We like the expanded kitchen of British artist Peter Nencini and textile designer Sally Nencini—formerly a garage and closed-off kitchen—redone by young, relatively unproven architect Thom Brisco. It's all done on a tight £95,000 budget—thanks to some hands-on work by the architect himself. Take a tour:
Peter and Sally live in an old Victorian house in Norwich, England, and hired Thom to transform an unused garage into a studio space for their creative work and to open up the kitchen to the garden.
One way they were able to cut costs on the cabinets: using Ikea base cabinets, paired with fronts from Naked Doors; the faucet is also from Ikea, as are the appliances.
Thom built the spruce plywood open shelving units himself in order to save on labor costs.
The flooring is “a ‘micro-cement’ finish...to unify the spaces,” says Thom.
The kitchen now enjoys access to the garden via folding glass doors; the studio space can be seen just beyond.
The studio gets a ton of natural light thanks to skylights and “a ladder-like ribbon of white wooden windows at the top of the northeastern facade,” says Thom.
Industrial shelving from BigDug is fitted with custom fabricated plywood drawers.
Thom built the unique stairs and balustrade himself on-site over the course of a couple days.
The lofted room upstairs.