Let the Sun Shine in: How to Brighten Your Kitchen With Natural Light

Remodelling your kitchen or starting from scratch? Don’t underestimate the transformation natural light can make to your culinary zone

4 August 2014
Houzz Australia Contributor. Principal of DE atelier Architects. I live and breathe architecture with my lovely husband and fellow architect, Leon Eyck. We travelled the world together seeking gastronomic delights and beautiful architecture. Homeward bound, we set up our practice and started our little family. My passion is family and the unique architecture that makes a home and soul for a family.
Houzz Australia Contributor. Principal of DE atelier Architects. I live and breathe... More
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Are you frustrated with your current kitchen and screaming out for a little sunshine to light your way while you cook up a storm? I can understand your predicament. Whether your kitchen is large and spacious, tucked in a corner, galley-style or L-shape, there are myriad options to introduce light. The best source of light comes free from nature. Task and pendant lighting only go so far. Sunlight should be a primary design consideration, and a well-thought-out electrical lighting layout should simply complement the overall concept.

In my home, the kitchen is the social hub of the family – a place to gather, create and share a meal. Many a cuppa or vino is shared with friends over the kitchen bench. If this is a dark and cold space, it can be uncomfortable and not a room you want to inhabit. Here are nine clever ways to enliven the culinary zone with sunlight.
Contemporary Kitchen Merricks
1. Add grand skylights
Adding a skylight can make a dramatic change to the light and ambiance of your kitchen. This one has achieved fabulous illumination through three, boxed-out, skylights. The skylights are set at the roof level, and the wall cladding returns into the box extending the impression of space over the kitchen. The sun floods down the rear wall, blasting light across the workspace. This option may cost a few dollars, and you need to consider your roof structure and form first. A more modest choice would be to install solar tubes that reflect light through a tube in your roof over the kitchen bench.

See more glorious benefits of skylights
Midcentury Kitchen by DE atelier Architects
DE atelier Architects
2. Eliminate overheads
Removing the overhead cupboards and extending windows up to the ceiling can vastly improve the amount of light, shown in this simple, clean-form kitchen. Sitting in the north-east corner of the dwelling saturates the kitchen in morning light, a great way to start the day. The reconstituted stone runs into the window, hiding the timber sill, creating a seamless junction of glazing to bench. The corner windows extend the breadth of the kitchen and opens up the vista to the garden beyond. Another method to lighten your space would be to remove blinds and curtains to windows as an economical way to let in more sunlight.
Contemporary Kitchen by Richard Cole Architecture
Richard Cole Architecture
3. Create a floating sensation
Most people would consider a long narrow space a challenge in design and functionality. The walk-through kitchen is shared circulation between the culinary zone and the passage, linking two areas of the home. This design has embraced the limited space and created a bright, airy and transparent environment. The floating timber overhead shelves are suspended between glazing vertically, and timber columns horizontally. The floating sensation is emphasised by the angled clerestory windows, and the timber roof appears to hover over the kitchen. There is plenty of space to pull up a stool at this bench to enjoy the water views. A highly successful walk-through kitchen.

More: Floating Furniture: Can You Handle the Suspense?
Contemporary Dining Room by Smart Design Studio
Smart Design Studio
4. Create a void
The hero of this kitchen is the double volume, curvacious void with the glass curtain wall beyond. The first floor is peeled back, creating the void and basking the galley kitchen in natural light. It demonstrates beautiful kitchen design in a restricted space. The meal table is a fixed piece of joinery, and you can spy an additional service bench behind. The galley bench is raised off the ground, and the timber floor tucks under giving the impression that the bench is floating. The full-height windows open the room to the view of the low-level, elegant, rock and moss garden, enhancing the sense of space.
Contemporary Kitchen by Site Specific Designs
Site Specific Designs
5. Let the outside in
The floor-to-ceiling glass stacking doors provide the sole daylight to this kitchen. With the doors slid open, the culinary zone expands onto the balcony. The central kitchen has been cleverly located as a freestanding element. The suspended bulkhead, (see how it is not directly attached to the ceiling) defines the work zone and provides direct task lighting over the bench. The extension of the floor tiles and white ceiling from inside to outside further blurs the boundaries, creating an illuminated kitchen from a single light source.

Discover how to connect indoor and outdoor areas
Contemporary Kitchen by DE atelier Architects
DE atelier Architects
6. Add a transparent splashback
The transparent splashback creates a picture window to the lightwell, which is teeming with lush green bamboo. The deliberate placement of the window between the counter and the overhead cupboards allows maximum storage as well as daylight concentrated on the workbench. When peering out of this window, your view is focused down to the vegetation, blocking the multi-storey office building opposite. You can install a glass splashback behind the cooktop, too. It needs to be fire-resistant glass to comply with building regulations though, and is relatively expensive.
Contemporary Kitchen by Wolveridge Architects
Wolveridge Architects
7. Consider a mirror
With no external wall to be seen in your kitchen and no opportunity for skylights, where do you go? This designer has ingeniously employed the use of mirrors. They extend full-height above the rear bench and reflect the daylight and the garden. It is a visual trick, but it works to enlarge the sense of space and light in this kitchen. The detail of dividing the mirror with vertical timber strips also reduces the cost as opposed to a large single mirror. You could consider replacing your splashback or overhead doors with a mirror and see the transformation and reflection of light in your kitchen.

See more of this home
Contemporary Kitchen Pavilion House
8. Stick to a light colour palette
The clerestory windows illuminating the breadth of the kitchen and living zone are the saviour of this kitchen. A simplified light colour palette of white carcass and white, grey-veined marble work beautifully together. Additionally, wrapping the rear bench stone up the wall to form the splashback is a winner. The solid timber bench to the island adds a lovely warmth to the space and marries with the timber floors.
It is important not to discount secondary daylight when renovating your kitchen. Borrowing light from another room, taking out a wall or adding a cut-out can make a big difference if your kitchen is room-locked with no direct sun.

More: Kitchen Inspiration: 13 Wonderfully White Kitchens
Contemporary Kitchen by Watershed Architects
Watershed Architects
9. Add some sunny hues
This striking colour palette of charcoal and white coupled with sunny, bright yellow pendants is a winning combination. The large glazed window provides great natural light from the side, and tucked up higher you can see a peak of the higher-level glazing, directly lighting the centre of the space.

MORE
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Sensational Skylights: Light Up Your Home Life

TELL US
Integration of culinary zone and vistas to the landscape have been a successful theme across these kitchen designs. It has made an enormous impact on soul, light and vastness of the kitchen. We’d love to hear how you’ve brought fabulous daylight into your own kitchen.
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DE atelier Architects
Hi Janet, they are a flexible tube, reaching from your ceiling to the roof. As they are flexible they can bend around structure in the roof so you can position it in the spot you would like to light. The light material of the tube reflects the sunlight down the tunnel. Effectively looks like a circular light in your ceiling. You can find some more info on the site: http://www.solatube.com/ (PS I have no affiliation with this company and there would be other companies that supply a similar product.)
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Joanna Tovia
All stunning. I wonder if glass splashbacks require a lot of maintenance though - there are two sides to clean!
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DE atelier Architects
Hi Joanna, if you install a glass splash back behind your stove, splashes and oil can cause more cleaning but does look great (when clean). If you install above your bench (not behind stove) it is really no different to having a window at your kitchen bench, so I don't think the maintenance is too big an issue. Cheers, Briony
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