In your mind’s eye you can see your dream kitchen, a welcoming space for family and friends to gather around your farmhouse table, or perhaps your contemporary-style island full of clever design features. In reality, however, what you have might more accurately be described as “compact” or, if you’re feeling particularly generous, “compact and bijou”. So how do you make the most of your small kitchen?
The final frontier
The primary object is to create an illusion of space, and there are two fundamental aspects to this: first reduce the clutter, then use light and colour to do the rest of your work for you. Search online for storage hacks – you’ll be spoilt for choice and there are some great ones out there. Be wary, though, of anything that makes your walls or worktops look cluttered. Clean lines are key to making a small room appear larger, so your aim should be to store as much as possible out of sight. This will almost certainly involve getting right to the back of the cupboards and disposing of anything you no longer need in order to make space for the things you do.
The colour of your money
Refurbished kitchens don’t have to involve a full refit, and without altering the basic structure of your units you can still give them a completely new look by replacing the doors and drawer fronts. More than anything else, installing light-coloured doors will help to create an airy atmosphere even in a small kitchen. Consider also refreshing your worktops with a light and fresh colour tone. Needless to say, replacing just these elements is also much more cost effective than fitting entirely new units.
The light fantastic
Make the most of whatever natural light source you have. If it’s a window, be careful not to have anything that blocks the light: a roller blind and a clean white windowsill will serve you much better than curtains and clutter. A useful trick, where possible, is to hang a mirror opposite the window. If that’s not an option for you, give careful thought to the walls: you need a colour scheme that will reflect as much light as possible. Use a pale base colour and introduce a few strategic splashes of brightness – if you can combine these with something useful like a storage solution or a kitchen appliance then so much the better.
When it comes to making the most of a small space, less is definitely more. Applying these simple changes will make a real difference to your kitchen, and you may be pleasantly surprised by how much change you can bring to what you previously thought of as a cramped and inflexible space.
