Majjie's Blog

A few people seem to have been asking, recently, about how to design a kitchen around a low window cill (or is it sill?).

A lot of flats converted from older houses have very tall sash windows ... which start below worktop height ... and you can get the same problem with barn conversions, and extensions onto older properties, where the roof height is restricted or where the window needs to line up with an existing one.

The best way of dealing with a very low window is to design around it. Put in a window seat (a single pan drawer with worktop over it), or just lower the cabinet height sufficiently so that the worktop comes below the window.

Here's a tiny kitchen, fitted under the mansard roof of a tall converted house in Islington ... where I designed a window seat to fit under the window. This seating is quite high, because it substitutes for stools on one side of the breakfast bar:



Here's another picture, in a more traditional kitchen, where the seat is at chair height for a table ... and worktop has been used for the window cill too. In this case, the cill isn't low - the window seat was requested so that it could seat more than two; in a space which would only take two chairs. You can see how it would be useful for a low window, though:



Of course, it isn't always possible to have a lower area, if the kitchen is small and you need full height worktop. Sometimes you have to take the units and worktop straight across the front of the window. If you do that, then it's best to have a small upstand along the back of the worktop, to stop things falling off into the well of the window at the back. I also think it's a good idea, if possible, to have a little "window box" made to fit into the well which can be lifted out for cleaning. If you just leave the boxed off window cill, it can be a nightmare to keep clean (even without bits falling off the worktop).

If the window is only slightly lower than the worktops - preferably at the same level as the base units, then the answer is to run the worktops into the window rebate. This method is often used on barn conversions with low windows and it can look really smart:



You need to check that the window can open and that the frame of the window is deep enough, for the depth of granite (usually 30mm)... without looking as if the window's sunk into the worktop. Usually it looks fine (you'd normally tile into the window recess too ... but my CAD system can't cope with that). It's a very easy arrangement to keep clean too.