Kitchen – Taru

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been walking through the bedrooms of Taru. You’ve seen that they are all inspired by nature one way or the other. The living area is earthy and neutral, the master bedroom has a Mediterranean ocean vibe, while the girls’ rooms are a floral treat. It’s finally time to take a look at the heart of the home and see how this fits into the scheme of things. Today I have for you, the kitchen of Taru.

Kitchen of Taru

The kitchen of Taru falls right into this nature inspired home. It’s done mostly in peaches and whites, and it’s pretty pastel vibe is so in keeping with the girls’ rooms. But as I show you the finishes we’ve used closer up, you’ll see that they are very textural and completely in keeping with the earthy vibe of the home.

But that comes later, let’s first start with the plan.

The Plan

The original kitchen was not as large as the one you see in the plan below. Only the ‘Kitchen’ and ‘Dry Balcony’ made up the kitchen when we first saw it. The ‘Pantry Area’ was then the staff room and staff bathroom. Since the client did not have a requirement for those, we broke down those walls to include them into the kitchen.

You can also see the bar unit of the dining room just outside the pantry area, to its left. When I shared the living and dining areas with you, I had told you that we pushed the dining wall back into the kitchen to make space for the bar. The other half of that space, is the pantry storage you see in the plan below.

So the kitchen is now neatly divided into 3 zones. The main cooking zone is along the longest wall of the kitchen. There is a small vegetable sink on this counter. Opposite that we have fridge and a glass crockery display unit right next to it.

The right side of the pantry area makes the washing zone. We have the large sink. The dishwasher is also placed below this counter.

Opposite the sink is the storage zone. The large cabinet on the right makes the pantry unit while the left side holds appliances like the toaster, iron etc. The smaller counter here doubles as an appliance counter and also the ironing area when required.

The dry balcony outside the kitchen holds the washing machine and has clothes rods in the ceiling above.

The Cooking Counter

As you enter the kitchen, you see this super long cooking counter ot the right. This holds all the major cooking appliances. It starts with the tall unit to the right which holds the oven and microwave. You can also see perforated drawers in the lower part for onions – potatoes and fruits.

At the centre of this counter we have the chimney and hob. We have open shelves on either side to keep everyday cooking requirements handy.

At the end of this counter is a small vegetable sink, so that cleaning, chopping and cooking can all be easily done together.

Fridge Wall

On the opposite side, we have the fridge.

We created the niche for this fridge by extending the sink wall outwards. This not only helped us get a larger sink wall, but also hides most of the fridge behind the wall, keeping the kitchen looking neat. The niche has been made large so that the clients can upgrade to a bigger fridge whenever they like.

We had a little space left between the fridge and the door to the dry balcony, which was less than a foot in depth. We fit in a glass crockery unit here. This gives a whole lot of additional storage as it easily fits in the smaller glassware.

The Pantry Area

The pantry area has the cleaning counter on the right and the pantry storage on the left. You can see the service door to the home at the far end.

The cleaning counter consists of a larger sink for cleaning utensils. Next to the sink we have an integrated dishwasher placed under the counter. Since it’s been finished to match the cabinets, it vanishes under the counter with the other cabinets.

Opposite that we have the pantry storage. It starts off with a smaller counter which is useful for using appliances like the toaster, sandwich maker etc, which can be stored above or below it. It also makes the ironing counter for the home. Dry clothes from the balcony outside can be stored in one of these cabinets before ironing.

The full pantry storage on the far side takes care of stocking space for all kitchen essentials.

Look and Feel

The kitchen of Taru is peach, white and gold. At first look it has a soft, ethereal aura to it. But if you look closer, you’ll see that the materials used are textural and earthy, in keeping with the home.

For one, we used a flooring tile that resembles wood. It’s a light colour that keeps our peach looking soft, but the texture at once adds a warmth to the space.

We used a similar wooden laminate on the open shelves on either side of the chimney. Though it’s only a little bit, it again adds the kind of warmth that only wood can bring to a space.

Now take a closer look at the tiles. With the uneven surface and the little white chips you can see, they have this handmade terracotta kind of feel to them which adds a rusticity to the kitchen.

Finally, take a closer look at the peach laminate we’ve used on the lower cabinets. It’s not a smooth surface. It has a leather finish to it which also adds texture to the kitchen.

So even though we went with a light peach and white kitchen that the client asked for, we made sure to keep the nature inspired feel to it so it looks one with the home.

Before and Afters

Here are a couple of before and afters from the kitchen of Taru so you can see the amazing transformation of this space for yourself.

The main cooking counter of the kitchen…

… remains the main cooking counter.. though in a completely new avatar!

The space opposite the cooking counter…

We broke down the staff room and bathroom to include the area into our kitchen. The sink wall was extended to increase the washing counter and hide the fridge behind it.

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This large kitchen is an amazing blend of form and function. We took an awkward, ‘L’ shaped area and used it to our advantage. The odd shape helped us divide the kitchen into separate zones. This way we could make the most of the space available. And then, we also made it as pretty as we possibly could.

What’s the best thing you like about this kitchen? Share your thoughts with me in the comments below. You can also click here to see the rest of this beautiful home.

Until next time,

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Photography: Biju Gopal of @bizou.photos