Kitchens have always been the hub of the home. A place to congregate and socialise as well as cook and eat. However, in this new post-pandemic era, they have had to become truly multi-purpose as we have found new ways of living and working.
Since the Covid-19 lockdowns of 2020 and 2021, our kitchens have become the place to Zoom family and friends from, host the kitchen discos when we couldn’t go to real ones, and be the place we worked from while the office was closed. We may be on the other side of that necessity, but many things are different now as we embrace hybrid working routines and choose to socialise more at home rather than attend crowded venues.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing; many people are relishing not having to do the commute every day and feel more productive working from home plus we’re all so much more connected with family and friends that live far away since video calling technology entered our daily lives.
Now that these new routines are ingrained in our psyches, kitchen design needs to stay a step ahead and evolve too. As many of us may permanently be working from our kitchens, at least for part of the week, it’s probably not feasible to push aside the fruit bowl or sweep away the breakfast pots every morning to find a corner for the laptop. Nor is it practical to trail cables across the floor or have to use fake backgrounds on business Teams meetings to hide the pile of ironing. If kitchen working is a long term thing, let’s start building it into kitchen design.
After all, if you need to work in your kitchen, your kitchen needs to work for you.
Likewise, if you’ve become partial to a kitchen disco on a Friday evening, let’s create some space, add some appropriate lighting, or create a bar or social area.
This is where ‘off the shelf’ kitchens struggle; they don’t have the flexibility to adapt to new needs. Bespoke design does. By working with a kitchen designer who can have all units, fixtures, and fittings made to measure, you can create the exact space that you need now and long into the future. You can even remodel the space entirely.
That will mean different things for different people. Whether it’s just a space on the table with a decent view behind them and plenty of power points and internet access, or a custom designed office area within the kitchen space, it’s all possible.
If your kitchen is not fit for purpose for the new ways of living and working, get in touch for a free design consultation and see how you can make it work for you.
