Photo by Freshome
By Olivia Reynolds
When it comes to redesigning your kitchen, you have to realize that you’re not only making over the nucleus of your household, you’re also raising the resale value of your home. When you think about it, most of your social occasions all revolve around the kitchen—from dining with the family to dinner parties and even breakfast with your spouse every morning. Oftentimes, kitchens are the only place we can actually spend some time together with our busy schedules.
So, whether you’re looking for a slight redesign with some new kitchenware and gadgets or a full-on remodeling, take these five tips into consideration—they could help you save some money while improving the most social of rooms in your home.
1. An interactive kitchen is more exciting and engaging. The memories that you make in the kitchen will revolve around its functionality, so make the room as engaging as possible. Accomplish this by adding utensils and appliances that make people want to get involved with cooking. For instance, adding a pasta roller or a sous chef board can make adults and children alike want to get in on the process.
Think about the space and how the flow of the kitchen is conducive to company. If you only have a prep area big enough for one person, only one person is going to be in the kitchen. Try to think about a kitchen island on wheels or other mobile options that open the space up in every instance—from cooking with the kids to throwing a pre-game cooking party.
2. Fill your space with necessities, not flamboyances. A lot of people think that they need to have a full set of knives, pots, pans and kitchen appliances to have a great kitchen. In actuality, you can minimize your cookware and just use a simple stockpot, a ten or twelve inch frying pan and a few saucepans and baking dishes are all most people need. The same goes with knives: a few different sized chef knives, tough scissors, a paring knife and minimal specialty knives pretty much give you a full run of the menu.
What you want to do instead is focus on quality, not quantity. This will free up a lot of extra space around your kitchen that you can use for other things such as nifty appliances and other design-orientated pieces. Of course, the space is really up to you to do with what you choose, but the important thing is to have the space to use in the first place.
3. Watch cooking shows and television kitchens. While it isn’t always practical to have three ovens in your kitchen, use the more pragmatic elements of kitchens on television. Pro chefs have their kitchens set up the way they do for a reason—it works. Pay attention to the easy-clean surfaces, stainless steel appliances and open shelf options. This makes cooking a lot more practical and cleanup a snap.
The simple fact of the matter is that the better you feel in the kitchen, the more time you’ll spend in there cooking. Take some hints and pointers from friend’s kitchens whose cooking you admire. Don’t be shy when you’re going out to your favorite restaurant either—ask if you can just pop in and take a quick peek. Let them know how much you love their food and you want to see how the chef works—they’ll be flattered.
4. Make your budget work for you. Thinking outside of the box can be a great way to save money on your kitchen redesigning project. Get creative and involve the whole family—make a scavenger hunt around the town. Try to get items like a colorful vase that matches the backsplash to hold your spatulas and grilling forks. Think about practical solutions such as placemats near the sink—a little color matching can make a kitchen look completely new for just a few bucks.
5. Redesign your design concept. When you think of kitchen redesigning, you probably think about knocking down walls and installing new sinks and tiling—it doesn’t always have to be like that. Redesign the actual concept of your design and you can find yourself making smaller, personal touches that make the kitchen your favorite room in the house.
For more kitchen redesign tips including where to find the best prices on contractors, click here right now.
Image courtesy of freshome.com
About the Author
This guest post is written by Olivia Reynolds working for Top Tradespeople, UK, one of the most sought after websites for finding kitchen fitters quotes. If you’re on the lookout for loft conversion tradespeople but want to check tradesman reviews on loft conversions as well as loft conversions quotes, do visit their site today for more info.
