A Contemporary Kitchen With French Cafe Flavor

When it came to her kitchen revamp, the owner of this converted industrial-style warehouse in London wanted something a little different — a vintage-style French theme. “She was inspired by old French brasseries and cafe culture, but it still needed to be a functional kitchen with modern appliances,” says Tom Long of Increation.

Long’s initial idea was to scour salvage yards for old shop fronts to use in the construction, but after a fruitless search, he decided they would have to build a new kitchen from scratch and make it look like an authentic vintage-style brasserie. “Because we decided to do something completely new using materials we hadn’t worked with before, it was a leap of faith for the owner,” Long says, “but it was worth it.” The finished kitchen is a charming space that nods to the past and is bursting with authentic French flavor.

Houzz at a Glance
Who lives here: A married couple and their baby daughter
Location: Shoreditch, London
Size: 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom
Designer: Tom Long, Increation

“Everything in the kitchen has been [custom] built to look like a vintage-style French brasserie,” Long says. “The warehouse itself has an industrial vibe, but the owner has used a mixture of styles for the decor, so the kitchen fits in really well.”


The island is the main feature in the kitchen, and its authentic look required some creative thinking. Long used walnut for the cabinetry and turned to a sign writer in Cornwall to create the gilded glass panels at the front. He then added a strip of LED lights so the owner could display her collection of glassware and pottery.


Long gave the inner side of the island a more contemporary feel with a bank of roomy drawers that showcase the walnut grain.


“Because we used solid walnut in the construction of the drawers, we were able to carve out a finger-pull detail at the top,” Long says. “If we’d put handles on all the drawers, it would have been too busy. This way the island looks really sleek, and it fits in with the blend of modern and traditional styles in the rest of the flat.”


The exposed brickwork is original to the flat, but some of the bricks in the kitchen area needed replacing. “The owner didn’t like the color of the new bricks, so she had them whitewashed to make them look more authentic and create a warmer look,” Long says.


The island is covered in a single slab of Calacatta Oro marble that reflects the light from the large windows. It was made off-site at the Increation workshops, and getting it into the flat posed a challenge. “We didn’t want the island to have any ugly joins, so it’s one piece,” Long says. “But it was just too big to get up the stairs and there’s no lift, so we hired a crane to winch it up through the large double doors in the wall of the flat. There were a few hairy moments!” he says with a laugh.


In keeping with the vintage-French-brasserie theme, Long inlaid the marble island top with a 3-millimeter (.1-inch) sheet of brass. “Brass is a popular material in France, and we were determined to use it in the kitchen somewhere. This seemed like the perfect solution,” Long says.


The countertop on the other side of the kitchen, which houses the range and sink, needed to be more durable, so Long used composite stone inlaid with brass. “Marble can be quite soft and stains very easily, so it made sense to use a more practical material here,” he says.


“As there’s a lot going on in the rest of the kitchen, we decided to keep the tap simple,” Long says. He settled on an Abode single lever in a matte finish. In another nod to the French-cafe theme, the backsplash is mirrored antiqued glass — the foxed finish adds just the right vintage note.


The ceilings of the warehouse are high, and the owner wanted to utilize the higher-up space for storage. “We decided to use simple white cupboards above the sink,” Long says. “It’s quite a large block, and we didn’t want this part of the kitchen to look too imposing, so we kept them light so as not to make a feature of them.”

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