Design Team:
Srujana Akkiraju
Katherine Dixon
Frances Manning
Alison Whittenmyer
Project Brief
Consider the items that one generally keeps beneath the kitchen sink. It would not be uncommon to find items such as dish soap, sponges, bleach, buckets, paper towels, and trash bins. These are all items needed in order to function in the kitchen, yet stored in a space that is not integrated in the function of the space. They exist as a disordered heap in the dark void located south of the faucet, like a dirty little secret... for cleaning supplies. For this reason, the space below the kitchen sink has become a neglected area of opportunity, destitute of a defined functionality yet charged with potential.
The team set out to solve this problem through primary and secondary research. A series of interviews and surveys was conducted in order to collect qualitative as well as quantitative data. Contextual inquiries and shadowing enabled the group to uncover insights that were pivital to reframing the problem.
After video-taping users interacting with the kitchen space, the team determined:
-The Kitchen layout dictates how each person lays out their work triangle.
-There was almost no interaction with the under sink area during the process of cooking.
-The sink area is the only part of the kitchen without vertical alignment of functionality.
