This is Day 219 of the Slow Home Project and we need you to join us in our quest to evaluate the design quality of houses in nine North American cities in nine months.
Today is Thursday, August 26, 2010 and we are doing an “In Detail” review of kitchen design in townhouses. All of the examples we are using today are from the Chicago area.
Townhouses tend to be long and narrow in plan, and as such the placement of the kitchen is a really critical design decision. As we have seen in many of the cities in the Slow Home Project, in townhouses, problems can arise when the kitchen is either too big, cut off from other living spaces or in the way of of the a major circulation route.
We need you to look through the floor plans from the Chicago area and find examples of both good and bad kitchen designs, post them to the site and leave us a comment. We look forward to the discussion!
When you are ready, you can watch John and Matthew’s tutorial on kitchen design in townhouses by clicking on the player below.
To see the examples from today’s tutorial in more detail, click on the links below.
1. This is a well designed “L” shaped town house kitchen. It is backed into the corner and has a good relationship to the other principal spaces.
2. This is a good example of a galley kitchen. There is about 3 foot six inches between the counters and the appliance triangle is nice and compact. It would be even better if the pass through was an eating bar with stools.
3. This is a good peninsula kitchen. The kitchen is well laid out, but it is too bad the adjacent guest bathroom opens directly into the kitchen.
4. This is a badly designed “L” shaped kitchen with an island that is oriented the in the wrong direction. There is really not enough room for a table and the guest bathroom is immediately adjacent to the kitchen.
5. This is poorly designed “U” shaped kitchen with too much floor space and a view from the dining table directly into the kitchen work triangle.
6. This is really bad kitchen design with a 45 degree angled counter that wastes space and pinches the sink, a poorly placed island and a fridge location that is too far from the other appliances.
7. This “L” shaped kitchen has no place for a breakfast table – even though the plan indicates that it would fit – and the guest bath and laundry – which is too large – are right in the kitchen space itself.
8. This kitchen is poorly located in plan and the work area is in the middle of all the circulation for the house.
9. This kitchen floor plan again states that there is room for a “breakfast” area, but the space is really too small. Notice that the counter on one side is only twelve inches deep but needs to be 24 inches minimum to be functional.
Make sure you join us tomorrow for our review of the Design Projects from Wednesday, our vote for who you think should win the Slow Home Award for Best Townhouse Design in Chicago and the winner of Slow Homer of the Week!
