Why I Dislike Open Plan Kitchens

The Scourge of Open Plan Kitchens

Gavin Wren Food Opinion Pieces, Writing

I’m struggling with a bitter fate that our country is facing, a murky descent of moral decline which has been created through contentious decisions, which have the power to divide our country and remove any retained Greatness from Great Britain. And I’m not talking about Brexit, I’m talking about a far more virulent, silent disease which is sweeping through the hearts of our nation’s cities and rotting them from the inside out. What I’m talking about is open plan kitchens. I am simply unable to get my head around the proliferation of these ridiculous excuses for kitchens that have swept the property market over the last 10 years. They’re like a plague upon our country, reducing our property stock to ever more tiny little fractious blocks, equipped with mere ‘tea and coffee making facilities’ style kitchens which have barely enough workspace to prepare a few olives.

The Decline of Western Civilisation.

This trait has steadily manifested over the last 10 years, having originally been a feature in mainly redeveloped properties, it has now has become the norm, from new builds to conversion flats, almost everywhere has an open plan kitchen/lounge. I hate it. It’s simply a device that developers use to squeeze the requisite parts of a flat into as little space as possible, purely in the name of making more moolah. “Oh yeah, lets stick the kitchen in the lounge”. I’m surprised we still have bathrooms, they could just stick a loo in the wardrobe, a shower in a closet and a sink in your bedside table, therefore enabling us to dispense with that tedious waste of precious square footage that is a bathroom, all in the name of modern, contemporary, stylish living.

I’m not completely against the concept of open plan rooms, because those lovely large properties with capacious ‘day room’ kitchens look amazing. Huge spaces with a bright, fresh designer kitchen with a huge breakfast bar, nestling with a dining table for 12, large L-shaped sofa and continent-sized TV integrated into the wall with a vast array of bifolding doors opening across the back onto a fresh patio. They’re cool, because they are in essence a bloody massive kitchen. What I’m talking about 1 and 2 bedroom flats in London, where the kitchen has simply been tacked into one corner of the lounge and the ex-kitchen is now a ‘double’* bedroom.

Is it because people who actually use kitchens are in a minority in today’s society? Are people who cook and use facilities beyond a toaster and kettle a dying breed? Are ‘people who cook’ no longer catered for, in the same way that garages are no longer places to store cars, but simply rooms for bikes and washing machines, or just a space that can be converted into another room?

The Kitchen is the Hub of the Home.

Without doubt, the kitchen is a very social place, so having room to talk, chat and eat in one is a beautifully homely vision which should be encouraged. It was a universally accepted truth that at any given party the kitchen was THE place to be, perhaps due to the inevitable proximity to the fridge and therefore, cold alcohol. But I think it goes further than that, because even in the absence of alcohol, a kitchen is a warm, convivial place to be, as long as it’s not at the expense of having any other space in the property aside from a matchbox bedroom.

Perhaps we need some real world examples to demonstrate my point. If I hold a dinner party, I want the kitchen to be a place to hide whilst I put the finishing touches to the food, so that I can curse, scream, apply first aid to myself and pick food up off the floor without anyone hearing my blasphemous words, seeing the gushing wounds or witnessing me picking dog hair off the entrees**. Also, I don’t want you to go home stinking of smoke and boiled cabbage with a thin veneer of airborne fat residing on your barnet, which is another side effect of spending an evening in a room that is also a kitchen. It’s also important to be able to turn around, effortlessly waft out of the room laden with food and close the door on the culinary armageddon that might have just taken place.

Qualifications for Open Plan Kitchens.

I wonder if there’s an aspirational twinkle to these rooms for some people. When watching food being made on TV we only see open plan kitchens, large counters and voluminous kitchen islands with ingredients laid out beautifully in appropriately sized bowls demonstrating a perfect example of mise en place, ready for a chef to whisk in and whip up a gourmet masterpiece. The reality of recreating that at home is quite different, the ‘mise’ is rarely arranged with such aplomb, if in attendance whatsoever. The spellbinding confidence of the chef cooking over flaring flames with swift cooking times has been developed by spending 15 hours a day in the kitchen since the age of 3, meaning they can whip up a meal for 1 cover in the blink of an eye without breaking conversation or a sweat. We see that display or such relaxed prowess and our ego says “yeah, you can do that, you can whip up a masterpiece in the kitchen whilst simultaneously explaining your finer knowledge of coffee roasting techniques to your guests and topping up their wine. No sweat.”

That is not my experience of cooking for guests. I would be a mute, sweaty heap, having just referred back to the recipe for the twentieth time, being so flustered I forgot to actually read what it said, again. As a result, there is no mise on place, the frying pan isn’t hot enough, the food hasn’t cooked and I’ve just realised I need remove 4 tablespoons of thyme leaves from their stalks in the next 10 seconds. I am not an aspirational figure, like Gordon Ramsay, as he bounces his energy off the walls like a profane squash ball keeping you engaged whilst some amazing food appears at the same time. Therefore, I do not want open plan kitchens, I want to hide these inadequacies as best as possible from my guests, family and friends. In fact, perhaps open plan kitchens should only be allowed once you’ve reached a certain level of cooking confidence, there could be a test before you’re allowed to have one in your property, perhaps making and serving a perfect chocolate soufflé or hollandaise sauce without swearing whilst holding a conversation would be a good start.

The Future’s (not) in Your Hands.

Sadly, the problem is quite out of our hands. If the people who make these changes, destroying traditional kitchens and installing open plan kitchens are developers, who are trying to eek every last little bedroom out of every property they work on, then they’re doing it purely for financial reasons. Their motives are simply to make more money, by squeezing more and more properties into the smallest spaces possible. However, I’m sure they would claim they are doing it to make property more efficient and convenient, therefore more affordable to us. How bloody altruistic of them. Of course, I’ve always dreamed of my fan oven blowing over my ear as I watch a film and my sofa smelling of kippers.

Of course, I could be wrong, there might be some owner occupiers out there who look at their beautifully proportioned property and think “I know what, I’ll get rid of the kitchen and stick it in the lounge. I want my washing machine next to the TV, I really want my sofa to get covered in a fine layer of grease every time I have a fry up”.

Actually, maybe there isn’t anyone out there thinking that, because that would be a very, very silly thing to think.

* I use the word ‘double’ in what would appear to be it’s contemporary meaning amongst estate agents, which is a room which barely exceeds the dimensions of a double bed, 137cm x 190cm.
** This is a joke. I regularly mop the floor to ensure that there will be no dog hair on your food.***
*** This is also a joke. I wouldn’t feed you food that I’d dropped on the floor, but I might have lower standards for myself. 5 second rule etc.


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