for the serious cook

A handy baking center emphasizes efficiency in this vintage-style kitchen, while a new island adds family-friendly comfort.

The scents of fresh-baked blueberry muffins and apple-walnut cake with caramel icing that waft across this Illinois kitchen are as inviting as the room’s vintage look is charming. Designed for a frequent baker, who also happens to be a mom of two, the kitchen needed to be ultrafunctional and family-friendly. Kitchen designer Rebekah Zaveloff helped the homeowners reconfigure the former galley kitchen by opening up the space to an adjacent butler’s pantry. “We made it one big room and doubled the kitchen’s size,” Zaveloff says. The layout change also allowed the homeowners to add an island—which now serves as a comfortable family hangout spot.

To create the hardworking baking zone the homeowners desired, Zaveloff located the main sink in the island rather than along the perimeter wall. “It would have been a hard sell for a lot of clients who are used to seeing the sink under the window, but they were a lot more driven by how the space was going to be used,” Zaveloff says. The new setup places a generous stretch of marble countertop (perfect for rolling out dough) right next to the range. Baking supplies—including a steel-lined drawer for flour and sugar—are stored below the countertop for easy access. A pantry across the room and a hutch in the far corner offer supplemental storage for food items, pots and pans, and everyday dishes.

A new island features a commercial-grade stainless-steel countertop. Its dark gray finish stands out against ivory perimeter cabinets.