The kitchen is usually the most troubled spot and the most common target of a home renovation.
Worn cabinets, peeled paints, rust, grease deposits, obsolete tiles, are just some of the reasons that make us feel uncomfortable.
Here you can see how to change everything and proceed to the renovation of your kitchen based on the logic of a modern one.
Make the most of your space
Sounds obvious but it is not. In fact, kitchens have a lot of dead space and need proper design to be utilized. The lower cabinets, the space around the refrigerator, the island, can all acquire new uses.
A good strategy is to put what you use most often at the right height, ie in the low cabinets and high drawers on the counter. The most used kitchen utensils do not have to fit in cupboards. You can just hang them. Or, stack them on a trolley.
Create space
A modern design wants a kitchen and living room in an open space, with or without an island. The old kitchens are separate rooms with regional furniture.
In any case, leave space to use as a kitchen, ie corridors around the island or “square” in an old kitchen. The logic is the same: We minimize movements and distances.
Improve ergonomics
If you are redesigning your kitchen, it is a good idea to consider a new space for the refrigerator. The refrigerator is good to be immediately accessible, as we use it more often than the rest of appliances within the kitchen.
However, it should be close to the oven if we cook often. On a piece of draft paper draw the layout that gives the most savings based on how you plan to move in your kitchen and ask the engineer to implement something similar for you.
Find a new place for your oven or microwave
If you cook often or have children at home, the oven goes higher but not too high. “Low” is an old logic and no longer fits into modern kitchens.
New cabinets
To be honest, if something is off in a kitchen it is almost always the cupboards. Either they are too retro for our modern metal appliances, or worn or damaged. Change them! So simple. Along with a painting, you will see a renovated kitchen without doing anything else.
Repositioning
Changing the kitchen’s position is not as simple a task, because it is related to the water and electricity networks of the house. If you try, ensure that it is absolutely necessary and that it will be done with an architect study in order not to create functional problems in the rest of the house.
Rails instead of cabinets
If you cook often, consider replacing the cabinets above the counter with rails. You can hang cooking utensils on the rails. From an aesthetic point of view, you create a very dramatic result in relation to the old boring but neat closet.
Lighting
Lighting is an issue that concerns the whole house and only in recent years it receives the required attention in the kitchen area. Choose the style of the kitchen and complete it with the appropriate lamp. A simple light bulb is wrong. A simple matching luminaire is the right one.
Ideally, you treat the kitchen, like the living room, as a place that should give you joy all the time, as a place where you can sit and drink a coffee, read a book.
Colors
The old “hospital”, as we say in Greek, white is dead. Move on. This means color combinations with cabinets, appliances and in general the overall aesthetics of the kitchen.
If your kitchen has historical value, it is e.g. In a house of the ‘60s or‘ 70s, you can keep some decorative elements such as some rows of old tiles and top up with matching new ones. Or keep the marble sink giving it a different use.