Case study part I: How curves in your kitchen can help you relax
When designing a kitchen, ergonomic concepts must be considered to ensure that the space is efficient and user-friendly. Most importantly, the designer should implement how the client will move through and interact with the space in their design.
Ensuring a good view from the cooking area to the rest of the room is important to be able to relax within the kitchen. As a species, we feel much safer when we are effortlessly aware of our surroundings, so keeping harsh visual barriers to a minimum is a simple yet effective way of increasing the efficiency of the space.
It is also important to keep walkways clutter-free to make moving throughout the space as easy as possible. We are usually concentrating on other things - especially whilst cooking - when walking around the kitchen. Reducing potential hazards such as sharp, protruding corners and awkward pinch points between furniture means less concentration is needed on movement.
The best way to ensure both easy sight lines and relaxed movement within the kitchen is to use a combination of concave and convex curves at crucial points within the space. Curved units can still offer a sense of privacy and safety, without creating the hard, angular barrier that a perpendicular unit would. They also create a softer guide to follow when walking throughout the space, and the reduction in sharp edges and corners enables more relaxed movement.
Over the following weeks, we will shed light on how we create our curved pieces, with special focus on a walnut butler’s pantry currently under construction in our workshop. Follow our journey through the design and manufacture of this bespoke piece, and learn about how it will interact with other furniture to create an efficient, elegant and inviting kitchen.
