How to Lay Out a Kitchen
Where everything goes in a kitchen, and the clearances that decide it before taste gets a vote. A workroom with guests. The triangle still rules; everything else negotiates.
BeforeAfter
- 1
Start from the job, not the furniture
A kitchen is hired for cooking, and cooking is a path: fridge to sink to hob, walked hundreds of times a week. Keep that triangle tight (each leg 1.2–2.7m), keep landing space beside each station, and keep through-traffic out of it, and almost any style succeeds on top. The modern complication is audience — kitchens are now rooms people sit in — which adds a second rule: the cook faces the room somewhere in the plan, or the kitchen’s social ambitions stay theoretical.
- 2
The clearances that are not negotiable
Work triangle legs 1.2–2.7m; total circuit under 8m. Landing zones: 40cm beside the hob, 45cm each side of the sink, 40cm at the fridge’s opening side. Aisles: 110cm for one cook, 120–130cm where two work or an island invites leaning. Counter runs: 90cm of continuous prep surface somewhere, unbroken by hob or sink.
- 3
Place the anchors in order
The pieces that earn their floor in a kitchen: the triangle, drawn before any cabinet is chosen; one continuous prep run; task lighting under every wall unit; a bin location that does not require opening a door mid-prep; somewhere to put a guest that is not in the aisle. Position the first before the second exists — each anchor constrains the next, and reversing the order is how rooms end up designed around their least important piece.
- 4
Then check it against the failure list
The triangle broken by an island, so every pan of boiling water travels around furniture. Zero landing space beside the hob or fridge — the daily juggling act. One central ceiling light, guaranteeing the cook works in their own shadow at every station. Corner cupboards without hardware, archiving cookware by inaccessibility.
Questions
- What matters most in a kitchen?
- A kitchen is hired for cooking, and cooking is a path: fridge to sink to hob, walked hundreds of times a week. Keep that triangle tight (each leg 1.2–2.7m), keep landing space beside each station, and keep through-traffic out of it, and almost any style succeeds on top. The modern complication is audience — kitchens are now rooms people sit in — which adds a second rule: the cook faces the room somewhere in the plan, or the kitchen’s social ambitions stay theoretical.
- Which numbers should I check before buying anything?
- Work triangle legs 1.2–2.7m; total circuit under 8m.
- Can I preview this on my own kitchen?
- Upload a photo in the Studio and run the ideas on the real room. New accounts start with 4 credits and a Standard render costs 4, so the first experiment is free.