Kitchens
For a Toronto couple with a love of minimalist Japanese architecture, a sleek, storage-packed kitchen was the first priority in their home's renovation. In the kitchen, white oak used for the cabinets, kitchen island, and dining table is finished with double-boiled linseed oil, which can be reapplied by the homeowners as the wood mellows and patinas. The custom beveled edge for the island's "Blizzard" white Caesarstone countertop forgoes the standard one-inch countertop overhang to save on space and maintain a sleek feel. A Vola faucet is used with a sink by Mekal.
Closet Case
To consolidate most appliances and food storage, keep his compact kitchen looking neat, and save money on cabinets, Sherman built a closet into the kitchen wall (“Cabinets are expensive but closets are cheap,” he offers). Inside is a countertop, blackboard surface, toaster oven, garbage cans, magnetic knife rack, and plenty of shelves. When the doors are closed, the unit recedes from view.
High clerestory windows provide light over the indoor kitchen, with its Gaboon ply cabinets and joinery designed by the architects.
Given the lack of a central power system on the island, Herbst Architects designed the kitchen on the premise that less is more, deliberately keeping appliances to a bare minimum. The fridge and oven run on gas, and a solar energy system supplies limited lighting.
Now rented out as an office/retail space, the downstairs contains a kitchen, which is fitted with Ikea lamps and steel shelving by Azevedo. For the flooring she glued down fiber-cement HardiePanel siding more commonly used for building walls, both because of its resemblance to concrete and its price of one dollar per square foot.
Despite their dark color palette, black and white kitchens can still feel bright. This tiny kitchen perfects the art of chiaroscuro with white shiplapped walls, custom-built open shelves and dark concrete floors. The owners selected sleek faucet fixtures by Santec and a sink by Blanco to complement the white laminate countertops. The stainless steel appliances include a Bertazzoni oven, Fisher & Payel refrigerator, and Thermador dishwasher.
When their house was in need of a pick-me-up, a London couple turned to the designer of their favorite coffee shop for an industrial-strength renovation. A Lebanese cedar island and stainless-steel countertops provide ample work space—and a place to display treasured items, such as the Buono V60 drip kettle by Hario. The island features a Franke sink with a Vola faucet. The oven is by Siemens and white MDF cabinets stow tools.
A green laminate countertop by Abet Laminati is surrounded by Norman Foster’s Emeco 20-06 counter stools at the island in the kitchen, which has an integrated Frigidaire induction range, Faber Cylindra Isola range hood, Blomberg dishwasher, Fisher & Paykel fridge, and flat-grain fir plywood cabinets by Portland craftsman Doug Chamblin.
The clients and design team chose to forego an open floor plan in favor of defined, separated spaces. In this scheme, the vertically oriented spaces act as a cinematic "hard-cut" to their horizontal counterparts. The custom hot rolled steel kitchen, one of these vertical transition spaces, receives light from above through a Velux skylight. A GE Profile Induction cooktop and oven and Miele refrigerator complete the space.
The budget was nearly as tight as the space in this cheerful renovation of a 516-square-foot flat in Bratislava. The centerpiece of Lukáš Kordík’s new kitchen is the cabinetry surrounding the sink, a feat he managed by altering the facing and pulls of an off-the-rack Ikea system. The laminate offers a good punch of blue, and in modernist fashion, Kordík forwent door handles in favor of cutouts. “I wanted the kitchen to be one simple block of color without any additional design,” he says.
In the sleek kitchen, the white Ikea cabinet uppers seem to disappear into the wall, while the bases get a distinctive custom walnut wrapping. Flanking the cabinets are open bookshelves, which provide secondary function as a spacial divider for the children’s play area. A Dornbracht faucet sits on a slab of Vermont Olympian White Danby marble, which is also used for the island and backsplash.


















