General Kitchen Design and Kitchen Floor Design
We design and build kitchens. Here are a few steps to get from where you are to your dream kitchen:
- Reorganize your kitchen layout. Change your work flow. Move a few walls. Reallocate your interior space to include more in your kitchen. Bump out your house to give you more kitchen space. These are general kitchen decisions that we can help with by providing helpful suggestions, while listening to your desires and needs. Contact us.
- Select materials. Choose particular cabinetry, flooring, countertops and fixtures. Determine what you are going to build in, or hang from your cabinetry. We can also assist with this. If you are not going to change your layout, you might go ahead and start choosing materials, or you may want to call us to assist you. See "Remodeling Resources" from the "Home" page for some sources.
- We will provide you with a detailed layout drawing with our first proposal to you. We consider this an iterative process, as we find that homeowners change their minds about some aspects of the design as they discover more detail of the plans. You will tell us what you want to change, and we will change everything else as necessary to accomplish your design. Call or e-mail us.
Kitchen Design including Style
Kitchen Style
If you have a kitchen style in mind, you should discuss this with your remodeling contractor. If you are having trouble expressing your views, ask your contractor to show you several designs or styles which may assist you. Consider that your visual design views express your style..
Kitchen Design
Separate from your needs and your vision, your contractor will consider many other design issues. The biggest single design issue the contractor will consider while formulating your design, is how the work flow will be laid out, using design expertise and experience. In a small kitchen, under most designs, only part of the work flow is considered, and that work flow is called the work triangle. It considers the path from food storage (the refrigerator), to the food preparation area (the sink) to the cooking area (the stove). Go look at any old literature on the subject, and you will find the triangle. This limited design concept ignores othe food storage areas (pantry, cabinetry, countertops, etc.). It ignores other food preparation areas that are not in the immediate area of the sink. In larger kitchens there may be more than one sink. In larger kitchens there may be more than one area for stovetops, ovens, and microwaves, or even a grill. The old concept of the work triangle is inadequate to address the complexity of larger kitchens in an efficient manner. Another area the work triangle concept ignores is food disposal. In small kitchens it is presumed that a disposal might be at the sink However, the location of the waste basket is generally ignored. Food disposal is an important step in the work flow. Another aspect of work flow that is generally ignored is the relationship of the sink to the storage for utensils, dishware, and pots/pans. It is sort of presumed under the old work triangle that the homeowner or cook will just walk to wherever the storage is and put things away. In small kitchens there is probably not much possibility of variation and ignoring the work flow is not going to potentially effect your design. In larger kitchens this view would be disastrous because of the inefficiencies it would cause. Your contractor should consider all these items in designing your kitchen.
If you have the space in your kitchen for potential variations, your contractor should not only be asking you about your visual design views, but about aspects of your work flow.
Kitchen Floor Design
Kitchen floor design may be considered in two parts. The first is the layout of the cabinetry and the appliances. The second is the design of the floor, whether that is complementary wood, or a complementary ceramic. In some cases there is actually a design in the floor, but this must be considered in the context of the kitchen as a whole.
If you choose ceramic, we can offset the tile or tile on a diagonal, or install about any design you can conceive. Your design will not be appreciated, however, if to see it you need a large open floor and you do not have the room or the design is partly hidden by an island or other cabinetry.
In most kitchens that we remodel, the homeowner knows exactly the layout changes that they want. In these cases, we just respond to the requests that we are given. We provide the homeowner with a scale layout of the new cabinetry and appliances.
If you have the space, or want to add some space from another room, or add to the house, you might ask us to provide you with a design for the addition, or the work flow layout.
