The Small & Stylish Kitchen, Part Two


By Paul Miller

Interior Designer

Read Time: 6 Minutes

Not all kitchens are equal, but size does not have to be a limitation. To be honest, I am a big fan of smaller kitchens, which is tantamount to treason in some areas of my profession. I have tried larger ones on for size and they work against my instinct for tight organization. Maybe you also prefer an intimate and efficient work area for creative cooking. Or if you are a cottage dweller like me, you might be limited by the scale of your house to a modest kitchen.  I can’t promise to make people who don’t like cooking into enthusiastic home chefs, but with my professional insights, I can make your small kitchen into a room you’ll love. In this second part of my Small & Stylish Kitchens series, I will get into all the nerdy details of good proportion, good lighting, and how to use pattern.

Open shelves flanking a winning feature like this large window in our Stonecleft project are a great way to draw the eye to a focal point. Photo: Emily Kallick

Open shelves flanking a winning feature like this large window in our Stonecleft project are a great way to draw the eye to a focal point. Photo: Emily Kallick

Honor Thy Small Space

First and foremost, make sure the scale and proportion of your choices are in keeping with the room. Unless you are cooking for a small army every day or plan to convert your home into a bed and breakfast, talk yourself out of that forty-eight inch commercial cooktop - if it looks out of scale in your kitchen. (It probably does.) Similarly, poorly chosen cabinet details can be visually overwhelming. The more ornamental the door styles and trimmings, the heavier the cabinetry will appear. Opt for simpler profiles and keep the trimmings emphatic enough to justify their presence without dragging the line of the ceiling down and closing in the room. 


A big visual gesture is a bit like a crescendo and in a small room, how many crescendos do you really need?

Designers use rhythm and harmony to keep your eye moving in a natural progression as it takes in a space. I think of music when I consider the movement of my eye around a room. Every time a finish changes, it’s like another instrument coming online. A big visual gesture is a bit like a crescendo and in a small room, how many crescendos do you really need? Keep things moving along rhythmically with uniformity in cabinet styles and low contrasts between cabinet finishes and wall colors. This will make a small kitchen feel airy and open. The same is true of the floors, where rugs and accent tiles might chop one already smaller surface into several, even smaller planes. A consistently sound rule of thumb in design is always less is more. 

Consider your finish colors thoughtfully. Strong contrasts can cause the gaze to stick in one place and should be used thoughtfully as punctuation or to emphasize a highlight of the architecture. You might have a nicely scaled window with a good view and choose to flank it with open shelves in a darker finish to help bring focus to the area. Or when underplaying the perimeter cabinetry is the better choice,  a darker finish or wilder countertop on a center island can be both visually grounding and interesting.  Before committing to making any one feature stand out, be critical and make sure this is really where you want the eye to come to rest.

Lighting You’ll Love

Another important consideration is your lighting design. The best kitchens have plenty of natural light, but even they require a dense and smart lighting concept for night use or rainy days.  Poorly placed or uneven lighting can drag down the look of your kitchen and make your work  less enjoyable. It is hard to over-light a kitchen, but getting it right is easier if you keep three lighting zones in mind: countertops, overhead, and accent.

The best way to light the countertops is with lights mounted below upper cabinets.  Lighting on the ceiling, depending on its placement, can cast your own shadow over your work; this problem is mitigated with under-mounted cabinet lights.  These are generally about eighteen inches above your workspace and provide uniform lighting everywhere you need it. Use LED technology to make sure the light is bright and clear, but opt for lighting that is dimmable. This is my advice no matter where it is installed in the house. 

Think of overhead lighting as a grid of recessed lights that dismisses shadows and gives the room an even brightness.  Use smaller heads but greater number of units for more uniform coverage and always make sure these are on their own switch.  When you don’t want this brighter task lighting, the accent and countertop lighting are often both functional and more pleasing. Still, for deep cleaning or more involved projects, you will always be grateful for your overhead recessed lights.


Ornamental light fixtures, like hardware on cabinets, should establish style and help clarify the personality of the space.

Accent lighting is anything from pendants over islands to sconces flanking the kitchen sink window.  It can be toe lights at the base of your lower cabinets or the LED tapes that illuminate the contents of a glass-fronted cabinet. Accent lighting is a great example of allowing form to follow function. Not only is it important to use accent lighting thoughtfully, but even the design of the fixture will need to be guided by what makes life in the kitchen satisfying.  Exposed bulbs can be interesting, but if they blind you when you glance across your island to talk with someone, that is not a great choice. Ornamental light fixtures, like hardware on cabinets, should establish style and help clarify the personality of the space.  Be less concerned about matching metal tones and more thoughtful about the scale and the originality of the fixture to make sure this detail adds both light and beauty to your space.

Getting Pattern & Texture Right

Two design fundamentals are pattern and texture. They are essential for creating a unique kitchen, no matter the scale of the space. Used thoughtfully, they can be the details that keeps you falling in love with your kitchen.  One dynamic pattern, placed perfectly, will have a more lasting impression and stay fresher looking longer than a mix of less important choices. Ask yourself if you want pattern in your sightline while you’re preparing food. This may determine whether you choose a patterned backsplash tile throughout or merely paper an accent wall.

This beautiful hand-crafted subway tile from our Bluemont House project is taken all the way up to the ceiling to create dynamic interest and keep the eye moving. Photo: Stacy Zarin Goldberg

This beautiful hand-crafted subway tile from our Bluemont House project is taken all the way up to the ceiling to create dynamic interest and keep the eye moving. Photo: Stacy Zarin Goldberg

The backsplash is a great place to start because it has some inherent containment. When using open shelves or when your backsplash opens up into an area where there are no upper cabinets, taking tile or wall treatments all the way to the ceiling can be a braver and more pleasing choice.  Think of it this way: proportion and rhythm really come down to how you visually divide up the planes of a space. When the wall opens up but the backsplash stays confined to the height set by upper cabinets, this cuts the wall into three sections horizontally: lower cabinets, backsplash, and upper wall area. Taking the backsplash treatment all the way up makes the wall from the countertop up into one large plane and keeps the eye moving.


One dynamic pattern, placed perfectly, will have a more lasting impression and stay fresher looking longer than a mix of less important choices.

When picking patterns for a small room, it can be tempting to opt for a small scale pattern, but know that larger proportions can make a better impression, such as a graphically interesting geometric or a graceful organic design. When using a small, repetitive pattern such as a penny tile, use it generously to really let it take on textural interest. Sculptural or dimensional tile adds a lot of warmth, but be mindful of ease of cleanup and look for well-sealed selections.

It’s easy to get overwhelmed when trying to figure out how to design within a small space. I hope my insights have helped make your small kitchen design a little more exciting. For my perspective on good layouts for a modest kitchen, read the first part of my Small & Stylish Kitchens series. If you think your kitchen renovation could use the help of a designer, fill out the design query below to get started.