Coming home from a long day of hard work. No energy to cook, but since the alternative is to warm-up some precooked meal you prefer to cook a healthy meal anyway for your loved ones. Did you know that preparing a meal in a functional kitchen will take less time and effort? When the kitchen is designed around your lifestyle you will manage to create a healthy meal in no-time! So how to design a functional kitchen? By carefully analyzing how you personally cook! Let’s dive into the essentials when designing a kitchen.
First things first: how would you like to start your day? Or better: how to create an easy start of your day? By having a proper breakfast area with coffee-corner in your kitchen!
How to create your functional breakfast area with coffee-corner?
Whether you had a bad night or not, having only one zone to focus on when preparing your breakfast will make your morning routine easier. Work smarter, not harder 😉
We all know that choosing the right stove is key for success in your kitchen. If you’re a couple or standard family of 4 a stove with 4 burners will most likely provide you enough space to cook your meals.
Choosing the right stove is essential to every household, but what if your household counts more people than average? What if you need to consider food intolerances or allergies or your way of cooking just requires the use of multiple (different types of) pans at the same time?
In this situation I highly recommend to opt for a stove with 6 burners or the equivalent of it with induction. Why 6 burners and not 5? When using the large burner, you will most likely use a large pan. Easy to imagine that your other (not so little pans) will not have enough space around this large pan.
Whether you opt for a stove-oven combination or you prefer a free standing oven, nowadays you have many options to choose from. When you’re used to prepare large oven dishes, opt for a large oven. If you like to choose between a small oven or a bigger one depending on what you prepare, than opt for a double oven. Do you like to steam your food, perhaps a oven-steamer combination is the best choice for you. Again, essential is to understand how you like to prepare your meals.
The space between sink and stove will be the area you cut your vegetables and prepare your meals before cooking or baking. Choose a kitchen worktop that will stand your preparation routine and is easy to maintain through the years. Make this area the longest you can: this will create maximum workspace in your kitchen with enough room for all you appliances!
Consider what utensils you actually use while cooking. These items will need to find a place around your stove and oven.
Another type of items you ideally place near the stove are seasoning essentials such as oils, vinegars, spices, herbs, salt and pepper. Having your canned food, sauces, pasta, rice and other dried food easily accessible will make meal preparation go faster.
First of all try to understand what items your frequently put in your dishwasher. Those are the items you ideally would like to store away with minimum effort after washing them. So let’s say it’s mostly glassware, crockery and cutlery. It’s best to fill the cabinets around your dishwasher with these items.
The same counts for items you only wash in the sink (more delicate pans for example).
If you have kids and would like them to help out or get involved I strongly suggest to create a kids-zone in the kitchen. Here (at their reach!) they can find their containers and drinking bottles for preparing their lunchboxes on their own. Trust me, they will love the feel of “independence”, there will be less to prepare from your side and best result: they will tend to eat all they’ve proudly prepared!
The same counts for breakfast and snacks: placing these items at reach of your children will make life around food in general easier, faster and more fun. Of course I’m considering fruits, veggies, nuts and crackers as snacks .. not sure I would place cookies and candies at their reach 😉
You probably have personal habits and traditions on how to prepare meals for your family. Being and expat and living the expat lifestyle you may have been inspired to experience food in a new way while traveling around the world. Designing your functional kitchen is all about understanding how you actually cook.
Make sure your kitchen at home provides the needed storage space first of all. Keep in mind to create enough workspace to prepare your meals. And last but not least, surround yourself with colours and materials that are practical to maintain and represent your personal taste at the same time. Look into my portfolio for some more inspiration.
Ciao, I’m Benedetta.
As an interior designer I’ve had the opportunity to assist many expat families over the years with home improvements, including renovations and tailored design solutions. As a coach at home, I specialize in helping expat mothers of young families who feel overwhelmed by the challenges of both home life and the expat lifestyle. My approach combines decluttering, smart storage solutions, simplified routines, functional space planning, and custom furniture design to create harmonious living spaces.
Would you like to reorganize or redesign your kitchen, but you have no idea how or where to start? Book your call to see how I could be at your side from decluttering to final design!