It’s not your Mama’s Kitchen. It’s more like Great (great,great) Grandma’s kitchen. Its a Period Style Kitchen With Attitude!
Wood beams, an old plank floor, tongue and groove ceiling, board and batten wood walls, big windows and lots of them. This Period Style kitchen is like the old keeping room of a 19th century stone farmhouse. It was once both the main workroom and informal socializing room for the home. Now it needs to be updated, but the owners want to keep its original character. It is still the ‘hub’ of the house, a tough working kitchen with more emphasis on leisure activities than ever before.
It’s got a fireplace, a really big one. The kind that was used for cooking as well as space heating and now it just works great as a focal point that can keep a very cozy fire. And all those windows bring in a lot of light but make it difficult to install normal cabinetry because the window sills are below countertop height.
This is just the place to use Kitchen Workstation Furniture instead of long runs of cabinetry and counter tops. Vertically oriented workstations with their deeper counter tops and storage systems take advantage of limited wall space between the windows, doors (and in this case the huge fireplace). Only a few workstations are needed to complete an extremely functional kitchen. And there is still room for a dining table, a desk and even a cozy sitting arrangement, depending on the desire of the family. (Note the full height storage pantries flanking the concealed refrigerator on the right.)
Shown here in these renderings are 4 arrangements of the same 17′-6″ by 18′-6″ room. Each design features a different way to use the center of the room. Since many of the pieces are interchangeable, many other arrangements are possible.
Though some of the workstations are farther away from each other than in normal kitchens, built-in efficiencies in the ‘reach zone’ in and around each major appliance help the cook to reduce steps when using the individual appliances. Just like the workstations found in commercial kitchens, YesterTec’s workstations keep the cook on task, but because most of the modern appliances can be concealed (unlike the ones in commercial kitchens) the room can remain in the style of the period. YesterTec’s U.L. Listed workstations that safely conceal the ovens are unique to the industry and are one of the keys to preserving the integrity of the period kitchen with attitude! (Note, there are two ovens concealed in the breakfront/ range on the left.)
The three dimensional character of each YesterTec piece is reminiscent of Great Grandma’s kitchen that used individual, freestanding pieces (worktables, icebox, cupboards, pie safes etc.) to accompany the cooking source. Often the only built-in piece was the sink base because it was attached to a water pump! These humble pieces that were born of necessity rarely matched each other, but because there were generally spaces between them, they all blended well together. The spaces, in this case the windows and fireplace, are what makes the very different shapes and styles of YesterTec pieces work so well together. And when two workstations are butted together, one piece must dominate, so that they both don’t compete for the same visual attention. (Note, the green piece in the foreground is a working pantry that conceals a countertop and all the small appliances.)
There are of course so many other arrangements and design constraints when designing period style kitchens. We’ve tried to illustrate some of the more common issues with the designs featured above. But if you have the desire to really explore the nuances of a particular style, we hope you will allow YesterTec to help you discover the design that is just right for you. Sometimes just blending one or two YesterTec pieces that have special functions into a design that incorporates other antique pieces or even period style built-in cabinetry can be just the right thing to do. After all, if Great (great, great) Grandma could do it with such limited resources, just think of what you can do.
