How to design sustainability into your kitchen
If you’re thinking about redesigning your kitchen, sustainability has probably already crossed your mind. These days a positive environmental impact is more than an optional extra – it’s a foundation of good design. It’s also a seriously hot topic, with interiors expert Michelle Ogundehin naming 2022 the year of sustainability in her annual trends report for Dezeen. The argument for green design goes beyond style too. Residential properties are responsible for between 17-21% of energy-related carbon emissions globally, meaning the choices you make in your own home can make a real difference.
So how do you balance concern for the world outside your home with a beautiful kitchen you actually want to use every day? Luckily, it doesn’t have to be a choice. Sustainable design has filtered its way into our consciousness and the high street, meaning many of the best home brands are producing eco-friendly products so stylish they don’t feel like a compromise.
Plus, if you need any further argument to think planet-first, the benefits go beyond your carbon footprint. Far from being the preserve of the most privileged, an energy-saving kitchen could save you hundreds – even thousands – of pounds a year, and could bring you better air quality, more light and warmth, and an extra splash of character to boot.
Where to start: sustainability or design?
While ethics and aesthetics don’t have to be at odds, it does take some planning to incorporate both into your kitchen design. Start by listing every feature you’d love to incorporate in your new kitchen. You don’t need a sustainability strategy at this stage, just write down anything you think of: it could be anything from pink walls or interesting tiles to a boiling water tap or more space for the kids to do their homework while you cook. Then list your environmental concerns: perhaps you want to reduce your energy consumption, use reclaimed furniture where you can, or be mindful of avoiding toxic materials. The final stage is to look for opportunities to combine the two lists. If pink walls are your thing, find a supplier of eco-friendly paints, choose a shade you love, and base your colour palette around that.
It’s important to remember that if you don’t love using your kitchen, you’ll end up changing it – and doing the same work twice is never going to be good for the environment. It’s one thing to swap your cutlery into a new drawer or re-hang a picture, but you don’t want to find yourself repainting walls or calling the builders back in six months down the line. Use swatches, draw up plans, create visual inspiration boards and notice how you use your current kitchen, looking for any points of irritation with its layout and usability. A well-loved kitchen is a kitchen that lasts forever.
Consider repurposing your existing kitchen
Before you start googling the price of marble, have you thought about using what’s already there? Don’t buy into the idea that to create a more sustainable kitchen you need to start from scratch; this simply isn’t the case. Avoiding the energy-use and manufacturing involved in a brand new kitchen actually makes a lot of sense, and you’d be surprised how different your kitchen can look and feel with a bit of design support. The benefits of a kitchen design only service are many: your repurposed kitchen will be reimagined around your own tastes and needs making it beautifully original. Other rooms in the house will be taken into consideration too, so you can enjoy a pleasing flow from space to space. You’ll also save money as well as carbon by making the most of what’s already available.
Get the basics right with sustainable build and kitchen materials
If you are starting afresh, the materials you use are one of the easiest ways to reduce your carbon footprint, so it pays to factor sustainability into your kitchen plans from the very beginning. You’ll need to consider where you’re sourcing materials and how you plan to use your kitchen from day one.
If you have the opportunity to insulate cavity walls during your renovation, it could make a huge impact on your energy bills: £160 a year across the whole house, according to Which? – so well worth doing if you’re stripping the building back anyway.
In broad terms, the most carbon-intensive building material is steel, which uses a lot of energy to produce and doesn’t break down easily – it’s even hard to recycle. Wood is the greenest alternative because it’s renewable, reusable and low-impact to process. For kitchen materials such as worktops, concrete can be a winning option; it’s hard-wearing, the production process can be relatively low-impact (check with your supplier) and the effect creates real bang for your buck – although bucks are what you’ll need to spend, with concrete coming in at about £300 per metre.
Find out how to choose the right worktop material.
The best eco-friendly paints
Colour can have a huge impact on the atmosphere of your kitchen, in both senses of the word. Many of the sustainable paint brands now offer a wide range of shades in non-toxic formulations, so this is a great place to exercise some ethical buying power.
Brands such as Graphenstone (the world’s most certified sustainable global paints brand), offer a wide range of colour and finish options include Lime ranges that actually absorb CO2 and other toxins from your home. Little Greene makes pigment-rich paints in a huge variety of colours, some of which are based on National Trust properties – perfect if you want to bring a vintage vibe to your reclaimed kitchen design. Lick is a modern, hip brand offering water-based paints that help keep plastic out of the ocean. If you’re evaluating other brands for their eco-credentials, check emissions and manufacturing practices as well as ingredients, and look out for added benefits like sales donated to charitable causes where your money will go towards making the world a better place.
A greener kitchen at every budget
There are so many sustainable kitchen products and materials out there now that you should be able to match your eco-credentials to your budget. The mid-market is flooded with options, but what about the higher and lower ends? If you’re redesigning on a shoestring, you could try swapping your cabinet handles for recycled plastic options, experimenting with plywood (very in right now for sustainable kitchen cabinets), or choosing a handful of eco-friendly tiles you love and just covering a tiny surface like a splashback for maximum impact without spending big.
More sustainable kitchen inspiration
Hungry for more inspo to inform your next kitchen design? We love flicking through Terence Conran’s Eco House Book for lots of great upgrade ideas, listening to the Home Style Green podcast, and watching good old Grand Designs for more ambitious sustainability ideas to try. We also post regular design inspiration on our Instagram feed, so follow along for more suggestions to fire up your imagination.
It can seem like an overwhelming task to design a kitchen that ticks all your aesthetic boxes while making a minimal impact on the environment, but once you get started we hope you’ll have some fun with it. Remember to reuse before buying new, get your priorities in order from the start, and read up carefully on the brands you give your money to. Above all, focus on creating a kitchen you know you’ll use – and love – for years to come. Trends come and go but there’s only one planet, so aim for longevity and you’re already on the right track.
If you’d like some support designing your dream sustainable kitchen or making the most of what you already have, get in touch