If you are renovating a kitchen or building a new home, the design service is usually free of charge if you are purchasing a line of cabinetry, such as Kraft Made®, Thomasville® or other special order brands. However, if you are renovating using stock cabinetry, then you typically have to design the layout yourself and this can be frustrating. Designing a kitchen is not like choosing a iron tree wall art from the metal art sculpture store.
However, the fact that stock cabinets are engineered in standardized sizes make the design work with ease for you. Bottom or base cabinets are designed to support a countertop that is twenty-four inches deep, although widths can vary. A problem can arise if you need a cabinet to accommodate an odd measurement. However, in this case, a local cabinet store can likely create the odd piece for you at an affordable price; this means that you won’t need to special order the whole kitchen.
Planning your Layout.
Use ¼ inch graph paper to create a scaled drawing of your kitchen including locations and widths of door, windows, future large wooden wall art. Unless you are changing the plumbing, note that in your drawing. Do not lock yourself into the current layout but instead be open to new ideas. For example, don’t be hampered by the current location of the stove; it’s not that difficult to rewire the new location. Also create scaled cut-outs of the appliances as well as the width and depth of the cabinets; height of the cabinets is not important at this stage of the process.
Kitchen Rules for Efficient Designs.
Based on their expertise kitchen designers know what will work and what won’t and what follows are some guidelines to consider.
1. Never put a set of drawers in a corner or the space next to it will be inaccessible. Your best option for a corner is a cabinet with a blind opening in the corner or a lazy susan.
2. Even if you have counter space on both sides, do everything possible to keep the stove out of the corner because you will not be able to reach the space in the back corner of the cupboard beside it.
3. Corner cabinets should be at least 18 inches wide or the opening will be too narrow to use.
4. Plan for as many drawers as possible: From hot pads to mixing spoons and silverware, you can never have too much drawer space.
5. Be as efficient with energy as possible: Avoid putting the refrigerator next to the stove or your electricity costs will skyrocket and your fridge will wear out sooner than it should.
6. Create an efficient work triangle between the sink, stove and fridge. If you must lay the appliances out on one wall, avoid having the stove between the refrigerator and sink.
Upper Cabinetry.
You can make an elevation drawing once the bottom cabinets and appliances are laid out. This gives a scaled representation of how the kitchen will look when seen from straight ahead as opposed to your previous drawing which was an overhead representation. Show the width and height of your windows and doors on the elevation drawing and draw a dashed line to represent where the bottom of the upper cabinets will be. Generally, this measurement is about 54” from the floor, but you can place them 52” if you are shorter. This will give you a keen visual as to how the upper cabinets will hang in the kitchen.
Since upper cabinets are 12” deep, go back to your overhead drawing and draw a dotted line on the plan 12” from the wall wherever you plan to place an upper cabinet.
Next pull out the elevation drawing and make in-scale paper cutouts of available cabinet sizes and line them up above the bottom cabinets in the drawing. Try to create a harmonious layout between the door patterns and lines between the upper and lower cabinets. If they don’t line up perfectly, create balance in your layout or balance several smaller cabinets against a larger cabinet.
Now make a list of everything you need by size and quantity and go comparison shopping.
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