Designing a moveable, hand-built kitchen for a 150 year old cottage
The moveable ash kitchen.
Another hand-built, bespoke kitchen has just been completed by Anselm Fraser Furniture at a cottage with an agricultural heritage dating from 1850 on the outskirts of Edinburgh. The refurbished kitchen with its versatile, new hand-built pieces of furniture replaces old brick-built kitchen units.
Anselm Fraser Furniture makes and restores bespoke furniture and handmade kitchens, and operates alongside the 25 year old Chippendale International School of Furniture, near Gifford in East Lothian.
The kitchen has been designed and built by Anselm Fraser and Alan McGovern, one of the School’s tutors, with design ideas from their clients, David and Vickie Macdonald. It has been built as free-standing pieces of furniture to fit in with and complement their own antique furniture.
The kitchen has a 2.5 metre movable island unit and a mobile trolley unit. This means that the components can easily be moved aside for access or rearranged, and could even be put into the back of a furniture removal van (although that is not the intention!).
David Macdonald says: “Having been inspired by some Danish furniture, we approached Anselm with a reasonable idea of the aesthetic design we wanted. He did the construction design so it was very much a team effort.
“We were originally thinking about using a pale wood like sycamore but were advised that it would mark too easily (particularly important as we have young children). So, we settled on olive ash which is more practical.”
Olive ash from East Lothian, cut and dried at Anselm Fraser Furniture, has been used to create the chunky 40mm thick work tops with interesting colours. The drawers are also in olive ash and those in the island have a push-me pull-you feature, allowing them to be accessed from both sides.
Ash island with push-me pull-you drawers with subtle cut handles.
The innovative design includes a gap round each drawer, creating an illusion of floating, and the cut handles ensure a smooth, uncluttered look. The wood is finished in three coats of boiled linseed oil, preventing chips and marks and enhancing the olive ash.
“We’re very pleased with our new kitchen”, David says. “The pieces of furniture meet our requirements and work well. In particular, we really like the aesthetic appearance of the island with its drawers. The construction is traditional but with a modern design.”
For more information, please visit the Anselm Fraser Furniture website or call 01620 810680.
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