 Welcome back (or welcome for the first time). Last week, we talked about 5 Wellness tips that you can incorporate into your Kitchen design. If you didn't check that out yet, you can find it here. At the beginning of that post, I posed a challenge to you. If you tried it we would love to hear if you saw any changes in your overall wellness, mood or anxiety level? Today we are going to expand on the topic of "Wellness In Your Kitchen" and share with you five more tips! A lot of us are spending more time inside our homes these days especially inside our kitchens. As we are trying to focus on creating healthy lifestyles with our food choices, it makes sense that your kitchen design should also be supporting these lifestyle changes. Our focus on meal-prepping and cleaning/eating more veggies, as well as finding ways of preventing the spread of germs within our homes, is becoming more prevalent. So, whether you’re looking to renovate your entire kitchen this Fall or just upgrade parts of your space, consider these five tips to help support your healthy lifestyle. 1. Touchless Faucets This is an easy change that you can retrofit into your existing Kitchen or something you can include in your design for your new Kitchen. Incorporating a touchless faucet into your Kitchen can increase the efficiency in your daily kitchen activities, as well as prevent the spread of germs by touching fewer surfaces before washing your hands.  2. Plants The study of biophilia (love of life) in design is becoming an emerging (yet timeless) trend. It centers around the idea that incorporating elements of nature into the kitchen will help reduce stress and increase well-being. Elements such as circadian lighting, air quality, nature sounds and colours are all great examples. (We will elaborate more on each of these ideas in future posts.) This tip is centered around adding real plant life into your kitchen as it's an easy and highly beneficial way to promote wellness and is a step you can take today. Some plants that are great to include in your Kitchen are the : Peace Lily, English Ivy, Aloe Vera and the Cast Iron Plant. Another great idea is to grow your own Herb garden in your Kitchen. If you follow us on social media, you may remember that a few months ago we gave away the AeroGarden Harvest Elite LED Garden as one of our monthly giveaways to celebrate our 25th Anniversary. (Note: If you are reading this post in 2020, be sure to check our social each month on the 25th when we will announce the next #TCSturns25Giveaway gift.) Well, that gift was actually won by a client of ours in Malta. So instead of shipping her a North American model, we kept that one and sent her a new AeroGarden from Europe. This sparked us to use it in our own Kitchen and we love it! So, if you want a super easy way of growing your own herb garden, conveniently placed by your sink/prep area we highly recommend that. We are not affiliated with them in any way, but love ours. You can check out their whole series here and if you are reading this in October, 2020 try to use code GREEN20 and you should be able to get 20% off their entire store!
4. Sinks As we move toward more wholefoods, including more vegetables in our diet, we are spending more time at our sinks cleaning and prepping. Choosing a deep single sink allows for more space and less frustration. Also, consider including a separate prep sink if you have more than one person helping in the kitchen and your space will allow this addition without eating up necessary countertop space. We always recommend our clients include a grate for the bottom of their sink. If you have a stainless sink, this will help reduce scratching and scuffing. It's also a great addition for every type of sink as it allows you to use it as a multipurpose area, such as drying your hand-washed dishes. One thing to mention here is to make sure that you clean the grate frequently so grim and gunk don't start to collect at the joints.  5. Toxins When renovating your kitchen or building a new home reducing the toxins in the materials you choose is a large factor in improving your indoor air quality and something that many of us, especially this year, are becoming more and more concerned with. The cabinetry takes up the largest surface area in your kitchen and potentially has the largest impact on the toxins you will inhale in your home, not to mention that your food and dishes will be stored inside these toxic boxes as well. Non-toxic cabinetry is essential and doing your homework is important. We've been selling Zero-VOC cabinetry for over a decade now, and have heard many horror stories of clients that come to us after they thought they were getting a green cabinet elsewhere, only to find out it was only semi-green. Companies can use green box construction and put a water-based top coat over their toxic finishes and technically be considered "green". The only issue is that if you have any sort of chemical sensitivity or develop one, your body will know that corners were cut. Once it's in your home and at that point it's too late. It is vital for your health and well-being to make sure that the construction and the entire finishing process is Non-Toxic. Our clients now have the opportunity to upgrade to European Metal Cabinetry as that is the next level of Luxury and Wellness. It is a beautiful alternative to wood cabinetry in that it is zero-VOC but also non-porous and both recycled and recyclable. These cabinets are available in many colours as well as stone faces and wood-like finishes. Below is a picture of one Metal Kitchen in a white textured powder coat finish.  Remember, the kitchen is the heart of the home and when designed properly can improve your mental, emotional, physical and environmental wellness. If you’re planning on a new kitchen, let’s talk about how we can design your space to support your healthy lifestyle. We will see you next week! In the meantime, make it a happy and healthy day!  |
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