the much desired seating area that it was lacking.

Here is a view looking back into the kitchen from the living space:

All New Kitchen Idea Book By Bouknight, Joanne Kellar (Google Affiliate Ad)

The granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances and hardware, carefully located recessed lighting and pendants, and updated hardwood flooring (installed in the same direction as the living area) all helped to bring this room to life.

But there was still one element we wanted to take advantage of and that was the fireplace. It was a very interesting cobblestone but it was tall and narrow. The hearth felt very plain and the mantle was big and set fairly high.
We wanted to allow this fireplace to maintain some of it's original charm but I personally wanted it to feel wider and have more visual weight. We also needed to incorporate the ability to install a flat screen television so we came up with a fairly simple solution. Remove the mantle and the hearthstone, then build a surround that had some of the same character of the kitchen cabinetry. Installing an absolute black granite hearthstone helped make the other fireplace features pop.
The ultimate goal was to help draw the two rooms together and make them feel like one continuous larger room and less like two separate spaces.

We also smoothed out the ceilings. That circular swirl may have been fancy 15 years ago but now it just made me dizzy and anxious. Here's the fireplace before and after:

And here's what the two rooms now feel like when you enter through the kitchen:

Adding a dropped light fixture and moving the breakfast table into the bay window area of the living space made for better views and comfort.

Overall, we managed to make a lot happen by allowing elements of both rooms to compliment each other and taking advantage of what was already there. Part of me misses the 'Blandberry' paint? But then again, part of me still misses Nintendo and Doogie Howser, M.D.

Long live the 90's.