Designing a Great Kitchen

I have always had a love of creating and designing kitchens.  Long before it became big business, my clients and I would tackle the project using a variety of sources, from cabinet maker to hardware suppliers.  It's a lot easier now with one stop shopping and sources that can all be found in one place.  The end result, however, is always the same when the approach is right.  Keep it simple (heard that from me before?) .......make sure function comes first, and design with a style that you love in a way that your planning will pay off year after year.

Design projects for me should always be the same.  They should all look like they gently floated down from heaven and landed in the right spot.  But getting there requires a bit of planning.  As Katie Couric has said "it takes a lot of effort to make it look effortless"....and the same is true for any design project.  The planning stages are all about assembling your options and then removing most of them so that the finished project has just what one needs, is built on selectons that you love, and has an enduring sense of taste and style supported by the working function of its purpose. 

Recently, I finished a project in Charleston, SC, small, simple and rich in style.  When I sent it to a prospective client who has been agonizing over her kitchen re-do for quite some time I was delighted to hear this back from her .........

Here are a few pictures of that project.

A PERFECT MATCH.......NO, NOT FOR ME.....

Since finding myself temporarily in the great state of Florida and returning to a retail store, the ever constant M word (MATCH) gives me pause.  When it comes to design, I threw that word out and buried it ages ago (maybe as early as my first year as a professional designer, in 1975).  Not only is this a no win scenario - that perfect match is sure to create an interior that looks right out of a furniture store.  Since, in my view, the best interiors are always the ones that are as Billy Baldwin said, "above all else .....personal (sic)".........one can only imagine how discordant this needle in a hay stack search is to me.

Madison Avenue may support the package deal with everything a perfect match, but as a designer, I do not.  I continue to say there is no genius in perfection, and a perfect match is one of the best examples.

Here's my best advice to those who fear anything less than that perfect match; choose what you love.  Let that be your first priority - let your close second be how what you love fits with what you have or where you are going.  Using this formula, I have always found that things have a way of fitting beautifully together - with the elements of personal taste, appropriateness and the desire to achieve an interior with that great triumverate of comfort, function and aesthetic.

Above:  A favorite project for the Symphony ASID Showhouse in Charlotte, North Carolina.  Alexander Julian, celebrity guest for the show, wanted to purchase the carved pine pedestal, sadly, sold the day before.