A Scandi-style kitchen is more than just a place to cook; it reflects a way of life deeply ingrained in Scandinavian culture. This interior design trend is based on bringing loved ones together over home-cooked meals. It’s a sanctuary where functionality meets personality.
Clean lines, bright spaces, and natural materials characterise the essence of Scandinavian design. This aesthetic blends minimalist elegance with practicality, creating a warm and inviting atmosphere. Suppose you want to craft your own Scandi kitchen.
In that case, it’s essential to understand the key features and principles that define this style, ensuring that every element serves a purpose while exuding charm and comfort.
What Is A Scandi-Style Kitchen?
In Scandinavia, the kitchen is typically the most important room in a home. It’s rooted in the Scandinavian way of living, where inviting friends and family over is a regular thing where food is prepared at home rather than ordering a takeaway.
The kitchen is the place to enjoy a slow way of living, indulge in all-day cooking and grind coffee in the early morning.
With interior design, it’s often a question of the overall look versus practicality, but in most cases, it’s easy to get both. While the Scandinavian style calls for minimalism, in its essence, it’s personality combined with functionality.
You might wonder where this trend in interior design comes from. The Scandi-style kitchen emerged as a response to the region’s unique way of life.
This design trend dates back to the early 20th century and was influenced by the values of togetherness and a deep appreciation for the culinary arts.
It gained prominence as Scandinavian households welcomed friends and family for home-cooked gatherings, prioritising the joy of cooking over ordering takeout.
The Scandi kitchen embodies the spirit of slow living, where coffee is ground in the quiet morning hours, and meals are prepared with care.
This style’s popularity transcends age groups, resonating with those who seek a balance between aesthetics and functionality. Its minimalist ethos, defined by clean lines and a bright ambience, sets it apart from other interior design styles.
While Scandi’s design hones in on using natural materials and a muted colour palette, it stands out for its emphasis on practicality.
For the past couple of years, the Scandi-style kitchen’s popularity has increased, partially thanks to the rising global interest in sustainability and eco-friendliness.
The trend towards integrating nature into homes has brought light woods like limed oak and limed ash to the forefront of Scandi kitchen design.
Moreover, its timeless appeal has found a new home on social media platforms, where enthusiasts share their Scandi-inspired spaces, making it a favoured choice for those seeking beauty and purpose in their homes.
What Features Make A Kitchen Feel Scandinavian?
Scandinavian kitchens are a harmonious blend of form and function, where the art of living meets impeccable design. In crafting the perfect Scandi kitchen, certain features and design principles reign supreme. These elements transform a mere cooking space into a haven of elegance and practicality.
From the importance of natural materials to the allure of vintage accents, from the essential role of lighting to the evolving trends in Scandi design, here are the fundamental interior design rules for a Scandinavian kitchen:
- Form follows function to create a sleek-looking and practical room. The interior combines clean lines, a bright ambience, and natural materials. Every design element should relate first to its intended function and then its aesthetics.
- Mix one or two vintage touches. For example, a contemporary kitchen with a vintage-style black range for cooking is a perfect combination.
- Use rustic tables as kitchen islands. Wishbone chairs fit perfectly for seating around it. This combo creates a great spot to read while enjoying breakfast in the morning.
- White subway tile is a common design choice for a backsplash in Scandinavian kitchens. It’s often sealed with white or grey grout.
- Implement a small area rug to keep the appearance cosy. Scandinavia is a country with cold weather, and such little touches of comfort will help you create the feeling of a long and happy life.
- Hood kitchen lighting is essential. Colours serve a purpose to reflect light and make the space brighter, but they can only do some of the work. Think of incorporating mood lighting into layers for ambience.
- A plentiful of natural materials is key for Scandinavian kitchens. Think of wooden flooring and wood or natural stone countertops as a starting point. After that, think of layering with accessories packed with texture in muted natural colours. This will give you the desired practical but beautiful Scandi look.
- Scandinavian kitchens implementlots of practical solutions. A lot of storage in a minimalist design is key. A single wall of kitchen cabinets with no visible cabinet knobs or handles works perfectly. This interior design allows excellent storage space, and it’s one of its features that makes it so appealing. Scandinavian kitchens are usually designed with designated space for everything, enabling perfect organisation. Behind the sleek cabinet doors and drawers, storage should be maximally efficient with reasonable organisation solutions. Think of partitions for flatware, inserts for specific items stored in individual rooms or pull-out storage for pans.
- Think of light colours. As a rule, this style is simple, and the prominent use of soft hues is for a practical reason. The Scandinavian countries are dark in the winter, and light colours and materials reflect light optimally. There’s one colour strongly associated with Scandinavian style: Scandinavian blue. It’s a muted blue mixed with grey to give it a toned-down, desaturated look. Black, white, grey and neutrals are a great way to mix primary Scandinavian colours.
Remember that Scandinavian design is not a static concept, and it’s often changing. Currently, the focus is on the eco-appeal of the kitchen. Design is moving towards light wood, such as limed oak and ash.
This is in line with the movement toward integrating nature into the house. A major trend for Scandi kitchens is a focus on sustainability and awareness of the environment.
How Do You Make A Scandi Kitchen?
To make your kitchen Scandi, you’ll have to go for what the Scandinavians call “hygge” – a place of cosiness.
The word is applied to everyday objects, which make you want to cook, bake and serve tea. “Hygge” is the Danish lifestyle concept of living well with simplicity and comfort at home.
It’s not so much about decorating but the creation of comfort that gives the people in the room the feeling of care and nourishment. It should be both functional and beautiful.
The first step towards a hygge kitchen is to clean and organise everything and think ahead. No matter how much storage you have in a kitchen, it’s never enough.
Don’t go down on storage space. Have as much as possible while keeping the style minimalistic and airy. Instead of having visually heavy cupboards above the counter, think about what you want to store in your kitchen.
Opt for open shelving above the counter if you need extra space because it works better visually than closed cupboards.
If your room is large enough, implement a kitchen island. However, remember that if your kitchen is tiny, it can quickly become overcrowded. You should be able to walk and work around the island comfortably.
Alternatively, consider a movable island cart. It’ll give you an extra counter and shelving and can be easily put away. A vintage garage-style shelf or an old wooden chopping block fits perfectly into the interior of a Scandi kitchen.
The materials are also important in a Scandi kitchen. You can introduce different materials through wooden fronts, stone and tiles as a backsplash, an entire wall, or flooring.
The modern Scandinavian kitchen no longer has all-white countertops. Although it’s still a dominant colour, darker blues and green tones, combined with natural materials, have also been implemented.
Besides wood and stones, there are also metals, linoleum, marble and stainless steel. The common feature of these natural materials is that they add warmth, authenticity and personality.
Choosing the right countertop for your kitchen is the most crucial decision you have to make when designing a Scandi kitchen. It’s essential for the overall expression while being one of the heaviest on the budget, especially if you choose a natural stone.
Think of its overall visual look, its functionality and practicality. No countertops are maintenance-free, so choosing depends on how much you’re prepared to clean.
Technological advancements have brought more appliances into the kitchen. This change has also been reflected in the design and choice of materials of the Scandi interior design.
Technology has advantages but doesn’t always match the modern Scandinavian style. Avoid appliance overload unless you’re trying to go for a more industrial style. Most appliances should be built-in and hidden with the same fronts as the drawers and cabinets.
Lamps should be easy to clean for a Scandinavian kitchen, so the best choices are glass ones. They also give a soft yet workable light. The exposed bulb also fits perfectly in this interior style. The best option is lamps that provide a decent light source for optimal cooking conditions and ensure you have enough light on every part of your working surface.
While creating your Scandi kitchen may sound exciting and fun, it may be more challenging. Even if you have experience with home improvement and DIY projects, sometimes it’s good to rely on the help of professionals.
A skilled local handyman can be your best ally if you want your Scandi transformation project to work. Their expertise in interior design and craftsmanship can breathe life into your vision.
They can play a pivotal role in infusing your kitchen with that distinct Scandi charm by helping you adhere to the fundamental design principles.
Professionals can ensure that every element of your kitchen serves a practical purpose and contributes to its overall aesthetic appeal.
A handyman’s guidance can make all the difference, whether it’s the inclusion of vintage accents or the careful selection and installation of natural materials like wooden flooring and countertops.
What Is A Japandi Kitchen?
Japandi is a fusion between the Japanese zen style and the Scandinavian style. Even though these nations are far apart geographically, the styles have a lot of similarities, and they merge very well together.
Like Scandi, Japandi also implements clean lines and simple shapes in the interior.
In a Japandi home, you’ll never find clutter because it’s a very minimalistic style. The rooms aren’t overfurnished in any way, and every item is curated for a specific function. It’s also a very grounded style, so most furniture is very low, open and close to the ground.
Like the Scandinavian interior style, Japandi is all about natural materials. In a Japandi space, there are never any plastic or artificial materials.
The most common material for this style is many different types of wood. It also uses rotten caning, seagrass details, stone, concrete, glass and metal. The soft furnishings implement cotton, linen, jute and sisal.
These natural materials keep your home cool in the summer and warm in the winter.
The Japandi colour palette consists of warm neutrals. This design choice serves the same purpose as in Scandi interiors – to bring more light into the space during the dark and cold months when there isn’t much of it.
When this Scandinavian feature is merged with the Japanese style, which is more about muted, earthy tones, Japandi still creates a neutral colour palette ranging from light and bright to muted and rusty.
A Japandi home is mainly kept to the bright side, but there need to be a few things in darker colours to ground everything and create dimension and contrast. The walls and floors are bright and light, while the details are in black and dark brown, rusty tones.
The Japandi style has a specific, tranquil, and cosy feel. When the Japanese zen is combined with the Scandi hygge, it’s all about feeling comfortable in your living space.
The rooms are calm and relaxing, making you feel more earth-bound. Not many elements can grab your attention and distract you, so breathing and focusing is easy.
The Japandi style embraces finding beauty in imperfections. The philosophy behind this is the wabi-sabi, which refers to a vision applied to objects, which alludes to beauty in imperfections and the value of the passage of time. It openly accepts the deterioration and transience of existence, both human and material.
The style also emphasises quality over quantity. You don’t need a lot of possessions but just a few curated items to furnish and decorate your space. Each of them should have a purpose and a function.
This is why this style allows you to decide what is and isn’t valuable. Many items in a Japandi home are handmade or handcrafted instead of factory-produced.
In its essence, Japandi is the best of Japanese Zen Minimalism and Scandinavian Hygge. This interior style creates a modern yet cosy vibe many people gravitate toward. It’s warm, serene, casual and sustainable, and it’s clear why it’s so popular. Try it out if you’re unsure which style is right for you.
Conclusion
Whether you’re embarking on a kitchen renovation journey or creating one from scratch, the Scandi kitchen is a design choice that promises a space to cook and a haven of comfort and connection.
With the guidance of a skilled handyman and a keen eye for Scandinavian design, you can transform your kitchen into a Scandi-inspired masterpiece, where simplicity meets serenity, and every meal becomes a cherished moment.
