When I was undertaking my home remodel last year, probably the hardest room to tackle was the kitchen. No other room is even close to as time consuming. The number of decisions I had to make – what flooring, what color tile, how big, etc, etc – was painfully large. Probably the hardest and most influential decision came at the beginning of the process, when I had to come up with a general kitchen layout that would match my “cooking style.” No, ladies & gents, I don’t mean whether I cook with butter or oil or whether I prefer broiling to searing; I mean how I “use” the kitchen.
In order to determine how I “use” the kitchen, I was asked by my Brooklyn kitchen designer to go over a bunch of kitchen designs. I was then told to imagine my making a couple of simple dishes in each kitchen layout from start to finish to determine which involved the fewest steps – not the most intuitive movement. (It was explained to me that what I felt was “intuitive” could be a matter of bad habit, and that I would grow to love the efficiency of reduced steps.)
A number of basic forms had to be considered: galley, U-shaped, Island, and some others. Ultimately, I decided that a kitchen centered on an island would make the most sense for my cooking style and my habit of entertaining since it combines the easy of reach of galley kitchen with the space of a traditional U-shaped cabinet setup. After the leap of faith in my decision about how to shape the kitchen, I then had to move on the “fun part” of picking kitchen counter tops and getting custom kitchen cabinets made. Still, in the end, it was definitely worth it to remodel: I enjoy my place much more, and the investment has paid off almost 2:1 as far as building home equity goes.