Light and Bright Kitchen Addition Extends Into the Backyard
Adding a kitchen and dining area in back creates an open, peaceful living space with garden views
A large garden is a great asset in a London property, but when architect Paulius Zakevicius spied the 92-foot-long garden behind this flat, he knew it offered more than the chance to plant a vegetable patch. Borrowing some of this generous garden space allowed him to extend the home out from the back wall by about 15 feet to create a large, open-plan kitchen, dining and living space that enjoys plenty of light.
“When my wife, Lina, and I bought the property two years ago, it had a very shabby kitchen at the back,” he says. “We demolished this and an old bathroom, then made a full-width opening in the wall and extended back.” This new space allowed Zakevicius to rethink the rest of the flat, too, creating two bedrooms and a bathroom in the original Victorian part of the property. “We moved all the living space to the rear to be near the garden,” he says. “We have a nice connection with the outside now, and it’s very quiet. Life is good at the back!”
“When my wife, Lina, and I bought the property two years ago, it had a very shabby kitchen at the back,” he says. “We demolished this and an old bathroom, then made a full-width opening in the wall and extended back.” This new space allowed Zakevicius to rethink the rest of the flat, too, creating two bedrooms and a bathroom in the original Victorian part of the property. “We moved all the living space to the rear to be near the garden,” he says. “We have a nice connection with the outside now, and it’s very quiet. Life is good at the back!”
The addition stretches across the full width of the flat. “You drop down about [3 feet] to this part of the house,” Zakevicius says. “We built the extension at ground level to increase the connection between the garden and the house.“
The couple chose a clean, minimalist look for the kitchen. “There’s a monochrome feel to the cabinets, with just one darker element,” Zakevicius says. “We went for quite reasonably priced units, then spent more on the worktops.” There’s a stainless steel work surface on the cooking side of the kitchen and a white solid-surface countertop on the peninsula. The vintage stools were originally used in a school science lab.
Kitchen cabinets: Ikea
Kitchen cabinets: Ikea
“We wanted some statement lighting over the dining table,” says Zakevicius. “This side of the [addition] feels like quite a big space, but the table will always be here, so it made sense to hang lights over it.”
Zakevicius designed the wall lights himself. “I thought, ‘What if you just stuck two bulbs in the wall?’” he says. “I asked the electrician to fit sockets, then we added mirrored bulbs to give soft, shaded light.”
Slope 50 black pendants: Nordlux, at Divine Lighting
Zakevicius designed the wall lights himself. “I thought, ‘What if you just stuck two bulbs in the wall?’” he says. “I asked the electrician to fit sockets, then we added mirrored bulbs to give soft, shaded light.”
Slope 50 black pendants: Nordlux, at Divine Lighting
The kitchen opens to a small internal courtyard.
The courtyard allows light into the rear bedroom, as well as into the kitchen and living space. The flooring throughout is a pale engineered oak, which keeps the look light.
Zakevicius chose sliding doors rather than folding ones. “Folding doors look brilliant once they’re fully open, but when they’re closed, they have a lot of sections,” he says. “There would have been about six sections in an opening this big, which would carve up the view.”
These sliding doors have just three sections, with the central piece sliding for access to the garden. “They are enjoyable to use, and this opens to the garden more than enough,” Zakevicius says. “The idea of the seamless transition still works, and this is less [drafty] than fully open folding doors can be.”
Zakevicius used simple pretreated roofing battens to cover the garden wall. “It was a cost-effective solution,” he says.
These sliding doors have just three sections, with the central piece sliding for access to the garden. “They are enjoyable to use, and this opens to the garden more than enough,” Zakevicius says. “The idea of the seamless transition still works, and this is less [drafty] than fully open folding doors can be.”
Zakevicius used simple pretreated roofing battens to cover the garden wall. “It was a cost-effective solution,” he says.
Zakevicius designed in a skylight above the doors, running the full width of the space. “The whole point here is that we are dead-north-facing, so the [addition] needed to catch a lot of light,” he says. “This really worked. We never feel we’re living on the north side. It feels really bright!”
Midcentury Danish dining chairs sit around an oak table bought on eBay.
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Midcentury Danish dining chairs sit around an oak table bought on eBay.
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Adding On: 10 Ways to Expand Your House Out and Up
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Who lives here: Architect Paulius Zakevicius and his wife, Lina
Location: North London, England
Year renovated: 2015
Architect: Paulius Zakevicius of Flik Design Ltd.
Size: 22 by 18 feet (6.8 by 5.4 meters); part of a flat with two bedrooms and one bathroom
The addition at the rear of the flat offers privacy as well as space. “We have neighbors above the bedrooms but not here at the back,” says Zakevicius. “It’s more private and quiet here.”
Brass pendant lights hang over the central workspace. “We wanted to add in an extra material here, either concrete, copper or brass,” Zakevicius says. The lights are suspended from a wall over the peninsula, rather than from the ceiling. “If they were hanging from the ceiling, it would make the light fall quite far back in the kitchen,” he says. “Here, they’re more useful. They are just above head height and not too big, so they don’t block the view through to the garden.”
Flori brass pendant lights: Rowen & Wren