The book covers everything you would ever need to know about kitchens, and nothing extra. The first chapter offers a rich history of kitchens going back to the Roman kitchens of Pompeii. There is a section on small kitchens loaded with clever design solutions for people who actually cook out of their small kitchens. The Kitchen Design section at the end is jam-packed with thoughtful ideas and advice on how to make the kitchen the beating heart of the home. Even the lists of types of tiles seem to point to a shared goal of creating a kitchen that not only work and is beautiful, but has the right energy for cooking well.

 

Even though the volume is twenty years old, very little of it feels dated, save for the yellow pages. Though styles change in terms of interior design (some of the textiles and artwork in people’s homes have a definite 1980s feel to them) mostly this book is filled with timeless ideas: what works and what doesn’t; what to consider when designing from scratch; what to consider when renovating; detailed descriptions of materials from flooring and countertops to shelving and lighting.

 

What was so exciting about this discovery is that this is the very same thing we’re trying to do now on The Kitchn and Apartment Therapy with our tours and other posts about design, materials and organization. Conran’s work reminds both Maxwell and me of what our goals are at Apartment Therapy, almost twenty years on.

 

The Kitchen Book also inspired me to go through the last year of our Kitchen Tours and see if I could pull together my own collection of kitchens we’ve shown on TheKitchn.com that follow this same spirit of the kitchen being the heart and soul of the home. Here are ten of my favorite tours, each of which illustrates the spirit of how the kitchen really is the heart and soul of the home.

 

 

• Adrian and Gregg’s Pacific Northwest Kitchen

 

• Jennifer and Jason’s Earthy Kitchen

 

• Chef Laurent Tourondel’s Country Kitchen

 

• Wes and Brianne’s Adorable Kitchen

 

• Gluten-Free Girl’s Warm Kitchen

 

• Lupine & Dan’s Joyful, Organized Kitchen

 

• Paule Caillat’s Splendid Paris Kitchen

 

• A Gentleman’s Working Kitchen

 

• Frank’s Swift & Stunning IKEA Remodel

 

• Matt and Blair’s Fresh Retro Kitchen

 

(Try to) Buy the out-of-print but still available book: Terence Conran’s Kitchen Book by Terence Conran

 

Cappuccino

The richness of espresso topped with frothy milk might not suggest a Catholic order devoted to poverty, but there’s a connection between cappuccino and the Capuchin monks. Members of that austere 16th century order wore a notably long and pointy hood, called a capuche. This earned them first the nickname, and then the formal name, Capuchin. The brown shade of that hood inspired the name of the coffee drink around the turn of the 20th century.

My favorite beverage, just FYI.