The work
A basement kitchen in a terraced townhouse, which is the hardest place to put one. There is one window, the ceiling is low, and everything has to be reached from a single corridor. The answer here was to run the perimeter in dark stone against a white tiled wall and keep every tall element to one side, so the room reads as long rather than tight.
The island carries the hob and the preparation. Its end swells into a curved solid walnut breakfast bar, thicker than the stone and set slightly lower, so it is a table rather than an extension of the worktop.
Taking the appliances in
A refrigerator, a freezer and a wine cabinet sit in one bank of full-height painted joinery, framed as cupboards rather than left standing in a gap. That is more work than it looks: the frames have to be set out around the appliance carcass and its service clearances before anything is machined, and the doors either side have to line through with the appliance doors, not with each other.
The range sits under a painted canopy in the same language, so the wall of the room is one continuous piece of joinery from corner to corner.
Light at the plinth
The plinth is lit continuously along its whole length. In a basement this does something a downlight cannot: it lifts the floor, so the units appear to stand on light rather than sit in shadow, and the room does not close in at the bottom on a dull day.
Specification
| Range | The Suffolk |
|---|---|
| Setting out | Drawn in CAD, then again at full size as a rod pinned above the bench. Machining is taken from the rod, not the screen. |
| Carcass | 18mm birch-faced plywood, glued and screwed, 9mm backs housed in rather than pinned on. Adjustable feet throughout. |
| Face frames | Solid timber, mortice and tenon, with scribed filler stiles where the joinery meets the building. |
| Drawer boxes | Solid European oak, 16mm sides, through-dovetailed front and back by hand, waxed. |
| Runners | Full-extension soft-close, rated to 40kg. |
| Painted work | Four coats, brushed by hand in our own finishing room, with the final coat cut in on site after fitting. |
| Oiled work | Hard-wax oil, applied and cut back three times. |
| Fitting | By the people who made it. Nothing is subcontracted and nothing arrives flat-packed. |
| Full specification | Door style, timber, finish reference, worktop, ironmongery and appliance schedule for this commission are available to specifiers on request. |
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