KXN Kitchen System

Life happens in the kitchen. The activity hub of the home, it generates mess and moisture— food spillages, grease, steaming dishwashers and water that inevitably never stays in the sink. In today’s culture of disposable mass-consumerism, the value of long-lasting design that withstands the test of everyday use is essential. Our challenge was to design a kitchen that could endure daily wear and tear and look great in decades to come— it had to be moisture resistant, be easy to clean, to work in harmony with the surrounding architecture, be affordable and be easy to replace parts.

KXN began with steel uprights, shelves and backs. In 2018 our journey to increase performance and sustainability began by removing laminate. Our first objective was a Front that could withstand heat and moisture, was light enough for hardware but survive the knocks and be easily cleaned. The Drawers had to endure a flooded sink or pot tipping over. Moving away from laminate for the Upright internals would increase durability and assembly accuracy whilst reducing cost and weight for easier handling. Over 6 years these 3 goals produced robust steel and aluminium components— continuous iteration increased durability, resonance, and assembly efficiency.

A laminate cabinetry box Kitchen is the status quo around the world. Whilst more affordable, there is significant wastage in the production process and they’re highly susceptible to irreversible damage. With KXN we strive to raise the bar in the building industry, change the culture around the value of lasting design and the environmental performance of a Kitchen, so they pass from owner to owner rather than ending up in landfill. There is an under-appreciated sense of joy when your Kitchen still looks great having survived another year of the daily grind, wild children and raucous dinner parties.

It became clear in our design journey that the process of delivering KXN to the end user was equally as important as the product itself. A new build or renovation is a complex process— it involves many moving parts, countless people and changing deadlines in an industry awash with cost overruns, uncertified Tradespeople and Clients managing their own projects to save costs. The joy and meticulousness in the building experience was lacking. The planning and logistics surrounding the production and delivery needed to have the same considered, innovative approach. Over 12 years of delivering Kitchens to building sites across the country, from the 25th floor in the city office, to the bach on a remote island accessed only by boat, we have honed our processes so Clients know what to expect from us and what we will need from them. We have refined our Terms & Conditions, perfected Plumbing, Electrical and Construction schematics on our Sign Off Drawings, sharpened our communications, developed extensive Client and Trade checklists and designed a reusable, collapsible KXN crate transport system. These all help to bring joy to the process, making things run smoothly, preventing delays and extra costs and ensuring damage free transport.