Case Study: Fixing an Awkward Kitchen

Friends of mine had bought a house with a kitchen that had an awkward layout – doors that opened into the workspace, circulation through the work zones, not enough counters – the usual problems with older houses.

View towards back door

Corner by sink

Dining Room common wall

Dining Room door

Dining Room common wall

Basement door

Stove and Refrigerator

Stove

Stove in use

We discussed what they were looking for, and what kind of materials they wanted to use. In this situation, they had some very specific activities, such as canning, that they needed to support. And of course a small budget.

I did two things to fix the problems, and they allowed us to solve the rest of the issues. One was flipping the swing of the basement door so that it didn’t open towards the stove. The second was moving the entrance from the dining room away from the wall to provide space for the refrigerator and a pantry cabinet. We also widened the opening to create a pass-thru space which connected to a new island counter to add workspace to the kitchen. We also mixed up the counter materials using butcher block on the island and quartz by the sink and stove.

View from Dining Room

New island workspace

New sink wall

View back into the Dining Room

Refrigerator and pantry

New stove wall