Worst Kitchen Designs

We've all seen one - a kitchen that is lost somewhere underneath a hideous decor scheme, cupboards fronted with ugly doors, badly-planned spaces with no room for food preparation. Today, we're taking a look at some of the worst kitchens out there.

Our first catastrophic kitchen is going for the crispness and clarity of a monochrome design, but is lost in a wilderness of busy lines and shapes, cluttered worktops and a rather horrible border around the top of the wall (and used as an accent beneath the cooker's fan hood) that features some rather portly dancing chefs. The problem with trying to achieve a harmonious simplicity is that if you fail to keep things organisied, and don't make sure that there is a place for everything, you soon end up with a kitchen disaster rather than the cool, sleek space that you had in mind. The lesson here is to be realistic about storage and clutter, and to decorate with your family's habits in mind. Try using wooden sideboards or dressers to maximise your storage.

This kitchen needs to be simplified

Our second kitchen nightmare is this awfully bodged repair job spotted by an estate agent. The owners of this kitchen have tried to hide a hole caused by moisture damage using the lid of a storage box. What's more, they then put their home on the market, leaving this terrible job to try and tempt buyers. Needless to say, the estate agent was unable to sell the property until the hole was properly attended to.

Would you buy this house?

Our next kitchen demonstrates the need for consistency and thoroughness. While the pink cupboard doors may not be to everybody's taste, they do speak of a clear design vision. The whole room is let down by the hideous window covering, which resembles a piece cut from the world's largest and loudest Hawaiian shirt. Remember - even if every other aspect of a room is flawless, even one detail out of place can ruin a room.

Attend to the details if you want to avoid this

Our final kitchen is a mess of clashing floral designs and dull, drab '70s wooden cabinets, that is sure to bring on a migraine should you find yourself spending more than five minutes looking at it. Make sure you don't overload your kitchen with patterns, as they can make a room look extremely busy. Instead, keep things simple, as no room attracts clutter like a kitchen, and your decor needs to create a clean, inviting look.

Could you put up with this?

American lifestyle presenter Rachael Ray held a contest to find America's worst kitchen. If you want to see the winning kitchen, and how it was fixed, check out this page, which recaps the whole contest, and see how you can turn a kitchen nightmare into a culinary dream.