Kitchen workbook: How to find your kitchen style
If you plan to remodel your kitchen, you have to start somewhere: How to find inspiration and how to narrow it down:
When most home owners tackle a kitchen remodel, they spend endless hours collecting inspiring kitchen photos. However, this does not necessarily help a person find out what they want and can even cause confusion. Most people don't have a favorite look. If you're like most people, you suffer from multiple personalities in the design department. The difficult part of the process is learning to narrow down the options and refine what YOUR dream kitchen should look like.
Here are some tips to help you with Step 1:
Collect pictures at random.
Collect images that appeal to you emotionally without thinking about why (at least for the moment). There is a pattern there – you may not be able to see it at first, but a pattern will appear. You may need to add a whole bunch of your kitchen inspiration images to an idea book for a future farmhouse or weekend getaway. Don't skip them just because they don't relate to this project, save them for later.
Don't edit yourself (yet).
Don't drive yourself crazy from the start by trying to edit as you collect. Collect with ruthless dedication first and edit later. Working on yourself while collecting inspiration is a sure death for creativity.
Organize (but only if you want).
It's okay to be disorganized and even a little messy – after all, that's creativity! What if your collections are a bit messy with no rhyme or reason? If you're fabulously organized, you're a step ahead of us, but for those who aren't, don't sweat it. It's time to go through all of these things again and mark them up later.
Look for a professional.
This can be a good time to look for a design professional. For some homeowners, it is right to hire a professional from the start and let them help you in this phase of collecting inspiration. Some homeowners even pass this entirely on to a designer. It is up to the designer to listen to the customer, interpret it, collect inspiration and bring it back for approval.
Categorize.
If you have a whole range of inspirational images available, go through them and classify them into loose categories. You can categorize by style: maybe you seem to be falling on the fence between vintage and modern, or maybe you find that you have a series of pictures of kitchens with dark wood floors. You can create a collection dedicated exclusively to islands or banquet seating for kitchens. For now, don't think about why you like things, just what you do or not.
To edit.
Go through these folders and idea books and see if you are still emotionally responsive to the images. If it's been a while since you started collecting inspiration and you've looked at hundreds of rooms, your taste may have changed without you even realizing it. Ruthless editing can really help clarify things. You see a room display saying "Why on earth did I save the photo?" At. If you can't remember and it no longer speaks to you, drop it. Do you see how easy it was?
Collect pictures on purpose.
After you've randomly collected, categorized, and edited, go through all of your saved photos and visit all of your old online hangouts – and look for images by specific elements. Just look for showcases, industrial hoods or island lighting … not for the big picture. You may not like space at all, but an element could be exactly what you want. Draw inspiration pictures and tell yourself, "Don't look at the wall color or cabinet style. Just look at the hood" or "Look at how the crown molding rotates around the beam and hood" or something very specific. Then edit again. This is where we really get to details. It’s also a great time to attract the talent of a design professional.
Author bio: The author is an expert in kitchen design who has worked with express kitchens for more than 5 years. He specializes in the custom installation of kitchen cabinets and introduces customers to the appearance of the kitchen before installation.
