Beginner’s Guide to Design a Kitchen Island Benchtop

If the kitchen is said to be the heart of the home, then a kitchen island is the soul of the kitchen. Besides cooking and placing food, a lot can happen over the Island countertops. Kitchen Islands are designed to perform multiple tasks, be it an interesting conversation with your family member or socializing with your old friends. 

Here’s a Guide to Setting Up a Kitchen Island Adelaide for Your Dream Home.

Why Do You Need a Kitchen Island Bench:

A well-designed island can help you with multiple kitchen tasks, including cooking, preparing food, storing appliances, washing dishes, and whatnot! 

While renovating an entire kitchen can be expensive, creating a kitchen island can give you plenty of space to make your kitchen look more elegant and organized.

In addition, kitchen islands are visually appealing and add tons of charm to your kitchen space. If you don’t intend to buy a kitchen island, you can try this DIY Kitchen Island project and create a Custom Kitchen Islands Adelaide.

Steps to Create a Perfect Kitchen Island:

1. Decide a Spot for Your Kitchen Island:

Kitchen islands are designed to enhance the functionality of your kitchen. It would be best if you thought of a perfect spot in the kitchen that improves your efficiency while cooking. A brilliant idea for designing a kitchen island is to prepare on one side and cook on the other. Thus, placing your island right behind the cooktop is more practical.

An ideal kitchen island setup offers enough space to move around it. Ideally, you can allow 1 to 1.2 m of space around the island. If you plan a sitting area on the island, ensure that you leave sufficient room to place the bar stools.

2. Take Measurements:

A standard kitchen islands are 2m to 3m in length and 1.2m to 1.4 m in width. If your kitchen space allows, you can extend the island in length for more counter space. But, an increase in width is merely a waste of centre space.

3. Think About Storage Options:

Factor in the storage as you move ahead with your island design. Plan wide and deep drawers on the working side for storing large pots and pans, and use shallow drawers on the dining side of the area for easy access to tableware.

Think of your kitchen needs and plan accordingly. For example, if you are placing a hob on the island, a pull-out pantry for condiments, spices, and oil can be a thoughtful decision. 

4. Choose Between Fitted and Free-Standing Island:

Depending on how multi-functional your kitchen island needs, they are available in Fixed units or flexible, portable kitchen islands with wheels.

The fitted kitchen island is anchored to the floor in a fixed position and does not allow any flexibility to place it in a different position. Fitted kitchen islands are best for spacious kitchens and offer more space for meal preparation and storage.

Portable Kitchen islands are perfect for smaller kitchens as they are light in weight and occupy less space. One can easily shift its position to a different place depending upon the purpose. 

5. Consider Integrating Appliances in the Design:

Consider hiding large appliances like dishwashers, ovens, and wine fridges by integrating them into your island design. You can also consider incorporating a sink or cooktop on your kitchen island. 

Washing your vegetables in the sink and using a kitchen island for chopping your vegetables and meal preparation can be a clever idea. A dishwasher underneath the island benchtop offers excellent flexibility to wash your plates and bowls, and pull-out bins help you to maintain a tidy kitchen.

6. Choose an Island Benchtop:

The most crucial step in creating an eye-catching and long-lasting island benchtop is to select the suitable benchtop material. Deciding the right material for your island countertops depends upon several factors, from price, colours, durability, and maintenance to textures of material.

Various island benchtop materials from Marble, Granite, and Engineered stone to timber and stainless Steel are available in the market to produce Unique Kitchen Island Adelaide. Each of these materials has unique features to meet your island countertop needs.

Although laminate surfaces are budget-friendly, Granite and Engineered stone materials are in high-in demand because of their seamless finish and high durability. Stone Benchtops offer a wide range of colors and textures to add an aesthetic element to your kitchen space. Engineered stone countertops are easy to clean and low-maintenance than their counterparts, such as marble and timber.

7. Add Lighting Elements to Your Design:

You must illuminate your island benchtops area with fittings that provide bright lights for the full functioning of food preparation. A pendant or series of pendants brings extra light to your kitchen surface while adding a visually appealing element to your kitchen space. 

Dimmable lights work the best when you want to switch from cooking to dining mode. A slightly dimmed light can offer pleasing dining on the island countertops.

8. Give Life to Your Island:

Experimenting with different colour schemes can add an exciting feature to the space. While the basic white and shades of grey evergreen choices for the benchtop surfaces, you can also coordinate dark colors with kitchen cabinets. 

Build a Custom Kitchen Islands Adelaide using timber elements in your island benches. Timber gives warmth to your kitchen with a natural look and stand-out feature.

Decorate your kitchen island with living plants like kitchen herbs that perform double functions. Tiny pots of herbs like Rosemary, Basil, and Thyme create a calming atmosphere with their aromatic fragrances.

Give definition to your island benchtops with colorful trays, wooden chopping boards or beautiful fruit bowls that contrast the primary colors of your kitchen theme. 

Create custom Kitchen Island Adelaide:

The above steps will help you design the kitchen island of your dream. Using the right materials for your cooking space is as essential as planning a luxurious kitchen space. Emperor Stone can help you select and install the best Kitchen Island Adelaide for every kitchen need.