The L-Shaped Kitchen

The L-shaped kitchen enables you to have an uninterrupted work triangle for quick, easy movement between the three vital elements of every kitchen: the fridge, cooker/oven and sink. You have to strike a balance between very little space (which will make your kitchen feel cramped) and too much space, causing a lot of unnecessary mileage around the room.

The L-shaped kitchen is so called because it consists of a vertical and a horizontal line of cupboards and appliances ranged on two adjacent walls of a room joined in one corner to form an imaginary ‘L. The L-shaped kitchen is ideal for practically any shape of room except very narrow rooms (that are more of a corridor than anything else) and rooms with lots of doors all around.

This is the sort of kitchen that could be situated at the end of an open plan layout or placed in an awkward corner of a large room. In most cases, you would incorporate an eating area within the room itself – even if it is just a breakfast bar – and this enhances the social element of the L-shaped kitchen, With the longer, L-shaped kitchen two people can ‘work’ at the same time with the person who is cooking joining in the general conversation (chatting together in the process). This is a practical, space-saving layout with long, uninterrupted working surfaces ideal for cooking. If one side is longer than the other, use the extremities for a broom cupboard/pantry and/or for storing less frequently used utensils. Alternatively, you could start with one of the appliances, like the fridge/freezer.

Try to ‘stage’ the drop between the extremities, with the tallest cupboards on the outside, then a tall top cupboard that rests on your work top but still leaves a little space, and then the rest of the cupboards. Ultimately, you retain plenty of flexibility to change the basic layout to your taste and convenience.

Keep in mind the various elements I mentioned in the checklist in one of our previous blogs, including the number of people in the household, the type of meals that are cooked, storage needs, the type of items stored (daily shopping or weekly/monthly?) and the types of utensils and appliances you opt for.