Kitchen design

[Gary G]

I've attached the drawing my architect did and wonder what peoples thoughts are on the layout?

 

I will be using DIY Kitchens for the actual units and they don't have a design service, don't really want to waste local companies times having them produce designs but I suppose it's not the worst idea.

 

Anyway, keen to hear others thoughts, cheers.

 

 

Regs Grey B L04 (1).pdf

[ultramods]

From a cosmetic perspective the layout may be dependent on the style of the house. i.e a more traditional style house might have a farm house style kitchen layout, whereas a more contemporary house might have a more minimalist layout. 

 

My design (which I came up with rather than professional designers) is here:  

 

 

I have had various quotes from kitchen companies based on my design and none of them have suggested any improvements.

 

From a practical perspective I have the fridge, freezer, boiling water tap, sink, oven, microwave, hob, integrated bins and dishwasher all very close to each other, which means when you are cooking you aren't moving all around the kitchen.

 

I know my style of kitchen with only one worktop (island) will not be for everyone. However the only compromise I see us making is having the toaster in the utility room next door. We could have put the toaster in one of kitchen cupboards with the retractable doors. 

 

We have made sure that the worktop is large enough to have 2 people preparing food at the same time.

 

In your design it looks like you will have a lot of worktop space, do you really need all that? I find with lots of worktop space it's very easy for the kitchen to look cluttered as more and more stuff is left of the worktop space. if you don't need as much worktop space you could have more tall banks of units, which I think makes better use of a space.

 

Are you not having a dining table in the house, are you going to be eating at the island? Personally I don't like sitting on bar stools (obviously this is a personal preference)

 

I have stayed in holiday houses with the same layout as I have designed, however i have increased the width of the walkway between the island and the tall bank of units as I found any less and you are bumping in to other people if there is more than one person cooking.

 

 

[Gary G]

Just had a look at your blog, very nice! I take on board your point regarding not having to move all round the kitchen. I think I'd like the island to be a breakfast bar with some stools then theres also a dining table in the open plan bit.

 

I found this picture which looks very similar in terms of space as my kitchen...

 

 

[lizzie]

@Gary G I would get yourself to a good independent kitchen designer tbh. That design by your architect seems to me to be all over the place in terms of a working space. Do you have any worktops near the ovens ........they seem to be stuck way over in the corner. Your hob sits central but a long  way from sink (for draining veg etc). Where is the fridge?

 

There is a good reason that the kitchen ‘work triangle’ developed.  

[wozza]

Are you having an American style fridge freezer? your plan shows just a freezer, and in the location it is, you may have trouble opening the doors - the doors on our American Fridge Freezer open quite wide and if you don't open them fully wide you cannot pullout some of the internal drawers correctly.

 

You have plenty of space to the right of the sink?

 

I would definitely do as Lizzie has suggested, take your plan to a few kitchen showrooms, and get them to draw up a plan. I have done this recently and you will be surprised at the different ideas that the planners will come up with.

 

 

Edited September 14, 2018 by wozza

[Hecateh]

https://planner.diy-kitchens.com/plan/range/

 

This is the DIY Kitchens Kitchen planner, (It's still in beta and they don't advertise it) so you can play around with units and see how they look.  At one point they stopped accepting new registrations - if it doesn't work.  I'll give you my log-in details and you can have a play and design your own.  My kitchen is now on order from them so I no longer need it. 

[PeterW]

4 hours ago, Gary G said:

I've attached the drawing my architect did and wonder what peoples thoughts are on the layout?

 

I will be using DIY Kitchens for the actual units and they don't have a design service, don't really want to waste local companies times having them produce designs but I suppose it's not the worst idea.

 

Anyway, keen to hear others thoughts, cheers.

 

 

Regs Grey B L04 (1).pdf

 

DIY Kitchens have a decent planner system available and if you go up to the showroom they will help you out. The layout seems very spaced out, the island looks small though and I can’t work out what the gully underneath it is for ..??

 

On the main build it seems very traditional and done to just meet BRegs...?? Trickle vents rather than centralized MVHR..? Have you looked at run costs based on the build and see if you can improve anywhere ..?

[bassanclan]

I think this is a situation where you really wanted to get the design of your dream kitchen, then get walls built around it!

[Alexphd1]

My parents designed their kitchen first then the house!

[PeterW]

Just a word of warning with the

kichen vs house design...

 

Always make sure that you keep both designs in line ..! I did a kitchen to a design that had been done before a block was laid and found the doorway had been widened at the last minute and the 500 tall cabinet next to the doorway no longer fitted ...

 

...on the upside, DIY Kitchens do refund you the cost of any doors that get returned ..!

[Jude1234]

4 hours ago, PeterW said:

Just a word of warning with the

kichen vs house design...

 

Always make sure that you keep both designs in line ..! I did a kitchen to a design that had been done before a block was laid and found the doorway had been widened at the last minute and the 500 tall cabinet next to the doorway no longer fitted ...

 

...on the upside, DIY Kitchens do refund you the cost of any doors that get returned ..!

DIY Kitchens willaccept returns but you need to pay for any return delivery costs as I have found out. 

[AliG]

Hi @Gary G just noticed this. Welcome to the forum.

 

Someone else here mentioned designing the house around the kitchen. We went and got our kitchen designed before finalising the house plans and realised we had to slightly alter the kitchen. I think you are past this point. One issue might be that the drainage is already in for the sink, although it looks like the architect has allowed for drainage to the island if required.

 

Kitchen designers will help, but in my experience no one other than you knows how you will live in your own house, the architect is probably the worst person to design the kitchen out of those three options. Did he put in those curved cupboard for example, that would limit your options for units.

 

For our house the kitchen people did the main design, but eventually I had to go and draw it out almost to the millimetre to make sure items were in exactly the right place relative to doors, windows, walls etc.

 

Unfortunately that design is poor. Not only are items spread out too much but you would constantly be walking from side to side in the kitchen with the island in the way. For example the sink is actually in front of the island towards the family room. I would also say that you have just too many kitchen units and too much worktop space. It will make the kitchen more expensive than necessary, stone worktops would be very expensive and you would also end up with multiple joins in the worktop. Also it will be very difficult to use the space in front of the island for a table as it would end up quite close to the door.

 

Part of the problem you have is lack of wall space/too many windows. Generally you do need one flat wall to put fridge/freezer/ovens on and the only wall is over in the corner away from everything else. This assumes that the fridge and freezer are tall and the ovens at eye level. If you put them all under the counters you it would help a lot with organising the space, but they are much less practical to use.

 

If possible I would actually want to lose window W9 and have the oven/fridge/freezer there. This would be by far the best idea if doable.

 

Assuming that you cannot do that, the fridge/freezer/ovens might be better in the 2m space between W8 and W9, but this would not be the most elegant look, tall items like that are probably better kept at the end of a row. You could then move the hob to the island, I like that so you can look out into the room whilst cooking. I spend a lot more time standing at the hob than the sink, you of course may be different.

 

Another thing that you could do is put the ovens and fridge on the wall next to the sink and turn the island around and put the hob on it. You could then fit a kitchen table in the area between the island and the utility room with no cabinets in that area.

 

TBH I could come up with dozens of things you might do and I think the best option is to go to a kitchen designer as they will have seen lots of different layouts before and have a better idea of what works and what doesn't work.

 

Sorry if I sound a bit down on your design. I spent hours on this trying to think about everything that I found annoying about using the kitchen in our old house and eliminate these things in the new place. Hopefully you can get a kitchen you love to use.