Teeny Tiny NYC Kitchen

Do you have the internal battle, like I do, of small, efficient city/apartment living vs. sprawling suburban living? I go back and forth almost daily. A huge part of me wants nothing more than a giant old house to renovate and decorate, complete with a garage (*sigh*) and a lush backyard for the kids and a garden. Some days though, I think about how great it is to live in a small space that's (relatively) easy to keep clean and limits the amount of stuff/junk I can fill it with.

Am I crazy?

Anyway, I was having one of those moments yesterday when I revisited this kitchen in the House Beautiful archives.


The owner, Stephanie Stokes, an interior designer, planned out this 48 square-foot kitchen to the last quarter of an inch, literally.

The teeny tiny NYC kitchen's footprint, complete with a family coat of arms! So fancy.

She cut her marble counters half size so she could have the extra inch of vertical space!!


And here's a little interesting piece of information to file away - in the home owner's many years of designing kitchens, she has found that shelves in lower cabinets are mostly a complete waste of space. She almost always prefers to do all drawers on the lower cabinets and shelves just on the uppers. Interesting, right? I can totally see where she is coming from. My lower shelves are always disorganized and a pain to use.


Pictures like these, above and below, make my heart sing. Wouldn't there be such a feeling of organization and efficiency in a space like this? A place for everything and everything in its place.


So what do you think about the urban vs. suburban debate?
{I'd actually really like to know - my husband's graduating this year and we are trying to figure it all out...}