A high quality kitchen , as far as furniture is concerned, can last in good condition for 20 or 30 years ; having said this, on the other hand, household appliances not only have a decidedly shorter useful life, but , with the passage of time they become “obsolete” and then, although our kitchen is still in excellent condition, it is completely natural that after ten or fifteen years, visually (and sometimes not only, no longer fully satisfies us , because tastes and trends in furnishings now change from year to year, just as lifestyle habits also change .
The desire to renovate the rooms of the house, therefore, is absolutely understandable , especially if we are talking about a room like the kitchen , which is in fact one of the most vital and used spaces within a home , it is an intimate and familiar, the one with which more than any other we associate the idea of ”home”, also by virtue of the scents and memories it arouses in each of us.
If, therefore, you have decided in one way or another, that the time has come to review the layout of your kitchen, read our advice to do it in the best way, because, even if it doesn’t seem like it, but , There are many things to decide and the practical and aesthetic implications are countless, therefore it is best to carefully consider each choice, so as not to regret it, at least for the following 15-20 years!
Furthermore , it is not necessarily the case that to bring a breath of fresh air you need to spend a fortune ; clearly if you want a total revolution you will have to be willing to spend and take on the inconvenience that construction work inside an inhabited house entails, but sometimes by spending reasonable sums you can still obtain the desired result, let’s see how.
FIRST STEP: CARRY OUT A SURVEY AND CONCENTRATE ON STUDYING THE SPACE
When you want to intervene, the very first thing to do is a precise and detailed survey of the environments you want to renovate , so as to be able to show everything graphically. You can also carry out the survey yourself, using a tape measure or, better yet, a “disto”, which is a laser pointer that is used to measure distances; the important thing is to mark precisely and correctly the presence of any windows or doors , with their opening direction, as well as that of niches or protrusions and then it is necessary to record the position in which the gas and water connections are located ,the discharge of the latter and all the so-called “power sockets” , i.e. those power sockets dedicated to the most powerful household appliances, light sockets and light points .
Only by putting all this information together will you be able to understand first of all how you would like to distribute the various elements in the space and then whether this is feasible and at what price. Because if you want to radically change the existing layout, in some cases doing so is quite simple as it is sufficient to make traces on the wall in order to reposition and adapt the systems, while other times it may be essential to also remove the existing flooring to make traces in the screed , certainly a feasible job, but more onerous and time-consuming.
Be careful then, because often today, unlike what happened in the past, when we talk about the kitchen we are referring not to a closed and separate environment, but rather to a portion of space open onto the living room, the so-called kitchenette and this can also cause some more problems because you also have to deal with functions and furnishings that go beyond the actual kitchen.
SECOND STEP: UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH YOU CAN SPEND AND TO WHAT EXTENT YOU WANT TO INTERVENE
Once you are aware of what could theoretically be achieved in the spaces you have available, the time comes to face the reality of the facts and establish a budget to dedicate to the kitchen renovation : only in this way will you be able to understand in what way and in what way. measure you should intervene. There is no point in deluding yourself into buying a new kitchen with a central island if you have a few thousand euros available, in this case it will be better to look for a compromise, so that the final result comes as close as possible to the desired one.
If we don’t have any particular problems, the simplest solution is obviously to change everything : scrap the old kitchen and replace it with a new one complete with latest generation appliances, perhaps also laying new floors and new wall coverings. So let’s see how to do it in these cases, but then let’s also try to understand what can be done as an alternative, if you want to limit expenses.
THIRD STEP: THE OPTIMAL DISTRIBUTION
If you have opted for a radical change, unless you also decide to intervene by redoing everything from scratch (including systems, walls and floors), the time has come to find the ideal conformation for your new kitchen and to do so you will have to take the space into account you have, its shape, its height, the openings present, the positions and number of existing connections and sockets.
In many cases we opt for the classic in-line solutions , i.e. those that develop on a single wall, which are not very invasive and for this reason lend themselves perfectly both to being inserted in rectangular-plan rooms and inside living rooms, but in reality there are many possibilities and we should not exclude any of them a priori.
