Kitchen lessons - specifically for small kitchens!

[WhereToPutTheLaundry]

I would like to redo my kitchen this year, and I've read a few of the threads of lessons learned/things loved etc and I keep thinking 'lovely but I don't have space' as I'm reading them.

My kitchen is 3.8x2.4m. I am intending to have two straight runs opposite each other with nothing at the far end so no corner cupboards. I have a full height fridge which must go in one corner but the placement of windows/doors/boiler mean I can't get in any more full height units without making it feel oppressive.

So - does anyone have any small-kitchen tips, tricks, loves, lessons they'd care to share?

Another vote for the ikea units with drawers aplenty. I halved the number of units in our kitchen by swapping to ikea units, and just put shelves on the wall to give an airier feel.

Was it tricky to manage the services behind the ikea units? That's what makes me nervous about it

Yes - our joiner moaned a lot as we have an old terraced house and the walls are all wonky. I would probably use an ikea approved kitchen fitter next time.

Have a look around Pinterest for kitchen space ideas.

I second the suggestion of drawers for storage instead of cupboards. Deep drawers are great for pots and pans and plastic containers. There are also cabinets with pull-out shelves which are very handy for pot storage.

There are ways to maximise space under your sink - creating useful space instead of the usual dark cupboard of doom and the fake cabinet fronts you often find.

For us, no. We had a full kitchen trfit, so no issues with services. My husband is a brilliant hoiner though, so he can happily work around stuff. I think some kitchen fitters are not joiners, do won't like to futban ikea kitchen, and many get reduced prices from places like Howden, which they don't always pass on. There must be 100s of thousands of ikea kitchens fit in the UK, so I wouldn't overly worry.

Keep your dishwasher beside your sink.

Do not have your hob close to the sink (water/ electricity issues).

It's fine to have the hob and sink on different sides.

If you have to have hob and sink on the same side, make sure you leave a minimum 300 mm and preferable more space between edge of sink and edge of hob. You need room for pot handles and also to avoid possibility of water affecting the wiring if there's a leak, and hob surface if water overflows or gets splashed.

Oh yes - water and electric probably a bigger potential issue that moving boiling water, which I have done for years without accident. Good point.

Yes - I do keep thinking that ikea sell loads of kitchen in the Uk so they must work despite the naysayers all over the internet 😆

Does a kitchen fitter do everything, or do you need a separate plumber and electrician? I'm assuming the latter?

I got an IKEA kitchen and it got pretty shabby after about 5 years, one of the cupboard doors has gone a different shade of cream (not near heat source or direct sunlight) and surface breaking down on cupboard sides near the hob. The carcasses were fine.

DIY Kitchens - price and quality are excellent.
They have an on-line planner, make sure you toggle the price display at the top to include VAT(!).

Plan where you will have the bins, be they integrated or free standing - they are often forgotten!

Think of everything you have (and want to keep) and plan where they will stored - from cutlery, to cling film, chopping boards, radio, oils & spices, dried good, food mixer etc

I agree with PPs who recommend drawers over cupboards

And plug sockets - usually more than you think.

Yeah I can't fault DIY Kitchens either. Good value, transparent pricing so you can compare cost of drawer versus pull out versus ordinary cupboard easily.

For me it was the range of sizing that made the difference. When you have a small space and a lot of fixed sized items to get in like oven or fridge the others need to be as flexible as possible.

Mine is 3.9 x 2.7 with 3 door openings. We’re having one wall with floor to ceiling including double oven, fridge and a corner walk in larder opposite will be sink, dishwasher, bin unit and at the short end the hob with pan drawers. No wall units.

The kitchen fitter should either be able to do plumbing and electric too or have people they can call in to do those.

Also. I would think about what things you can move out of the kitchen? Can the washer go in a cupboard somewhere? Can the crockery live in a dining room ? Is there somewhere nearby where a long term kitchen storage cupboard would be practical?

We've recently had our small kitchen done. Things that have worked really well for us are:

• having all of the full-length units, and the couple of wall units, go right up to the ceiling. That's given loads of extra space for things that maybe don't get used so often but are still needed
• as many deep-pan drawers as we could fit in - an absolute game-changer in terms of being able to easily find things.
• secret, shallow drawers inside the tops of the upper pan drawers. These have taken all of our cutlery, utensils and so on so helped reduce how much stuff we need to have out on worktops
• having a built in bin/recycling bin. This fits under the draining board so uses a bit of that lost under-sink space. If we hadn't have done this, we'd have had to lose a unit somewhere to have space for a freestanding bin
• having a tall larder unit with some pull-out drawers. It stores so much and the drawers again make it so much easier to find things.

I was able to go to the designer with a really clear list of what I wanted/needed so his job was just to work out how to fit it in the space. I'd never have been able to do that without all I'd learned from MN!

secret, shallow drawers inside the tops of the upper pan drawers. These have taken all of our cutlery, utensils and so on so helped reduce how much stuff we need to have out on worktops

Although they don’t need to be secret drawers - they can just be a separate shallow cutlery drawer and 2 pan drawers.
I find having to open one drawer just to access a second a pain.

I have a slightly smaller kitchen than yours (3.6 * 2.2), and whilst the advice for drawers is good be very careful about the placement and width of the drawers, especially if you go with a galley type kitchen - whoever designed our kitchen decided to put massively wide drawers right in the middle of the run and it's so inconvenient as soon as there's one other person sharing the space as it blocks their path and due to placement of hob and sink they're often hovering in front of it.

I'd also advocate for at least one tall and deep storage unit - my previous kitchen was even smaller than this one, and our most useful storage was basically 5 deep shelves in the furthermost corner. Not in anyone's way, fit all of our plates, pans, dishes etc, with room to spare. In that kitchen we barely needed cupboards! Whereas our current kitchen is full of cupboards and drawers and frustrates me to no end!

My other advice is that not everything has to be fitted - allow yourself some flexibility in your space, and get some non fitted furniture so you can adapt as you need to. I've seen so many kitchens with just pointless wrong-sized units in them where the space could've been better utilised just because someone felt they should have wall to wall units.

Lastly, prioritise a dedicated space for chopping/preparing your food. It's such a pain to wander around the kitchen with a chopping board full of veg falling off, or to have to clear counter space just to start cooking.

Good luck and let us know how you get on!

Drawers rather than cupboards where possible.
Bins - very important!
I didn't think I generated much and got mini ones built in, bloody emptying the thing constantly and end up using a carrier hooked on the door half the time!

I forgot to plan in a bin in my kitchen 😔

However it turns out, I didn't really need one. I have a food recycling bin on the worktop. Then I already had a recycling box in the hallway. Add a plastic bag to collect plastics which I take to recycling in Tesco.

We don't produce much more rubbish than that. The 'bin' is a breadbag on a hook and we only fill one a week.

Some fantastic advice on this thread already! YYY to kitchen units that go all the way to the ceiling, plinth drawers, drawers rather than cupboards, and a pull out larder (no matter how skinny)- they'll make a massive difference to how much you can store and how you'll use the space. Just to add, pay careful attention to the style and colours you use in a small kitchen to keep it from feeling oppressive. I think mirrored splashbacks can work really well in small kitchens to bounce the light around. Also going for a clean look with a handleless design can help stop things from looking too cluttered- if you go for a soft blue or green with a wooden worktop it'll stop things looking too stark (unless that's your taste of course!). I've added some pictures which are obviously much bigger kitchens but it'll give you an idea!