The Cabinets Glen Waverley is the workshop of the homemaker. In the average household, she spends the equivalent of 3 full months a year – 24 hours a day around the clock – in preparing, cooking and serving food, baking cakes and pies, and washing pots and pans.
Modernizing a kitchen to make it more enjoyable to work in, to add extra conveniences and time-savers is the ideal of every homemaker. The kitchen is a room that calls for a large outlay of money, but once it is wisely built, you’ll be happy you made the investment.
Until a few years ago, modernizing a kitchen meant purchasing a new refrigerator, range, a combination sink and painting the kitchen in a bright, shiny white. We have come a long way in only a few years. The most striking aspect of the contemporary kitchen is its color. White has been displaced by more sophisticated colors. Counter space has been increased. Storage has been engineered to provide maximum use of all available space. Everything is within easy reach. Today’s kitchen blends into the home. It is not a room apart, but a part of the home’s living area.
Appliances in the kitchen have gone contemporary! Everything has been redesigned to make life-in-the-kitchen easier and more efficient. Exhaust fans under colorful hoods over the kitchen range remove the grime and dirt as well as unpleasant smoke and cooking odors. In the more modern kitchen, the old range-oven combination has been dis-placed by counter-top ranges and built-in ovens. Automatic devices practically make the kitchen run itself.
The refrigerator has a new companion in the kitchen. While combination refrigerator-freezers are very popular, many homemakers prefer having an upright freezer in addition to the refrigerator in the kitchen. The white look is passing on. Appliances in attractive colors are gaining in popularity. Models have been introduced where fabric can be added over the appliance door, so that the refrigerator can match the kitchen curtains.
Built-in Kitchen Closet
The traditional kitchen has many base and wall cabinets; after the refrigerator, sink and range have been set into place, there is practically no unbroken wall area left. Here is an unusual treatment of a kitchen. This “all-in-one” kitchen closet is one of the best ways of storing kitchen utensils, groceries and cleaning equipment. When it’s time to prepare a meal, the doors are opened and everything needed is within easy reach. After the meal, the doors are closed and one end of the room becomes a delightful picture wall. The colorfully decorated doors add a pleasant note to the kitchen area, far different from the pantry entrance found in many older homes.
If you are artistically inclined, you can paint your own attractive door. However, if you feel out of place in a painter’s smock, you can buy attractive murals in the form of wallpaper and apply these to the door. You can also buy murals in outline form, glue them to the doors, and then paint them yourself following the instructions.
This pantry wall is designed for greatest efficiency. Notice the effective use of hooks to hang utensils and pans. Note, too, the way the lids are stored in the lower part of the door on the right. These are ideas you can borrow and put to use in your existing kitchen.
Even if you don’t have space inside of a wall, you can add a wall storage unit to your existing wall. Two doors, made of %” plywood with 1×6 or 1×8 “frame” pieces, can be hinged to a wall. Shelves, perforated hardboard and other kitchen convenience racks can be combined to provide ample additional storage. If you cannot use the entire wall, use only part.
