future simple passive: sustainable kitchens

Showing posts with label sustainable kitchens. Show all posts

5 Jun 2015

Kitchen Island love

WOW! Our kitchen continues to draw attention, featuring on thekitchn.com (for more of my posts see A sustainable kitchen, kitchen progression, kitchen installation, kitchen reveal). It's the moveable island that is the star of the show today.

Once Sam, from Sustainable Kitchens, and I had the initial design and layout sorted out, I was able to start thinking about the details of 'what and where'. I imagined using the kitchen and where I would ideally like to store things and how I would use the space.

The island quickly got identified as the 'prep' area. So all mixing bowls, sieves, weighing scales, measuring jugs, lemon juicer, etc. would be stored here. Sam pointed out that we would be able to have storage on both sides of the island. I had been very keen on the idea of a breakfast cupboard, where all breakfast foodstuffs, cereals & jams/marmite/honey could be stored conveniently close to the dining table (mornings are busy enough!). This meant that I could use the other cupboard for vegetable storage. I wanted it to be dark but also ventilated so Sam suggested cutting vents into the doors- the design of these was left until as late as possible so that we could relate it to other design choices in the rest of the house.

The island still in the workshop waiting for the stainless steel wrapping.

We looked at baskets and got a little sidetracked by metal/wire industrial style trays, but in the end I really liked Sam's idea of just making the slatted drawers from ply like the rest of the carcass of the kitchen. This was the first time Sustainable Kitchens had been asked to make this feature and they made two drawers with dividers to give me 4 different areas. This has been really was useful esp in the autumn/winter when we have squash, celeriac, beetroot, jerusalem artichokes and so on.

9 Mar 2015

Kitchen installation

Sustainable Kitchens were ready and waiting to install the kitchen. Charlie O'B (so identified due to the extraordinary amount of Charlies we have had on this project!) arrived and set to work. The units had all been made in the workshop but the countertop had to be measured and templated onsite. Only then would we have the exact dimensions needed to fabricate the stainless steel countertop.

Charlie was supposed to have had the place to himself but with the plumbers and electricians busy with other jobs and trying to squeeze us in where they could, it meant that everyone was on site at once. It was very noisy and busy and meant that everyone had to do a little more jiggling and juggling to not be other's way. NOT ideal, but there was a lot of jolly camaraderie.

It took only three days to install the units and then it was immediately covered in board to protect it while all the other trades continued.

By now we were in the first week of August, and had been planning to move in at the end of this month!!! Doubts were beginning to seed... My presence on site was really limited due to the fact that we were full swing in the middle of school summer holidays and site was really not safe to bring the children to visit.

A few weeks later the steel was ready and Joseph came along with Charlie to install. This was far from a straightforward task. But Sustainable Kitchens handled it with a cool and professional head.

Steel, unlike wood, is an unforgiving material. Wood can be planed and eased to fit like a glove. I had also asked for an experimental aspect which concerned the edge detailing- normally the steel wraps around the ply base so that you see a metal edge (we have since discovered why, as it hides a multitude of sins). I had asked for the edge to be exposed so that the steel just looked like another layer in the ply. I wanted the lighter feel that this would give to the metal countertop.

This meant that the front edges had align perfectly or be cut/sanded so that they would be. It also meant that the bonding of the metal to the ply base had to be perfect as the edge would expose any gaps in adhesion. This aspect would normally be disguised by the wrapped edge.

A bit of head-scratching but Charlie figured it out calmly and with a smile, always up for a challenge with my experimental kitchen design! The wires you can see in the wall are the for the LED lights which have been recessed into the Dinesen Douglas shelf which wraps around the kitchen. The moveable island was finished in the workshop and wrapped in the wobble-sanded steel. It was kept out of the way and delivered the day we moved in. It is so beautiful. I'll share finished photos soon.

23 Aug 2014

Kitchen progression

The chaps at Sustainable Kitchens have been busy and I popped into their workshop to get some previews!

This beautiful Dinesen box is going to house my extractor fan. It looks amazing!

The carcass is constructed from birch ply and is rock solid. Even without the fronts it looks fantastic.

I can't tell you how beautiful these drawers are. They are dovetail jointed at the corners and they feel like they will last forever.

I got to open the box and have a first look at my sink, Kohler Vault Offset Double. It was chosen over the internet as I couldn't find anywhere locally to look at it in person, but I'm not disappointed. This was one of the first things I chose for the kitchen, and you know what i'm like about sinks and taps! The decision for the countertop material was one of the last choices. I was very nervous about having a sink and countertop in the same material, I was worried that the sink would lose it's impact. Also I prefer inset sinks to under-mounting and I worried about how the edge would look. Below I was looking at how the a wobble-sanded stainless steel finish would look. This way of finishing the steel has many advantages as it shows less smearing and fingerprints and also allows you to sand out any scratches yourself relatively easily.

And finally my moveable island. WOW!

5 Jun 2014

A sustainable kitchen!

I really wanted to stay true to the ethos of a sustainable build and try to get a kitchen that would be solidly made from sustainable materials and would last decades.

As always I was searching high and low to find the solution where I can get outstanding design, excellent function and affordable prices. A friend highly recommended the company who had built her beautiful kitchen - Sustainable Kitchens who are based in Bristol. I gave them a call & went to visit their showroom. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect match.

The showroom is ever so gorgeous, and when you get to touch and feel a kitchen which has been so beautifully crafted you realise that anything else will be a massive compromise.

Dimitri and I both enjoy cooking, in fact our lives revolve around it. I had initially decided that with a limited budget I would spend on the appliances and save on the carcass. However when I started to reflect on this I realised that this wasn't right. Appliances are easier to change and upgrade. The carcass and cabinets though are a much bigger deal, they are here to stay. This firm really do care about sustainable principles and put their ideals into action. I was really excited about the possibility of working together.

Sam, Partner & Designer of Sustainable Kitchens, and I started with their classic Shaker Design- the one I had seen and loved in their showroom. Sam drew it all up on the computer and sent me visualisation images. It was beautiful, simple and elegant but I just couldn't get that excited feeling. It took me a couple of weeks to realise that I wanted something a bit different. This was a while ago and I hadn't yet finalised my limited materials palate for the internal finishes. It was through this process that I realised that I really wanted a birch ply finish throughout the house. Once the material had been chosen then that influenced the design of the cabinetry a lot. I was interested in being able to see the edge of the ply and all those layers.

We've been refining, changing, playing with the kitchen design and we finally nearly there! As it is all bespoke the choices are unlimited. It has been a really creative and satisfying process. We've interrogated numerous possibilities at almost every stage -

Layout. Door design. Door material. Handles. Drawer design. Countertop materials (the biggest issue I reckon!). Countertop heights. Plinths. Upstands. Upper level cabinets/shelves. Sinks. Extractors. Appliances. Lighting. Power sockets.

Sam has been ever so patient, enthusiastic & supportive at every stage. He has calmly interpreted my random whims of fancy.

You get a sneaky peak of the kitchen in the photo above. We've designed a moveable island, so we were looking at castors.

This is so exciting, it's going to be so beautiful!

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