Diane Berry

Simon and Helen came in with a definite wish list but were searching for a special finish and hadn’t managed to find anything quite right. They wanted understated luxury so nothing flash or fancy but design detail that was clearly high end but to work with natural materials that were calm and robust.

Most stone kitchens they had seen came with warnings about being porous, easy to scratch so I showed them a material called Carbono water jet; it’s Quartzite a metamorphic rock formed when sandy quartz particles and natural cementing agents are subject to high pressure and high temperature. Its characteristics are scratch resistant, acid resistant, heat resistant and easy to clean. They loved it and I then suggested combining it with some satin bronze aluminium anodised doors to warm up the tones and add another texture to their room. At this point they really fell in love with the materials and we touched on budget as they needed two kitchens the main kitchen sitting in their open plan home and smaller butlers’ kitchen behind.

I explained the costs and they seemed very relaxed about spending in excess of £200,000.00 on the two rooms, would be happy to spend more to get it working well for them and wanted both areas to match.

Their wish list which included:

Large fridge and freezer each to be 36 inches wide, (no wine fridge as they have a bar) Microwave, steam oven, two ovens, two warming drawers, induction hob in main kitchen, gas in the back kitchen, extractors in both rooms, we used special sealing wall outlets as the house has Mechanical heat recovery. Dishwashers in both kitchens, with large sinks, Quooker taps and waste disposal. I suggested using electric pop up sockets to keep the walls clear and created recess for hidden led lights for moods. The wall units are set off the wall and edge lit; the underside of the wall units are stone too.

Ovens are behind pocket doors so when not in use they are invisible maintaining the clean look of the understated kitchen. Another area with pocket doors houses their coffee machine, toaster, storage for coffee capsules, tea, bread bin and bread board built into the top drawer.

Base units are electric opening and illuminated, the unit interiors are made of Black Nano soft touch laminate which is fully repairable and anti-bacterial.

The stone doors are solid stone not a thin layer onto chipboard, plinths and worktops are all made from the solid stone and the unique mitred worktops add a special depth and detail.

The back kitchen has finger rails also made of solid stone and a mitred stone box to house the extractor, a 900mm wide oven for extra wide joints of meat, fish, a small fridge. This room has a small staircase down to the laundry and pool and up to the bedrooms. (main staircase is in the entrance hall).

Simple attention to detail and great use of materials won this client over

Cost of Project: £318,910.88

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