open kitchen vs seperate kitchen

[Jan]

Do you prefer to have your kitchen in a separate room, or a combines kitchen and living room?

[Quall]

Seperate. I'm not a big fan of open concept.

[Jan]

In here it's all open kitchen these days, a separate kitchen is being considered somewhat old fashioned. When you want to be really now you need to have a cooking island.

My new kitchen is going to look like this one (kitchen island and table combined)

[Jonesy55]

Open, if I'm cooking I want to be able to talk to other people, not shut away in a separate room.

I have a separate kitchen unfortunately but we have taken steps to open it out a little.

[tpe]

I was never a fan of open floor plans. It has been said that kitchens open to the living/family rooms are more suited to today's mode of entertaining. Also, kitchens are now treated as a kind of showplace -- not to mention that in today's modern lifestyle, many kitchens are largely unused or under-utilized...

Nonetheless, I do think this type of informality will not suit all types of houses. Historic/period/vintage spaces renovated to have open kitchens many times don't blend well with the overall layout. In those instances, I think the owners would have done better by staying true to the period.

[Suburbanist]

Open, unless you live in a residence big enough to fit a kitchen + dining room fused in one room, and another living room elsewhere.

[Eric Offereins]

No preference. Open means that your room looks bigger, in a closed kitchen you can store more/place more cupboards.

[Disturbing Reality]

i prefer separate kitchen.. i hate the smell of food in my living room..

[Ribarca]

I prefer a separate kitchen. So my wife can do her job while I watch tv or sit behind the computer. I don't like the noise and smells of a kitchen in the living room. If I would live on my own I would prefer an open kitchen.

[Eric Offereins]

Originally Posted by Disturbing Reality

i prefer separate kitchen.. i hate the smell of food in my living room..

Maybe because you don't cook so well?

[Jan]

^ are you going to cancel the standard kitchen as well? You get €5.000 in return if you do (cash!). It's not a bad kitchen but to upgrade it to the level that I wanted (marble plate, induction cooking, gripless) they asked another €3.500. For €8.500 total I think can do better, or at least get me something that doesn't look like it came standard.

[AsianDragons]

Originally Posted by Disturbing Reality

i prefer separate kitchen.. i hate the smell of food in my living room..

you must certainly not be a spoiled teenager or young adult eating and dropping food in their living everytime watch a movie or play games or just watching normal tv

[Dezz]

My kitchen and living room are combined, and I love it! Whenever we're cooking (with friends for instance) we can still have a chat with one another

[Jan]

I guess it also depends if cooking is your thing. When I lived in downtown Chicago there were so many eateries around that your kitchen is basically just the place where you store your breakfast and beer. Doing groceries was usually more expensive compared to eating out. I know how to cook me a proper dinner but 9 out of 10 times i just fix myself a simple pasta, soup or a salad. But if you like cooking with meat and spices on a regular basis, I guess you'd like some separation in between the kitchen and the rest of the house.

Some of the luxury apartments I have seen have kitchens that could easily cater an orphanage. Especially when living downtown I don't see the reason to have a massive kitchen in your apartment.

[AsianDragons]

Originally Posted by Jan

Especially when living downtown I don't see the reason to have a massive kitchen in your apartment.

bingo, people who live next to shops are people who use them often, therefore people who live next to restaurants are people who eat out more or at least a coffee very often, imagine eating out everyday but living 20 min away from the nearest eatery

[Rebasepoiss]

It's a tough question. From an aesthetical point of view, I like an open kitchen because it makes the apartment (or house) feel more spacious. However, there are several reasons why I actually prefer a separate kitchen with enough room for a dining table. First and probably the most important one is noise. Sure, kitchen appliances have got a lot quieter but I'm a quiet-freak so even things like dishwashers are way too loud for me to comfortably watch a movie or listen to music, not to mention vent hoods - those are incredibly loud. I'm also not a fan of food smell when I'm full

At my mother's apartment, there's kind of a semi-open kitchen. The business side of the kitchen is separated from the living room by a wall but the dining side of the kitchen is open to the living room. That's actually a good compromise, IMO.

[Jonesy55]

Eating out for every meal soon gets expensive though, especially for multi-person households..

[AsianDragons]

when im at uni, i eat out all the time but i try to save a bit i spend about
$50-100 on food sometimes i eat 3 times in the city which is really expensive

[Jan]

^ think more about takeaways then restaurants here. Again some of them are so cheap buying the ingredients needed at a downtown grocery is probably more expensive. Restaurants usually add up because of the drinks.

[HKG]

My Dad's takeaway shop has an open kitchen.