At Gateway Kitchen + Bath, we love to watch the upcoming kitchen trends. From the latest colours and textures, to new storage solutions that make your experience in the kitchen more efficient, we’ve got our eyes on whatever is coming next. Sometimes, however, it’s really fun to dream about what trends might be well down the road in kitchen renovation. Beyond the next steps, what are the kitchens of the future going to look like? How will our experience differ 5 or 10 years down the road?
We racked our brains and came up with a few things that we think will start becoming more important in kitchen design and function. Some of them are already underway, and some we just wish were already here. Let’s see how our predictions stack up!
Kitchen Trends Prediction #1: Integrated Gardening
With rising grocery costs and an increased focus on healthy food, grow-it-yourself kitchen trends have been gathering steam over the last few years. In the past, bringing aeroponics or hydroponics into your home meant bulky homemade and often complicated systems. Those days are nearly gone. Ever year there are more companies who are building set-it-and-forget-it growing systems made for use at home. Who doesn’t want a fresh crop of lettuce, fresh herbs and greens available all year? (Especially when you’ve got winters like we do in Winnipeg). Even small fruiting plants can be grown now using countertop aeroponics systems. Just Vertical offers Canadian-built indoor garden systems that fit into your house as seamlessly and beautifully as furniture. Check out their AEVA system below:
So what does this mean for the future? We think that it won’t be long before simple growing systems become as integral to your kitchen as your refrigerator. In 2012, Hyundai released a concept for their idea of what future kitchens will look like with their plan for the Kitchen Nano Garden. Using recycled grey water from cooking and dishwashing, this system was imagined to fit into your kitchen as a beautiful living display and provide a constant supply of healthy, chemical-free produce.
Designers: Lee Hyun-Jung, Park Jae-Yong, Shon Chang-Jin and Park Seul-Ki
While this is still only a concept, we’re sure the industry will continue to grow and develop. Building cabinetry with integrated lighting or grow systems that can help you produce some of your fresh food with ease in the comfort of your home is one of the kitchen trends we’ve got our eyes on.
Kitchen Trends Prediction #2: Hidden Appliances
Kitchen design has always needed to straddle the line between beauty and functionality. While design and style is incredibly important, the fact is that a kitchen is a hard-working room too. It’s full of tools that need to be easily accessible, easy to clean and able to withstand constant use. As time progresses we are getting better and better at making all those tools a little less visible in the design. We can now put panels onto the outside of your fridge and dishwasher so they disappear into your cabinetry, and it’s possible to build induction ranges underneath stone countertops that are invisible at a glance, so you have a completely unobstructed surface area (like this one from InvisaCook).
Kitchen Renovation Prediction #3: Smart Kitchens
We’re already well on our way with this kitchen trend. Every tool in the kitchen is rapidly getting smarter, more connected to each other (and us) and offers more features. From intelligent lighting to refrigerators that make sure you’ve always got enough eggs and fresh fruit, we see much of the kitchen work like meal planning, shopping and cooking continuing to simplify and automate. Kitchen faucets can now be voice activated so you never need to grab a handle with messy hands, and Grohe even has a faucet that dispenses carbonated water on demand. Of course, that doesn’t mean we think you’ll never want to get more involved in cooking. Cooking is tactile and most satisfying when you make a bit of a mess, but in the future you’ll have more options available when you want or need.
Kitchen Trends Prediction #4: Waste Minimization
It’s a simple fact, kitchens produce more household waste than any other space in your home. Food waste is smelly, wet and generally unpleasant, and kitchens make a steady supply. We’re already starting to see electric composting machines like this Lomi, and we think this industry will continue to grow until every kitchen has the ability to process its own waste.
From carrot peels to stale bread and even some compostable packaging, a home compost system can easily and quickly turn waste into quality soil that can be used for houseplants or gardens. The Lomi can even handle animal products, so between that and a good recycling program, you could cut down the landfill-bound waste from your kitchen significantly and do something good for the environment at the same time.
Kitchen Renovation Prediction #5: Self-Cleaning Kitchens
If we’re going to dream about kitchen trends, we might as well dream big. We weren’t really able to find anyone who is already making useful products in this area just yet, but we figured there was no harm in asking! Cleaning and sanitizing are important tasks for a kitchen since many foods can harbour bacteria and no one wants to get sick because they missed something while wiping down the countertop. We’re dreaming about self-cleaning countertops, dust and crumb sucking floor cleaners, sink sanitation and maybe a good overall steam cleaning system to lift those mystery sticky bits.
At Gateway Kitchen + Bath, we love to innovate and discover new solutions to create kitchens that work for you. Have an idea? Want to try something new? Contact us and talk to one of our talented designers, and we’ll see how we can help.