The Move from Sofas to Stovetops

”Kitchen. Noun – A gathering place for friends and family. A place where memories are homemade and seasoned with love.”

At the moment I am renovating my kitchen so this once humble room of the house  has been on my mind for awhile as I ponder on various kitchen designs and appliance choices. Ever since I owned my first home in South Africa a quarter century ago, and then relocated to subsequent new homes in New Zealand and Australia , I have had the pleasurable task of designing new kitchens many times. Although I have used both kitchen companies as well as DIY flat pack kitchen solutions, I actively participate in the design and construction of the kitchen because of my interest in design and my creative side. It is both interesting and amazing to see how this engine room of every house has evolved through the ages. Guests from the bygone days who were once comfortably ensconced in the lounge on the sofas have steadily made their way around the island bench of the stovetops. 

It’s been a mighty long journey from the early days when the kitchen was relegated to the back of the house and was regarded as purely utilitarian for preparing food and just barely large enough to fit the woman of the house and the big, sooty stove. With the movement of nuclear middle-class families into suburban homes, the kitchen edged closer to the living areas for more convenience and flexibility. 

Remember the popular Brady Bunch television kitchen of the seventies that we all thought were so high end: the bright, orange laminate counter tops with avocado green and brown cabinetry? If my memory serves me correct, all our childhood homes in the seventies in Chatsworth, South Africa, looked as if we were a part of one big franchise operation with the mottled, uniform , store-bought, panlyte kitchen sets in almost every home I visited. Remember the one with the kitchen dresser, the sink cupboard and the table and four chairs? I swear that not one of those clocks that was propped in the centre front facade of those dressers worked. We had the pinkish- reddish colour one while one of my neighbours had the greenish one and yet another had a sort of turquoise one (which to me was the coolest then). No wonder we thought that the Brady Bunch kitchen was to die for!

In the eighties, in keeping with the design principles of that decade, everything got bigger like the kitchen layouts and the appliances. Breakfast nooks were added and the kitchens started encroaching into the living areas. With most mothers working by this time, the open feel of the kitchen connected us to mum while she prepared the food as we watched TV. The busy, wall-papered floral flashbacks and walls of the seventies gave way to ceramic tiles and the lighter coloured cabinetry in warm beiges, oatmeal and off-whites became more favoured with timber trims. 

As the nineties approached, the kitchen was officially crowned the throne of the home as fancy, restaurant type cooktops and sleek, granite counters became the order of the day for gourmet cooking. Stainless steel appliances became the rage and in an effort to soften the cold, clinical look, cabinetry took on the earthy tones of oak, beech and  maple. With the open plan living area, the kitchen enjoyed equal importance as the hitherto TV lounge and dining room. Culturally, this was a significant change as this democratisation of the home no more confined the woman slaving or slogging over a hot stove. Cooking saw a metamorphosis from a tedious chore to a fine art as  more men discovered that their manhood was not compromised when they donned an apron. 

In the 2000’s the kitchen was part of the whole living area and therefore blended seamlessly with the lounge and dining room decor. Modern lighting pendants, fancy range hoods and multiple, industrial ovens built in towers made the kitchen the selling point of the home. A new house on the market was practically sold if the dominant buying partner of the house-hunting couple(the woman, duh!) fell in love with the kitchen storage solutions like the triple undercover bins, the pull-out pantry drawers, the humongous pot drawers with easy, soft close sliding functions, special, separate compartments for the pot lids and spacious cutlery drawers with concealed inner recesses that made the most economical use of space. Tuscan influenced colour schemes with warm tones in tan, browns, maroons and reds became trendy. 

After 2010, the natural timber look and granite were definitely out and the modern, bright, light and white kitchens with Caesar stone bench tops and timber flooring were splashed out in Instagram posts. Now, everything is clean, green(in an environmentally friendly sense) and pristine and a minimalistic, uncluttered look is achieved with all the small appliances like the toaster, kettle and food processor and even some big ones like the dishwasher and fridge concealed behind doors which are part of the cabinetry. With cooking shows like Master Chef and My Kitchen Rules and celebrity cooks like Nigella Lawson, Gordon Ramsey and Jamie Oliver becoming so popular, the kitchen has usurped the lounge as the entertaining room. The island stone bench top now is a mandatory inclusion in every modern kitchen cleverly dividing the two areas with the home owner on one side prepping and cooking and the guests   perched on stools on the other side sipping beverages and appraising the newly learnt culinary skills performed by the host. What do you know, cooking is now a spectator sport. 

The kitchen is probably the most important room in our house and it is where most of my family’s memories were made. While I prepped and cooked, I supervised the homework as the kids sat around the kitchen counter. Most of the messy school projects and art activities were  done on the hardy, granite tops. It was in this room while having breakfast, getting ready for school or finishing the day with dinner that stories were shared and confided. Even now, when I have guests, we seem to gather around the kitchen island bench instead of sitting in the lounge, laughing and talking while the food is being prepared. 

From the early days to now, while the kitchen architecture, decor and appliances have seen big changes, one thing remains the same: the kitchen is indisputably the heart of every good home. Life happens in the kitchen with the secret ingredients of love and laughter. It is in this sacred space of our home that we appreciate our culture, pass on traditions and cement our love as a family. 

Getting back to my kitchen design, I have decided that, yes, in keeping with the times, I am leaning towards an Arctic white kitchen  with soft-close drawers and cabinet doors without any handles that open with a touch, a waterfall stone, island benchtop in a neutral tone of mottled oatmeal, with similar toned retro tiles as a splash back.  I spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking for each one’s individual taste (because I have the time) so I am treating myself to all the enticing storage solutions that makes all the crockery, cutlery, utensils and napery convenient to put away and take out. The only thing I am not looking forward to is the price tag that comes with this modern kitchen! But, if anyone objects, I am going to argue that it is going to be an excellent selling point for the house should we decide to move (which I doubt!).