5 Elements of a Well-Designed Kitchen
For many homeowners, the kitchen is not merely a place for preparing food, but also the part of the house where family and friends often get together. Because of this, people prefer a kitchen design that keeps both aesthetic and functionality at its core.
However, aside from the homeowners’ preferences, there are also several elements that need to be considered in order for a kitchen to be considered “well-designed.” Here are five essential elements to keep in mind for when you decide to make changes and upgrades to your kitchen.
1. Work Space
The available workspace is one of the most important considerations when it comes to designing a kitchen. Maximizing the area allotted to this part of the house, especially when there is limited floor space, is imperative when it comes to achieving both functionality and aesthetic appeal for the design.
With that said, it is important that you keep the kitchen work triangle in mind when creating a kitchen design. This concept encompasses three parts of the room: the sink, the refrigerator, and the stove. As the name suggests, this idea involves positioning all three parts in a way that they form an invisible triangle.
The purpose of the kitchen triangle is to optimize workflow by providing easy access to the ingredients (the refrigerator), the area where these are prepared (the sink), and the area dedicated to cooking (the stove). It is also a good idea to ensure that at least three people will be able to work in the kitchen simultaneously to ensure that the kitchen triangle can cater to the most ideal kitchen workflow.
2. Lighting
If you are in the midst of designing a new home, you have the luxury of creating a kitchen in a way that will let natural light in. Having natural lighting inside the kitchen means you won’t have to add too much artificial light to work there (and you can save on energy costs). It even provides homeowners with an option to grow herbs that they can use for their cooking.
In case you’re renovating and cannot do anything about how much natural light can come into the kitchen, it may be time to think about different types of artificial lighting. There are three: basic lighting which illuminates the entire space; task lighting ensures that there is ample light to work in specific areas of the room, and accent lighting that makes the kitchen look more elegant.
For all three types, LED kitchen lighting is probably your best bet since it saves energy, it is cost-efficient and environment-friendly, and it is relatively sturdier and brighter than other alternatives.
To top that off, you should also install lights to illuminate important areas in the room, particularly the spaces under the cupboard and above the sink.
3. Storage
The kitchen is a room in the house that requires ample storage not just for food items, but for utensils and other tools as well. To ensure that your client doesn’t have to dig through tons of items just to find a can opener, include an organizing component into the cabinets and drawers of the kitchen.
Speaking of cabinets, many kitchen designs feature cupboards that are too high up. These may be great to look at, but may not be the best choice functionality-wise since these hinder the homeowner’s workflow. Instead, you can try to incorporate as much storage as you can in easy-to-reach drawers or add a big island into the kitchen design.
4. Seating Placement and Layout
Back in the day, the kitchen’s purpose was limited to serving as the area where food is prepared. However, those days are long gone as new age interior designers have transformed this room into another communal space where people can gather together, share delicious meals and build wonderful memories. Because of this, kitchen designs evolved into something more stylish and elegant in recent years.
Of course, you should still put functionality on top of your priority list. This means that you should create a seating layout based on what the homeowners plan to do in the space, which can range from parents entertaining guests during party meal preparation, to the children doing their homework while waiting for dinner to be ready, and the whole family gathering around the counters and enjoying afternoon snacks while catching up with each other’s day.
A functional kitchen should also consider the workspace when it comes to the layout of the seating space. This means that if the area is expected to become crowded because of too many people watching the food preparation process or conversing with the cook, it would be better to place the seats away from the kitchen triangle.
Instead, you can incorporate a nook or countertop with stools in the opposite side of the room to serve as a space to entertain guests while preventing them from hindering the cooking process.
5. Ease of Cleaning
A well-designed kitchen also helps make cleaning up a piece of cake. While this may not seem like the first thing you would consider as the interior designer or contractor, it is something that your clients would appreciate very much.
Ideally, the kitchen should be one of the cleanest rooms in the house since it is where food is prepared. However, it is possible that it can end up as the messiest area if the kitchen design doesn’t support ease of cleaning.
As the designer, you should keep in mind how parts of the kitchen are cleaned. Make sure that crumbs, grease, and water won’t accumulate and can easily be tidied, which means there should be no hard-to-reach areas. There should also be waste disposal bins in strategic areas.
One Last Thing…
Before offering a kitchen design to your client, you must first ask them what they plan to do in it and how they want it to appear. After reflecting on their responses, work on the project with these important elements in mind to ensure that your clients are satisfied with their newly built or renovated kitchen.
If you’re looking for a reliable LED light and kitchen solutions supplier, you can hit us up. Concept Bath would be delighted to provide quality products that are sure to meet your clients’ expectations.