Kitchen Additions

Update Your Home & Increase Livable Space

Kitchens are undoubtedly an integral part of your home life, and whether you're preparing food for a party or overseeing your kids' homework activities around a kitchen island, you probably spend a good deal of time in your kitchen.

Unfortunately, many older homes, particularly those found in the Washington, DC area, have small kitchens that are walled off from the adjacent main living space and aren't conducive to the way we live today.

Kitchen Additions for Modern Lifestyles

Kitchens in middle class homes were often built with a small footprint until the 1960s when home design took on a new form and drew inspiration from the open plan designs of Frank Lloyd Wright. And when it comes to even older homes in Washington, DC, it's rare to find a large kitchen built between 1900 and1940. A closed off kitchen was more practical back then because there might have been a maid or a cook in the kitchen; we lived more formally and kitchens reflected our lifestyles. And kitchens of that time were less attractive and more likely to produce cooking odors and were therefore closed off and kept separate from the other living areas.

But today, when kitchen appliances and our day-to-day to lives have changed so dramatically, cramped kitchens spaces do not function well and it's difficult to match the needs of a modern family with an older kitchen.

Fortunately, kitchen remodeling is usually the best way to solve this modern day dilemma. And although it is often practical and cost-effective to reconfigure existing space to gain a larger kitchen, we have worked with many homeowners who opt to build kitchen additions that provide them with the ample living space they need.

Benefits of Kitchen Additions

Kitchen additions are frequently constructed at the rear or side of a home, but zoning regulations for each project will determine what is allowed in your specific neighborhood. Ideally, the new kitchen addition will be placed next to an informal living space and dining room, thus maximizing functionality.

For a recent client, a move from Chicago to Washington, DC required a lot of adjustments, and the family included two young boys. This dictated their need for usable space and a home they absolutely loved. When they found a 1950s Colonial Revival in the Spring Valley neighborhood of Washington, DC, the tiny galley kitchen at the front of the house wasn't ideal but the perfect backyard already outfitted with a treehouse made sense for their family. That's when they contacted the Wentworth design-build team to reconfigure the space and update their home while still preserving the Colonial Revival style.

Washington, DC Home Addition Project Details

The ultimate goal was to build a two-story rear addition to accommodate a family room and new kitchen on the first floor, as well as a master bedroom, bath and walk-in closet on the second floor. As the location and size made sense, the galley kitchen would be gutted and converted to a home office. The new rear addition incorporated oak hardwood floors to blend seamlessly with the original home, while the new addition had 9' high ceilings, (a foot taller than the existing house) a design decision which gives the addition a spacious feeling. The resulting floor plan makes it easy for the family to converse between rooms and to congregate around a new oval kitchen island. Because the addition was built at the rear, the space benefits from great backyard views, where a spacious, wooded rear garden provides peaceful ambience.

A kitchen addition with a design that best suits your lifestyle can be a smart way to update your home. By working with a design-build team, you can analyze your home, relevant zoning regulations and neighborhood to design and ultimately construct a kitchen addition that makes sense for you and your home.