The kitchen is usually considered to be one of those “in-and-out as quick as you can” rooms. But it doesn’t have to be this way. In fact, the kitchen can be a place where everybody in your home can just get together and enjoy a good meal.
The problem with the kitchen usually comes down to the atmosphere. Sometimes it’s just a little lacklustre or cluttered. Here’s how to transform it from a backwater into a room everybody will want to hang out in.
Blow Their Minds With Dark Cabinetry
Pine cabinets or white cabinets are all the rage in kitchens today. And while this might be the style “du jour,” it’s not exactly cosy or endearing. Many rustic and older homes, especially those built in the Victorian era are being retrofitted with dark cabinetry. Often these homes have features, like blacked-out fireplaces and dark window frames that complement dark cabinetry in the kitchen. Dark cabinets make the kitchen space feel less like a factory production line and more like somewhere you could actually hang out and spend some time relaxing.
Salvage Beautiful Fixtures
Many people are looking for ways to make their homes more eco-friendly, thanks to concerns about the environment. One cool way to enhance the greenness of your home is to install what are quaintly called “milk glass” lights. Essentially, these are round, milky white bowls made from salvaged materials that can be hung from lighting fixtures on your ceiling. They fair well with neutral features, like a white apron sink sunk into an acrylic stone surface, but also go well with wood effect. Milk glass lights are relatively cheap too, coming in at less than £70.
Make The Floor Come To Life
Rugs in the kitchen are a big no-no because they will inevitably get covered in crumbs and mess. So when it comes to making the floor come to life, it can be a challenge. The only real way to make a statement on the floor in your kitchen is to use patterned tiles. Don’t just go with regular black and white. Instead, take some inspiration from Tuscan-themed homes and incorporated other patterns into the design, like red. Patterned tiles are especially effective when the rest of your kitchen is relatively neutral.
Make Appliances Moody
White appliances just look like white goods, no matter how beautiful the rest of your kitchen interior might be. In other words, they stick out like a sore thumb, ruining the atmosphere in your kitchen. Of course, there is no escaping white goods in the kitchen, like the cooker or the refrigerator, so what can be done?
One cool idea is to remove all your white goods and replace them with white goods that are black. Samsung, Whirlpool and GE have all now introduced stoves, microwaves and refrigerators that come in black. Yes, they’re slightly more expensive, but if you’ve already spent a fortune getting your kitchen just how you want it, they’re totally worth it. Black slate appliances go particularly well with white worktops.