Modern? Yes. Functional? Yes. Different? That too.
I’m always on the looking for kitchen ideas that feel new or innovative, ones that set this room apart and keep it looking current. That’s not always easy because kitchens – traditional, modern, rustic and even cottage styles — have settled into a certain visual language over the past ten years and aren’t budging much. These days, really new kitchen ideas and features are found on the contemporary or modernist side, as we saw in the hidden cabinets of the Curved Oak Kitchen, or the Under Counter Refrigeration in a kitchen of that same name. Here are four kitchen ideas that are a little different and worthy of consideration.
1. Recessed Ventilation. A soffit fully conceals ventilation over a cook top in a long modernist galley kitchen [top] with a stone backsplash wall and matching counter. Many vents can be installed flush like this one without defining the vent in a hood. The work of design firm Simonsen Czechura, in the Copenhagen Showroom of Danish furniture icon Fritz Hansen, is a set up similar to that in the Belgian Country Kitchen although the more traditional Belgian approach included a relief molding on the face of the soffit.
2. Install Lighting in a Counter Top. A former apartment in Milan’s fashionable Brera neighborhood is now home to the Dimore Gallery, an avant-guard design studio where Britt Moran and Emiliano Salci installed strip lighting down the length of a stone countertop in the kitchen. I’ve seen lighting below the toe kick and inside cabinet drawers but never before as a feature on a work surface, where it might be vulnerable to spills. But I bet it looks amazing at night.
3. Use Contemporary Soffit Cabinets to Create a Range Niche. The partition wall of an interior loft kitchen often functions like a screen. It can’t connect to the ceiling without blocking light. One way to help define that space and create room-like proportions on a range wall is to use short (soffit) cabinets across the top of the backsplash so they connect with full height cabinets on each side. The result is a range niche. A cleverly installed chimney hood (also the perfect shape) runs through the blind panel at the center. On either side there is handy, but limited, upper storage.
4. Kitchen Counter that Doubles as a Dining Table. When I look at this expansive kitchen counter that’s arranged across two cabinets like a bridge, I can hear the comments about “barrier island” or grousing about lack of storage space. I see three uses that outweigh any drawbacks. First, is an exceptionally long unbroken counter top that’s ideal for preparation, baking or a buffet dinner, just steps from the range and the sink. Second, a fully accessible dining table that offers comfortable seating on each side (a small eating bar is on the opposite side). And third, an open space where attractive portable storage or objects can be stowed underneath. That’s why I find this a better kitchen set up than first glance might suggest.
(Source: desiretoinspire, dimore gallery, hgtv, aimecescuisines)
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