New interior project: a light-filled, minimalist kitchen and living room in south London

[interior design, kitchen design, styling and photography: Cate St Hill]

Following on from the monochrome bedroom and ensuite I shared last week, I’m excited to reveal more from my latest interior project. This time, it’s the turn of the light-filled, minimalist kitchen and living room. It’s a calm, considered haven of Scandinavian design, utilitarian details and soothing grey tones, and I think you’re going to love it!

Because everyone loves a good before and after, right? This scheme has transformed two small, disparate and cramped rooms in a three bedroom, Victorian maisonette in south west London. Now the clients have an airy, multi-functional, open-plan space that’s perfect for relaxing, eating and entertaining.

The new minimalist kitchen
When I first visited the property, the kitchen was accessed both from the hallway and through two narrow doors from the living room. In a small city apartment, it’s all about maximising the space you’ve got and making it work efficiently for you. So it made sense to get rid of the wasted thoroughfare to the kitchen and just have one entrance to help the space flow better.

The kitchen, situated at the back of the house, was also fairly dark with one window and cupboard units on either side of the room. The decision was made to knock down the wall between the kitchen and the living room to benefit from the light flooding in from the large windows at the front of the house (one is a beautiful bay window). The thinking was that this would also help open things up and give the illusion of a more generous space. 

Now you enter the living space from the hallway and find the kitchen immediately to your left. Because of the units, the kitchen before felt quite narrow and corridor-like – if you were opening the oven, there couldn’t also be someone at the sink next to the window, for instance. By replacing one wall of units with floor-to-ceiling open shelving and creating a kitchen peninsula, it makes the room feel much wider and more intuitive to use. The client can now be preparing food and cooking with a lovely view across the living room instead of looking at a wall – they can be chatting to someone on the bar stools or on the nearby sofa and feel much more part of an open, dynamic, communal space.

Below is the concept I first presented to the client. The scheme is essentially a simple, white, minimalist kitchen with a little twist – and that comes from the light wood. It adds a tactile touch and prevents it looking too clean and clinical. The wooden units also help delineate the visual border between the kitchen and the living spaces.

The client fell in love with the metro tiles that I had arranged in a vertical grid pattern in my kitchen. You might notice they’re also the same as their ensuite upstairs, helping create a common thread that runs through the project.

The kitchen I designed is from IKEA but it’s been given a bespoke look with plywood doors made by Custom Fronts. There’s lots of companies, like Superfront, Plykea and Naked kitchens, now that offer high-quality fronts and panels to hack IKEA cabinets, whether they’re kitchen units, console tables or wardrobes. There’s lots of options in terms of colours and materials and it’s a great way to get the look of a beautiful designer kitchen for less.

Custom Fronts makes handmade doors, fronts and worktops from its workshop on the banks of the River Ouse in East Sussex. It was set up by husband and wife team Rachel and Ian, a former landscape painter, and now has a full team of joiners, metalworkers and designers. They take inspiration from the natural landscape – with colour names such as Dungeness Black, Musk Mallow, and Downlands Path inspired by the local landscape. Conscious of sustainability, they use FSC-certified native and European woods, unlike other companies who might use wood veneer to conceal an MDF core. They have a range of hardwood, bamboo, brass and painted fronts that use low toxicity paint. Plus, a proportion of their profits also go to woodland conservation charity The Woodland Trust.

You send them the plans for the kitchen and then they’ll make the fronts to fit, complete with holes for hinges.

The black pendants with their brass detail contrast with the pure expanse of white. I love the subtle grain of the wood with the clean lines of the metro tiles against the organic, sculptural shapes of the ceramics. The small beige Shoulder vase is by Lucia Fraser for Heal’s and the two black and white vases are from West Elm’s Shape Studies range [press loans for the shoot – affiliate links].

The open shelves create an eye-catching display when entering the kitchen space from the living room. They can be curated with picture frames, kitchen objects and the things that need to be close at hand for everyday use. They’re wide enough to fit cookbooks and plates too. A vertical column radiator fits in neatly and helps save space.

A row of top units run along one wall, concealing the extractor fan above the hob – I didn’t want to clutter the space around the window, block any light or make the space feel too enclosed by having cabinets there too. Together with two tall cabinets (one concealing the fridge), the units of the peninsula and the open shelving, there’s plenty of storage to hide away clutter.

I had great fun styling these shelves and trying to create a simple, balanced composition. If I live here I’d be faffing with them all day long!

The ‘Things will work out’ print is from The Poster Club, the black plates are from Arket [press gift – affiliate link], the black tea/coffee pot is from Made [press gift – affiliate link], the salt and pepper mills are from Habitat [press loan], the Sway Low bowls with the painterly swirls are from West Elm [press loan – affiliate link], the spotty and marble effect mugs are by Edinburgh-based designer Myer Halliday for Heal’s [press loan]. 

So that’s a look into the minimalist kitchen, as you can see, a very different type of space than before. It’s changed the aspect of the room, so instead of feeling constricted you’re looking out. The best compliment I could have was from the client saying they just love living here!

Living room
Now for the living room. It’s gone from beige walls and beige carpet (nothing wrong with beige, it’s on trend at the moment, but sometimes it just needs a lift and an update!) to fresh, pale, grey walls and light, white-oiled floors. 

It’s a fairly small space but with some clever spatial planning, we’ve fitted in a generous, extendable dining table for 6-8 people, a roomy, squishy sofa and a stylish armchair. But where’s the television I might hear you asking? It may look like a picture frame above the fireplace, but it’s actually the clever Samsung Frame TV that displays images when not in use. It’s discreet and ensures the original fireplace, cleaned up and restored with its own version of the kitchen’s vertical metro tiles, is the centre of attention.

The living/dining area is flooded with natural light from the beautiful period windows. It was all about keeping it simple with pared-back shapes, Scandinavian design and refined forms.

For a fresh, clean start, the radiators were replaced with column radiators, new doors were installed together with classic beehive door knobs and new light-oiled engineered wood flooring was fitted seamlessly throughout the space.

The minimalist white dining table is complimented by the smooth curves of IKEA’s dark blue Odger chairs. Designed by Swedish design studio Form Us With Love, they’re proof I think that sustainable design can be affordable – they’re made of reclaimed wood and 55% recycled plastic. They won’t have you sighing with despair to put them together either – you don’t need any tools, the parts cleverly slot together with a simple mechanism under the seat.

The smooth lines of the minimalist furniture are softened with cosy textures from a shaggy Berber rug and soft, tactile cushions. Two pendant lights with exposed bulbs hang over the dining table and can be looped onto hooks if they’re getting in the way. A little detail – I like how the vases mimic the curved shapes on the window panes.

So there we have it – a light-filled minimalist kitchen and living space! A huge transformation from dark to light and closed to open, don’t you think? Ask me any questions in the comments if you think I’ve missed anything!