Majjie's Blog

Do you want to know how to decide on your kitchen layout? Forget those work triangles you've been told about ... and ignore all those kitchen design guides you've seen that tell you your kitchen should be a galley shape, or an L-shape, or a U-shape. Some kitchens are best laid out in those shapes but many more are not ... especially in older and larger UK kitchens, which have often been extended a few times. It's no wonder that many kitchen designs are so un-inspiring, when so many websites and glossy magazines insist on introducing the subject as if they were talking to the kindergarten.

I stole this example from a Google search. I won't say where from, partly because it was a rubbish site and I don't want to embarass them (I don't think it was UK based - we normally call a parallel design a "galley" kitchen) and partly because they might be fine at making/fitting kitchens. Don't pay any attention to kitchen layout diagrams like these:

This is a particularly bad example, because they've used the same shape room for all of the layouts. I think they should have left out the bottom wall in that last picture!

The first thing to do ... is draw out a room plan, to scale. You can do it yourself on graph paper (or you can buy squared paper which is better), or you can use building plans, or you can use one of the free CAD programmes available on-line (but a lot of those are very limited and will only let you use a room shape from Noddy Land). What you need is an accurate outline of the room showing all the windows and doors - plus any other fixed features like alcoves, pillars and the like.

Something like this:

Then - on your scale plan - draw in blocks 600mm deep, wherever you could have units along the walls. It doesn't matter, to start with, whether it's worktop or tall units - they're all 600mm deep. If you know you want a table then you can show that too.

Then draw in some distance lines. For areas where you know your sink and hob might go - draw in 900mm lines (for working areas) ... for a thoroughfare through the kitchen - use 1200mm. That will show you how much space there is in the centre of the room - for an island (or a table).

Here's my example from above. Doors in a corner are always difficult. I can't use all of wall A because I need to leave a big enough diagonal gap between the units on that wall and those on wall L. Because it's only at that diagonal, though, that the units come so close together ... I've reduced my 1200mm thoroughfare requirement to 1000mm (just for that diagonal gap):

This trial layout immediately shows me that there isn't enough room for an island in this kitchen. The potential space in the centre is too small (only 200mm) - even if I leave out block 4 of my units, it would only give me 300mm of island depth, if I allowed a 1200mm thoroughfare from wall C. It's possible sometimes to reduce the ideal widths for walkways through the kitchen - and to leave out units along one wall, in order to squeeze an island in - but, in this case, it just wouldn't work. There isn't very much room for a table either, by the time I've allowed for the main thoroughfares in the kitchen ... so I've put in a round one. Round tables are good for using corner spaces (like the corner between walls F and G) which might otherwise remain unused - and can also be placed closer to a wall, if the chairs are set at an angle to the wall.

If an island is out of the question, the next thing to do, is to consider peninsular areas. These can be either 665 (approx) or 900mm deep (front to back), if you're using laminate worktops ... or any size you like, for bespoke worktops (from solid surfaces to granite). It's not often worth making them any more than 1200mm deep, though - since that's two base units (of standard depth) back to back.

In my plan, I looked at using 900mm peninsular areas:

Try to keep any peninsulas to the end of your working areas - you don't want to be walking round them all the time. The idea, of course, is to use as much of the space as possible without making the room seem cramped and without diverting the flow of people walking through the room, too much, from the path they'd naturally take.

The main thoroughfare in this room is diagonally across - with a secondary route out through the patio doors. This fits in well with my two peninsulas - except that I've constricted the thoroughfare in the centre of the room to 939mm. This again breaks my own rule of leaving 1200mm ... but once again, the restriction is only at that very small area, where the two peninsulas approach each other diagonally. It isn't going to look cramped because there's plenty of space around them. It might be a pinch point at parties - when the room is full of people - but for normal family life it would be fine.

So that's how I come up with a layout for a kitchen. It bears no resemblance to the - kitchen layouts for simpletons - at the top of the page. It's based on the actual room in question, with all it's quirks and odd shapes (if it has any) and on how people will use the room. You need to know where any doors lead to - in order to know where the thoroughfares are likely to be.

Of course the layout will get tweaked as you go along, as you decide which actual units to use (and because some appliances, these days are deeper than 600mm), but ... whatever you do ... don't start with an over-simplified, geometrical (or alphabetical) shape, which bears no relationship to the room where your kitchen is going!