Modern Family Kitchen, East Grinstead
This house and its kitchen are only about seven years old, but our customers found the kitchen design impractical for a busy and large family. The brief for us was to make it more practical, make better use of the room and give it a new, more classic aesthetic.
Our bespoke kitchen design
The old kitchen cut the room in half with its design and meant that one-half of the room was really unusable space. Additionally, the layout meant there wasn’t room for the fridge-freezer in the kitchen area, so every time anyone needed something from it, they had to walk around the peninsula to get it, not ideal when you’re cooking for seven!
The usable space in the kitchen had become cramped and in the dark gloss finish, felt small and enclosed, despite the lovely natural light and high ceilings the room benefits from.
To really transform this kitchen into a light, spacious and practical kitchen, our designer, Debbi, redesigned the whole layout, moving the kitchen to the other end of the room, moving the peninsula onto the opposite wall and creating a dining and family space that opened out onto the kitchen. Now, everything in the kitchen has been thoughtfully designed to make it beautiful and practical, including a breakfast pantry which has been designed to house small appliances and keep the worktops clear. The fridge-freezer has been properly incorporated into the design and has a bespoke wine rack built into the storage above, handmade by one of our fitting team.
This redesign also enabled us to create a bespoke window seat with an oak top for the bay window, the perfect nook to settle into.
The kitchen is a classic shaker in the timeless Dove Grey, and the utility area is in Graphite, which creates a nice distinction between the two spaces. The worktops are the stunning Konigstone Ontario with shark nose edging, and the peninsula breakfast bar is complete with a BORA Pure downdraft extraction hob. The kitchen is fitted with a NEFF oven and microwave and Quooker Fusion.
The lovely herringbone flooring is Sierra Exempla Parquet, which we laid in the kitchen, study, lounge and downstairs WC.
The handles and knobs are brushed satin nickel by Crofts and Assinder.
All in the detail
The room had lovely high ceilings which Debbi wanted to accentuate, so she designed coving for the ceiling and a cornice for the top of the kitchen units. These features give the kitchen an even more classic feel and really make the most of the height of the room.
The utility unit is a completely bespoke design which houses; a stacked washing machine and tumble dryer, the boiler, the vacuum, hanging space and deep drawers for extra storage. It is a beautifully designed and practical area for this busy family kitchen.