Kitchen remodeling requires long-view thinking and planning to balance current kitchen trends with timeless aesthetics and function.
Yes, we want to design kitchens that are trend-relevant. However, we also want to make sure clients enjoy today’s design with the same level of appreciation two, five, and ten years down the road.
2024 Kitchen Remodeling: Plan For Today & Many Tomorrows
Here are 2024 kitchen remodeling trends we have confidence will stand the test of time.
1. A solid luxury backsplash surface (sans grout lines)
The backsplash area offers the perfect opportunity to add color, texture, or pattern to a kitchen home design. So, it’s no wonder that as solid surface countertop options (granite, marble, quartz, and butcher block) increasingly stole the kitchen countertop show, homeowners continued using backsplash tile layouts and patterns above the slabs.
Today, we’re watching tile backsplash trends go by the wayside as homeowners embrace the luxurious look – and low-maintenance appeal – of solid surface luxury backsplash options. Whether you stick with the same slab pattern for continuity’s sake or choose a slab that provides captivating contrast, ditching the grout lines is a choice we can’t imagine you’ll ever regret.
2. Wood-grained cabinets (or accents)
We’ve seen a proportional relationship between contemporary kitchen design and wood cabinetry selections.
Initially, contemporary kitchens were all about sleek, streamlined, and polished – often eliminating wood for glossier, monochromatic cabinets and finishes. So, as contemporary trends increased, the desire for wood decreased.
Then, people realized that many contemporary kitchens lacked the warmth inherently part of a space historically considered “the heart of the home.” Now, as an understandable counter to the pendulum swing, contemporary kitchen designs increasingly leverage wood-grained cabinets and other wood finishes to strike a better – and warmer – balance.
As we head into 2024, we encourage homeowners to think about the ways natural wood cabinetry or wood-grained accents can enhance the contemporary or modern kitchen space, even if you use them for only a few accent cabinets – like part of the wine cabinet display, coffee and tea station, or the cabinets used to house cookbooks or seasonal kitchenware displays.
3. Extending the kitchen into the outdoor space
If you enjoy an indoor/outdoor lifestyle (we’ve yet to meet an Orlando client who doesn’t), brainstorm ways to extend the kitchen into the outdoor area. The idea of outdoor kitchen design used to seem like a separate category of home design – more in alignment with landscape planning. Now, outdoor kitchen and dining spaces frequently fall into the kitchen design sector.
These days, we help clients find ways to remodel their kitchens so the communal kitchen space fluidly expands into an outdoor patio, dining, and social area. When you go that route, the inclusion of wood-grained accents and nature-inspired color palettes makes even more sense to maintain visual continuity.
4. Bigger (and bolder) is better when it comes to islands
Heading into 2024, the kitchen island continues to steal the design spotlight with newer and better innovations. What was considered a desirable accessory has now become the central kitchen showpiece.
Islands take up more square footage than ever before. When space allows, many homeowners include two separate islands or build two islands perpendicular to one another (forming a T), with one as the functional workstation and the other as the dine-in, homework, or hang-out space.
Regardless of your island’s footprint, design features to consider include:
- Optimizing island storage.
- Ensuring there are plenty of under cabinet outlets to support charging stations for guests.
- Resisting the urge to follow “trends” and truly personalize your island to match the household’s daily flow.
- Customizing islands to accommodate work-from-home spaces for adults and children.
- Wrap-around seating vs. all-in-a-row seating.
- Designing for “the island triangle,” or how the kitchen island workflow is a subset of the kitchen workflow.
- Visual impact (as islands get bigger, their esthetics comprise more visual space, which deserves special attention).
5. Integrated and layered lighting design
Finally, design innovations have really flipped the script on how kitchen lighting “works” from household to household. One thing we can all agree on is that integrated and layered lighting is the way to go. Low-profile lighting fixtures mean we now think about lighting from the ceiling down or from the ground up.
LED lights and dimmable options mean we can make your kitchen glow in ways it never has before. That said, while some design enthusiasts boast that 2024 will see more streamlined lighting – with a decline in punchy overhead pendants or suspended lighting features – we don’t think that’s the case.
Clients should feel free to go as big or bold as they want – and as the design accommodates – but a demure and barely there approach is also available in ways it has never been before.
Get the Most From 2024 Kitchen Remodeling Trends with Creative Construction Group
Schedule a design consultation with Details Construction Group to begin discussing your 2024 kitchen project. As design-build experts, we help clients balance the appeal of contemporary trends while integrating design tenets that keep your kitchen relevant for years and decades to come.
