The question returns with every project. Should you take down the wall between the kitchen and the living room? Here is the framework we use to decide, without dogma, and always with you.
The argument of light.
This is often the principal reason to open. A closed kitchen frequently deprives a room of daylight. If the kitchen faces south and the living room faces north, opening up redistributes the light across the entire floor. A single large window begins to illuminate two rooms instead of one.
Conversely, in a Haussmannian apartment whose kitchen is already well exposed and whose living room is dual-aspect, opening up adds nothing, it merely breaks a layout that was working.
The argument of sociability.
Cooking becomes a moment of meeting. Children work at the table while you prepare. Guests pour themselves a drink at the island while you plate up. The open kitchen turns a technical act into a shared moment of life.
For families, for those who entertain often, for those who spend a great deal of time in the kitchen, the argument is almost unanswerable.
“The good kitchen is not the most open one. It is the one that matches the way you live.”
The argument against.
The kitchen keeps its constraints: cooking smells, dishes waiting to be washed, the passing disorder of daily life. An open kitchen exposes everything, all the time. For anyone who values visual order, it is a daily discipline, washing-up done at once, nothing left lying about.
Acoustics, too, must be considered. The extractor hood, the dishwasher, the blender become the soundtrack of the living room. A toaster popping during a dinner can be enough to break a conversation.
The intermediate solutions.
Between the traditional closed kitchen and the full open-plan, there is a whole range of solutions we use regularly:
- The semi-open kitchen: a wide passage without a door, but without taking down the entire wall. The light passes, the gaze too, but the room keeps its identity.
- The integrated sliding door: pocket-style, it disappears into the wall. Open on entertaining evenings, closed in the morning for the noise of the toaster.
- The atelier glazed partition: separates visually without blocking the light. Well sized, it is one of the loveliest solutions for a Haussmannian flat.
- The central island with partial return: creates a symbolic separation without a partition. Ideal when you want an open kitchen without losing the entire wall of storage.
Our reading.
At Maison Maray, we ask three questions before deciding:
- Do you live alone, as a couple, as a family? An open kitchen does not play the same role for someone who dines alone with a book in hand as for a family of five.
- Do you entertain often? If yes, opening up serves a purpose. If you rarely receive and prefer the intimacy of daily life, it can weigh down the living room.
- Are you tolerant of temporary visual disorder? This question is the most honest. And the most decisive.
The answer to these three questions traces 80% of the decision. The remaining 20% is the architecture of the place itself: orientation, layout, ceiling height, presence of mouldings, configuration of the wall to be taken down.
The most frequent mistake.
Opening up because it is fashionable. Over the past fifteen years, open-plan has become the implicit standard. Many clients arrive with their mind already made up: we open. Without having thought through what that changes for them.
Our role is to ask the questions before the hammer. Often, the result is an opening. Sometimes, it is a kitchen kept closed, and that is exactly what was needed.
In conclusion.
There is no universal good answer. There is your answer. And that is exactly what we are listening for at the first meeting in your home.
