Making it Personal: 8 Ways to Add Personal Style Your Kitchen

Trisha Mead • Oct 21, 2014

At Arciform, we believe in designing kitchens that will fit the era and style of your home. But we also feel that your kitchen should really feel like YOU. How can you add special personal touches to your kitchen design that reflect your family’s unique style?

Here are 8 ways to add a pop of personality to your kitchen:

1. Colorful cabinets: Whatever style of cabinets you choose, painting them a vivid color can be a great way to make your kitchen uniquely yours. Here are some great examples of Arciform clients who used color to express themselves in their kitchen:

Vivid blue lower cabinets add personality to this Laurelhurst kitchen while  Carrara marble counters and subway tile backsplash keep the overall vibe clean and classic. Design by Kristyn Bester.

FoxPecka_1938_Kitchen_A_1_P_NonPro This client was in love with their vintage tile counters, mesh door inserts and arched valance of their original 1940s kitchen. We exactly replicated those historic elements and then painted the  cabinets apple green to honor her love of bold color. Design by Kristyn Bester.

2. Cabinet Door Inserts. Your recessed door panels do not have to be wood. Adding a perforated metal or glass insert to some doors adds a subtle but very special custom element.

For this kitchen design by Anne De Wolf, we inserted white perforated metal panels into this clients upper cabinet doors to create a cool texture. The simple color palette keeps the design from feeling busy or cluttered.

This client fell in love with a heavy gage mesh that was incorporated into her custom upper doors and her lower drawers. The lower drawers are used to store dog food and pet items, making the mesh a beautiful and practical way to allow airflow around these items. Design by Anne De Wolf.

3. Open shelving. One of the simplest ways to showcase your family’s obsessions is to incorporate open shelving into your kitchen plan.

This allows you to show off your favorite collections and change things up with the seasons. Your selection of shelving material and bracket style can add a decorative touch while still maintaining a neutral backdrop for your favorite things.

This Arciform client incorporated open shelving as a way to frame their fridge and display their favorite dishes. Behind these shelves, a custom divided lite window screens additional open pantry storage that tucks the useful but less pretty items in easy reach but just out of sight. Design by Anne De Wolf.

Simple narrow shelves with cool shelf brackets create a space to show off favorite ingredients and much used items. They also help to solve a tricky storage challenge in this long and narrow kitchen. Design by Anne De Wolf.

The shelves in this project were made of salvaged tropical hardwood that was used as spacer to transport pipes across oceans.The custom metal brackets are suspended from the ceiling and show off the client’s eclectic taste. Design by Anne De Wolf.

If your kitchen has the height for it, you can also create plate rail display space above the cabinets.

This Arciform  project in a National Monument home integrated plate rails and display space around the entire perimeter of the room to help the client showcase their treasured Turkish pottery collection. Design by Anne De Wolf.

4. Lighting. Decorative lighting fixtures are a great way to showcase your distinct style. And since they are relatively easy and inexpensive to replace, you can update them over the years when you are ready for a fresh look.

This client supplements her decorative pendant lights with under cabinet lighting and a few discreet can lights so that she can enjoy the best of both worlds: beautiful fixtures and practical task lighting that puts light just where its needed. Design by Anne De Wolf.

This elegant fixture over the sink adds a ton of personality to a small kitchenette in this client’s daylight basement guest suite. Design by Kristyn Bester.

5. Hardware. Knobs, pulls and hinges are often called the “jewelry” of your design. Vintage knobs or custom pieces can be sourced to fit your exact taste. Keep in mind that your knobs and pulls don’t have to all match – you can mix it up to add interest to the space and if you find yourself wanting an update later, it is inexpensive and fun to change out your knobs for a fresh look.

You can also showcase your style in other kinds of hardware… from bottle openers to towel hooks.

Maybe a whimsical bottle opener is just the right touch. Or use a whole wall to showcase a collection!

6. Tile niches. With thousands of varieties, colors and patterns of tile out there, your back splash or stove niche can be a great place to add a personal touch to your kitchen design.

This Arciform client chose a subtle blue grey tile for their stove niche. The unusual curved medallion shape contrasts nicely with the clean and classic subway tile of the backsplash. Design by Chelly Wentworth.

This client incorporated some very cool painted tiles that were salvaged from the original kitchen into their new stove niche. Design by Anne De Wolf.

7. Custom windows. If your kitchen has one main window, consider making it a focal point with a custom shape or salvage stained glass element.

This Arciform client added a custom gothic arched casement window to her kitchen addition, creating an unusual and striking centerpiece to the kitchen design. A salvage stain glass accessory window adds color and vintage flair. Design by Anne De Wolf.

8. Flooring design. Another place you can have a bit of design fun is in the selection of your flooring pattern. From chevron patterns to inset tile elements and stain options there are a variety of ways to add subtle personal details to your kitchen floor.

The flooring in this kitchen features decorative inset wood pegs in a contrasting color that give the floor a “buttoned” look. Design by Chelly Wentworth.

Hex floor tile offers a wealth opportunities to incorporate a custom tile pattern. You can even have your family’s name or the year of the house inset into the tile pattern if you like. Design by Anne De Wolf.

Even simple marmoleum floors can add a bold graphic element, like the contrasting band of color used in this Arciform project. The design element also acts as an aging in place feature by making the transition between floor and cabinets easy to distinguish. Design by Chelly Wentworth.

 

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