Room of the Week: A Kitchen Makover in a Pettit+Sevitt Home

Mid-century touches and a nature-inspired palette are the makings of this kitchen in an iconic project home

Georgia Madden 18 February 2019

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In a Q&A format, we talk to the designers – and examine the creative thinking – behind some of Houzz’s most loveable rooms.

Karen Aston Design

Images by Thomas Dalhoff
Answers by Karen Aston, principal designer at Karen Aston Design

Who lives here: A family with two teenagers, a cat and chickens
Location: Lindfield, NSW
Room purpose and size: A 34-square-metre kitchen-diner with a walk-in pantry (the kitchen alone is 17.4 square metres)

Karen Aston Design

Brief
The clients wanted to update the look and layout of their kitchen. The existing kitchen was functional and reasonably sized, but it looked tired and lacked pantry storage.

Initially, the clients were not sure about the style, colours and finishes they wanted, so I assisted them in their research. They wanted their kitchen to have a sophisticated look and favoured cleaned lines, whites and neutrals. It also needed to feel welcoming as the family likes to entertain.

Karen Aston Design

Starting point
The house has unique architectural bones, being a classic mid-century Pettit+Sevitt project-home design – an influence we were keen to incorporate into the new kitchen.

The clients were open to including some mid-century features into the new kitchen design in a contemporary way, hence the introduction of the classic V-board panelling that was painted in a contemporary grey rather than a traditional stained-timber finish.

The pendant light trio was selected for its mid-century style and shape.

Challenges you worked around
None.

Karen Aston Design

Colour and materials palette

Key design aspects
Colour palette: White, green-grey and mid-tone timber.

The colour palette was informed by the clients’ preference for whites and pale neutrals, and the soft green-greys of the bush garden outside the window.

Materials palette: Benchtop in marble-look Talostone quartz Carrara Gioia; base cabinets finished in Dulux Manorburn polyurethane satin finish; tall cabinetry wall and overhead cabinets finished in Dulux Powered Rock polyurethane satin finish; V-board panelling on bulkhead, wall and door leading to the pantry all painted in Dulux Powdered Rock; other walls painted in Dulux Ghosting; white melamine cabinetry inside pantry; engineered oak flooring from Solomons Flooring Willoughby.

Karen Aston Design

Key pieces of furniture/fittings:
Abey Luz Goose Neck pull-out mixer tap. Abey Schock black sink.

In the dining room, contemporary furniture pieces with a Scandinavian feel were selected from designers such as Ethnicraft.

Karen Aston Design

Thinking behind the arrangement of furniture/fixtures:
The galley-style layout of the kitchen was retained as other designs could not be achieved without major structural changes and expense. However, this layout was improved both aesthetically and functionally with some minor structural changes to the walls and windows.

These included:

Adding a walk-in pantry to the rear of the kitchen by stealing space from the adjoining home office.
Lowering the height of the window above the sink and adding a second window beside it to create one long, contemporary splashback-style window, with space for wall cabinets above it.

Karen Aston Design

Why do you think this room works?
The palette is contemporary and calming, and reflects the surrounding bush. The selected finishes and subtle nods to the mid-century design of the house integrate smoothly with other areas of the house, creating the contemporary update the clients were hoping to achieve. The kitchen/dining/pantry space is now incredibly functional with more than enough storage – and all without the huge structural changes or expense of extending.

Tell us
What do you love best about this kitchen? Tell us in the Comments below. And don’t forget to save your favourite images, like this story, and join the conversation.

More
Want more kitchen inspo? Check out last week’s Room of the Week: An Affordable Art Deco-Inspired Kitchen

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nancymiller48

Liz - they have used that dead corner for a drinks fridge on the other side of the island by the look of the pix.

Like 20 February 2019 at 1:20pm

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Brian White

Liz, without seeing what’s inside it’s impossible to tell, but kitchen manufacturers do make blind corner cabinets with pull out or swing out fittings. Nancy, take a closer look...

Like 21 February 2019 at 2:11am

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kbodman14

I always wanted a P&S house in Kenmore, Brisbane, they were always well built with interesting layouts. Way beyond my then budget. It is great to see the adaptability, while keeping the ambiance of a mid 20th century, the functionality of a modern 21 st century has been achieved. It appears so workable. Congratulations

Like 23 February 2019 at 5:13am