Life’s good when you are dancing across the kitchen floor, late at night in the dim of the refrigerator door light or basking in the warm sunshine of a Sunday morning.

“Life’s Good,” I responded to a colleague as we passed one another in the hallway. A response I didn’t really think too much about in that moment. We often say things like this as a quick passing response, reassuring ourselves and those around us that we are fine, life’s manageable and good. The chaos that is our “now normal” with two little one’s two-and-a-half and under had calmed down at this point, well for a few weeks anyway, and I’d found my groove again. I was baking up a storm, cooking almost every evening,  and I was so excited about decorating our new home.

For me cooking, baking and decorating are signs that I’m in a good place, that there’s a sense of “balance” in my life because these are some of the things that bring me joy. That’s why when I had the opportunity to cook along-side celebrity chef Chuck Hughes in the LG Kitchen Suite and discuss design ideas with Jane Lockhart of Jane Lockhart Design, I was more than thrilled.

I was warmly welcomed into the LG kitchen by Chuck and some of his colleagues and let’s be honest for a second, I was in stitches the whole time. Cooking with Chuck was a blast, we clicked and jived in the kitchen! He and I bonded over a twist on an old-fashioned recipe that he’d developed, our children who are around the same age, and the innovative new Kitchen Suite  that LG has come out with. He and I both have young boys who are just as interested in being in the kitchen as we are and when he told me about the “French Door with InstaView and Door-in-Door” I was kind of excited about the possibilities; like a little separate space in the fridge for your little ones; basically a separate door, within the door, that lights up and could be used for toddler-accessible snacks.  He also brought so much fun to the cooking experience, reminding me of the many reasons why I love to cook and the things that make me happy in the kitchen.

When I think about the perfect kitchen space, flow, functionality and design all come to mind.  While cooking in the LG kitchen suite with Chuck, I learned how efficient Electric Slide-in Range was, bringing the water to boil for our jardinière so quickly; something that really matters when you’re trying to cook during the week and need to get that water for your pasta boiling as quickly as possible. Flow in the kitchen is also so important, I like to call it the “dance in the dream kitchen”. I like to feel like I can dance across the space, grabbing what I need with ease and fluidity.

After cooking with Chuck, Jane Lockhart and I got to spend some time talking about design and fluidity in the kitchen. We talked about the contemporary idea of zone-based designs in the kitchen, which focus on how the space is divided based on what you are doing; for example: washing spaces, cooking spaces and prep spaces. We also chatted about our favourite design when it came to fluidity in the kitchen and agreed that it was the galley, a wide-luxurious galley, with lots of space for two, or more, to wash, prep and cook. Our conversations kept going from there and we got to talking about how the kitchen has evolved overtime and become another gathering space, which means we can consider this in the design.

If we think about the kitchen as a gathering space, a place where guests will gather before or after a meal, we also want to consider the way the space looks and how it represents who we are. I love when my kitchen is also open to the entertaining space, or when it becomes one of the entertaining spaces in our home, but I’ve never considered my appliances to be features and ways to decorate the space until I sat down with Jane and talked more about the “French Door Refrigerator with InstaView and Door-in-Door. “This Refrigerator door can actually be a place for you to display the things that you love,” Jane suggested, she went on to explain how “you could put beautiful desserts or flowers in the InstaView Door” to share a bit of your personality with your guests, something I’d never considered before and now think is such a fantastic idea.

The LG Kitchen Suite truly is the kitchen of my dreams, a beautiful mixture of innovative engineering, functionality and sleek design. When baking and cooking bring you a sense of balance, the way they do for me, life’s good when you get the opportunity to dance across the kitchen of your dreams.

Would love to hear what your favourite thing is about your kitchen or what you would want in your dream kitchen?

xo

Vanessa

*Disclosure: Companies featured often sponsor my posts. If I love the company or products I am more than happy to share them with you!