Majjie's Blog

I went to a Kitchen Conference recently, organised by the trade magazine KBB Review. I've written about it already over at Majjie's Kitchen Corner in How has the Recession Affected Kitchen Sales and Why Do You Need a New Kitchen. One of the most interesting talks was given by Gus Desbarats of The Alloy, an industrial design company. He was discussing modern product design. If new kitchens need to be bought on their own account, rather than just as an investment for your property (see link above to why you need a new kitchen), then how should they be designed to work better and appeal to their owners more?

Perhaps innovative design for kitchens should come from
the designers and not just the manufacturers

Modern product design is apparently quite an involved process, encompassing software and services, purpose and meaning, not just the product and it's shape, colour and finish. The starting point is always the consumer. Designers need to know their customers better than they know themselves, to have genuine empathy with them and to be obsessive about detail. So, how does that apply to kitchens? Well Gus described six "megatrends" that will be affecting prospective purchasers of kitchens:

1. Time Poor Mums

Mums are more likely to work than ever before, dads are more likely to get involved in cooking and neither want to spend hours in food preparation or cooking - at least during the working week. Gus suggested that two microwaves, or a double cavity microwave might be a useful product for these consumers. Their kitchens need to be super efficient - not just easy to use but ultra simple. How many people, for instance, struggle to re-set the electronic clock on their cookers, after a power cut ... Gus does!

2. The New Old

The UK population is becoming older and more demanding. The baby boomers are hitting retirement age and they're not about to accept the sort of kitchens that their mothers coped with. As age takes it's toll on some of them, their kitchens may need modification - but they certainly don't want kitchens that look different. Design needs to provide for these stroppy, grumpy old consumers and make the kitchens easier for them to use.

3. Stuff Overload

New houses and apartments are often very small - with tiny kitchens - but we all have more possessions and gadgets - especially in the kitchen - so clever storage is becoming more and more important.

4. Risk Aversion

I'm not sure we should be pandering to this one - but perhaps that's just me becoming old and grumpy! Consumers are becoming very aware of hygiene and want easy to clean surfaces and antibacterial materials. Safety and risk reduction are big concerns.

5. Actionable Sustainability

Consumers do care about the environment and they also want to save on energy costs, so having energy saving appliances and sustainable materials/processes in the kitchen provides a win:win situation ... saving the planet and reducing running costs

6. Hunger for the Natural

Natural materials and, in particular, natural foods without additives are increasing in popularity. People prefer food with lower sugar and salt levels and without perceived man-made risk (like artifical fertilisers or genetic modification). That means better storage for fresh food and produce in the kitchen and also a desire for craftsmanship in the kitchen itself; hand-made, solid timber kitchens for example.

A handcrafted, solid oak kitchen could appeal to those with a hunger for natural materials

I'm entirely in agreement with Gus when it comes to designing a kitchen ... it needs to be designed specifically for it's owners and users (without, of course, making it unsellable in the future, for a different owner).

Appliance manufacturers already seem to be taking some of these trends into account. I wrote recently about going to a demonstration of cooking with a V-Zug combi-steam oven. You can't get much more user friendly than one of those - with it's Soft-roast programme (you tell the oven when you want the food to be ready and it does the rest) and the BakOMatic programme, which will automatically cook 14 different types of food, to your specific level of browning - and tells you when it will be ready. Gorenje - at the more affordabe end of the market - also introduced their Simplicity range this year with a single control knob ... and CDA brought out their SV310 Sensor Touch single oven, with a touch control screen where you can simply touch the icon of the food you want to cook – and the oven will do the rest.

Gorenje's Simplicity range of appliances are operated by a single knob

Appliance manufacturers realise that innovation can drive sales (just consider the big sales successes of the past year - the Kindle and internet books - and the i-Pad). You might consider swapping your built-in oven for a more sophisticated model, or buying a new fridge-freezer with an ice dispenser, even if you're not going to change the whole kitchen. Kitchen unit manufacturers, on the other hand, don't seem to be so good at innovation. They go for "me too" products ... like the now ubiquitous curved end unit and ranges of paint colours ... they mostly just tinker with colours and finishes. It's perhaps more difficult to come up with anything innovative for units ... it's down to us designers to come up with innovative designs for each individual room. To do that, though, we need more flexibility in unit sizes and types.

My demand from kitchen manufacturers then, is more versatility in sizes ... but what's yours? Is there anything you'd like to see available for your next new kitchen?