Kitchen Design: Where To Begin

Your kitchen could well be the room where your family meet and engage most often, or just a small cooking facility! Whatever roll your kitchen fulfills it must be efficient, comfortable and beautiful for it is central to your familiy life and needs careful consideration when it's up for change.

So what should you consider when contemplating a kitchen change?  Well, we at Kitchen Solutions Kent feel you should consider a few basic points before you begin.

Firstly you need to assess your kitchen needs.  At this stage, remember it is your kitchen and the advice of others, while helpful and interesting, will not have contemplated the same needs, likes and loves as you.  So chat with your family, and friends extensively, but do speak to professionals whose first step is not to talk but to listen.

Don't worry if you feel bewildered at this time.  Everyone does. Kitchens are complex and no one design fits all.  Look at as many displays, photographs and brochures as you can and keep pictures or notes of things you like.

Remember, set your budget, establish your essentials and note how you really live.  Be honest with yourself.  While a state of the art oven may sound ideal, if it's not going to be used to it's full potential then a saving here could release that budget for something that really lightens your kitchen life.  Be sure you have fun thinking things through and involve all of your family. They will all have needs from the kitchen.

One essential tip to remember is the kitchen triangle.  Efficiency experts have noted that a natural pathway exists in any kitchen between fridge, oven and sink. This natural pathway forms the heart of your kitchen and while it's sides need not be equal, it is always present.  Consider this natural affinity and try to imagine how you would move around it and, in some kitchens,  what distances you would cover!

Also make sure your design includes counterspace next to the open side of the fridge for standing those bags of shopping, as well as plenty of heat and wet resistant counterspace on both sides of the hob and sink for landing of heavy, hot, or slippery cookware.

Big or small, most efficient kitchen designs fall into one of a few basic arrangements. L shape kitchens have one long "leg" housing two of the three basic appliances and one short "leg" housing the other. U shape kitchens have two "legs" and a connecting "middle leg", while G shape kitchens are L or U shaped with an added peninsula partly separating the work area from an adjoining space.  Finally, galley-shape kitchens often have the hob and sink on one wall, the fridge on the other, and a walkway in between.

Whoever you seek advice from, though, always remember they should be "listening".  No two kitchens are the same and your needs are unique.  A good kitchen designer doesn't tell you the latest craze but listens to you talk about your kitchen life and designs it around you. 

Little things will give the game away.  So if they ask if you're left or right handed, feel assured ... they are looking to put the draining board on the correct side of the sink for you!