Smart kitchens and bathrooms

Clever technology, practical solutions and innovative materials should enhance your kitchen and bathroom spaces. Choose carefully and they can make a real difference to the usability of the space

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In an ever increasingly reliant digital age, smart kitchen and bathroom solutions ideas are becoming more commonplace when designing these essential spaces in our home. Although they are primarily associated with products that offer extra connectivity via Bluetooth or WiFi, they can also relate to the materials used, lighting and storage. But are all of them necessary or are they simply gimmicks that don’t really serve any purpose?

Having spent a lot of time both choosing and using kitchens and bathrooms over the years, I’ve taken a look at what’s on offer to see the main areas where smart solutions really can make a difference. As with any new innovation, however, they only really work if it benefits the way you live.

‘Planning a smart kitchen is all about understanding how you use your kitchen,’ says Nadine Chadwick, head of marketing at Nolte Kitchens UK. ‘How do you tend to cook? What appliance do you use? Do you bake, or host, or sometimes work from there? Smart kitchens are all about utilising innovative design and technology to enhance functionality, usability and efficiency, creating a seamless and stress-free kitchen environment. So it’s only once you have a solid understanding on what your kitchen needs to do, that you can begin to understand the appliances and automations that will enhance your usability - as opposed to hinder it.’

For bathrooms, tech can also be a valuable addition to your space, but with the average lifespan of a bathroom ranging from seven to 10 years, anyone who's owned a piece of tech knows that a lot of things can change during this time.