Kitchens are not only are the heart of the home, but the heart of home design in recent years. Changes in design over the last five years have made kitchens not only more functional, but more open to the rest of the home. When redesigning a home or building a new home, kitchen design should be the one area that needs to last for years to come. Here are some design trends that are going to stand the test of time for years to come.
- Smart Kitchens: Technology has entered the kitchen in full force and not just in the form of fancy gadgets and appliances. Today, you can have a kitchen with technology integrated into every function and appliance–from the faucets to the fridge to the lighting. This is what we call a smart kitchen. Smart kitchens are an evolving aspect of design. In fact, a lot of kitchens today are built smart from the ground up. For older kitchens, sensors, smart gadgets and other devices can be added to for convenience to the homeowner. Ease add-ons are motion sense-equipped kitchen faucets that can sense the presence of hands underneath and will come on automatically or try a one-touch feature. Refrigerators that can alert you when your groceries items are running low or a coffee maker programmed to have your coffee ready when you wake up. There is also a gadget that monitors your eggs, telling you which ones are almost going bad. Do not forget to update your lighting system–allowing you to control all the lights from your smartphone or tablet.
- Black Fixtures & Faucets: It feels simple, modern, and adds a visual plus, it won’t show wear and tear or water spots as easily as some other finishes which is always a bonus in the kitchen. Our tip for this one would be to make sure to pepper a few other black elements around the room so that it doesn’t feel jarring visually to have a black faucet when everything else is in a different color vibe. The kitchen above has a row of black lower cabinets, whereas the kitchen below has some black pantry cabinets as well as the black stools and light fixture to help balance it out.
- Built-In Sinks: This one might be one of our favorites, and we are calling it “built-in sinks”, which basically translates as having your sink be the exact same material as your countertop creating a seamless transition between the two and keeping the whole area looking very clean visually. We are pretty sure that the above marble sink is not an affordable option but man does it look beautiful in that kitchen.
- Dark Cabinets: White is still a big favorite for kitchen cabinets. Homeowners love it for its clean look, which is especially beneficial in a space that tends to get cluttered. White cabinets are simply beautiful and timeless and can be used in almost any kind of kitchen style. We expect white to remain a popular cabinet color in 2018 and probably for years to come. To break up the all-white kitchen expect to see islands in a variety of different paint colors or wood stain colors. The mixing of finishes create a needed accent piece and additional pops-of-color for the brave of heart.