As Kitchen + Bath Month celebrates 40 years, we look back at the styles of the decade in which it started.
By Dianne M. Pogoda
Kitchen + Bath Month is 40! To mark its ruby anniversary, we’re spotlighting the design themes that characterized the decade in which it launched: The Go-Go Eighties.
The Eighties began with dark wood cabinetry — cherry was big — with lots of panel details and laminate countertops — a boon for easy maintenance. As the decade wore on, kitchens started to go lighter and brighter. Dark wood cabinets morphed to honey oak and then to white, finishing the decade with modern minimalism.
Some holdovers remained from the natural look of the Seventies, which incorporated earth tones, muted shades — harvest gold, avocado, almond — and a forest’s worth of wood. Some homeowners still favored the country kitchen, with wood furniture, cozy built-in banquettes, rustic exposed beams, floral-patterned wallpaper and curtains over the sink. But in the Eighties, the wallpaper and curtains began to come down, and linoleum floors began to come up.
Gleaming white kitchens, which had been popular pre- and post-WWII (before the pastel explosion of the Fifties), were making a comeback, especially in the latter part of the decade. European style — a white slab cabinet door, sometimes glossy, often with wood trim — began to appear in American kitchens. Another sleek cabinet trend was the lack of knobs or handles — perhaps push-to-open latches, or a hidden groove to open a door or drawer — a precursor to the continuous, integrated look popular today.
The colorful appliances of the Seventies gave way to white, with a few options in black or bisque. (Stainless steel was still a decade away.) Most countertops were white tile, white or ivory laminate, or laminate that looked like butcher block. Color wasn’t completely over, however. Some bold, fashion-forward designers used color to make a statement with the myriad colors available in laminate countertops. Still, new kitchens were fairly antiseptic, even down to their white tile floors.
Granite, which had started to make rare appearances in the Seventies, came on more frequently in the late Eighties, but early iterations were expensive, and only those with big budgets could typically afford it. Besides, color choices were limited, and granite processing was primitive compared to today, resulting in low-quality stone that chipped or cracked and was not especially durable.
The decade saw wide acceptance of a new appliance: the microwave oven. Invented in 1947, it only became available for household use two decades later. This Jetsons-like gadget caught on somewhat in the Seventies despite claims of radiation hazards, and finally became standard equipment in the Eighties, a symbol of the futuristic kitchen — although most of them were still large and clunky and took up a lot of counter space.
As the family dynamic changed, so did the kitchen. Families with two working parents, or single-parent households, needed spaces and surfaces that were quick to clean and functional to get everyone out the door in the morning, and get dinner on the table quickly in the evening. The kitchen was where the family gathered. Layouts expanded to the U-shape, and started to include bigger pantries, peninsulas and islands. These design features added storage and workspace for cooking prep or homework, and added casual barstool seating so everyone could be together. Although islands really took off in the Nineties, they were born in the Eighties, allowing extra cabinets to house all the gear, small appliances, designer cookware and gadgets accumulated during that decade of mass consumption.
Kitchen design, features and technology have perpetually transformed the way we live, evolving along with our lifestyles. The Eighties decade was big and bold in all areas of design: interior, fashion and industrial. And many of the trends pioneered in that fast-paced era still influence design today.