THE JOY OF KØKKEN

In Brooklyn, a writer transforms her kitchen into a space of warmth and connection, blending personal memories with Scandinavian design.

- Thessaly La Force

When I decided last year to embark on gut renovating a Brooklyn apartment for my growing family, the first thing I thought about was the kitchen. I love to cook, and I love to host, and I wanted something different from the one that had been installed in our current place, of which a very chic friend of mine (French, naturally) once remarked "how American" it looked. There is, of course, no one kind of "American" kitchen, but I took her comment to mean that this one-with its generic Shaker cabinets and their decorative door pulls-looked as though it could have belonged on the set of a 1990s sitcom.

Space in any Brooklyn apartment is precious, and mine is no different. I wanted my new kitchen to be economical and low-fuss but highly practical too. It needed to possess a simple kind of beauty. There should be natural wood, minimal cabinet pulls, and a round table where the family could gather, with a pendant light hanging overhead. But I also required something harder to capture: the spirit of a Scandinavian kitchen (or, as they say in Denmark, køkken) something beyond specific design choices.