Kitchen Aesthetics: Blending Interior Elegance with Functional Design

Designing for more than good looks

The Kitchen Aesthetics: Blending Interior Elegance with Functional Design includes the size and shape of your home, how it fits into the surrounding community and urban landscape, and its impact on your site. Although home design is a matter of personal taste, designing a home or decoration has the following practical benefits:

  • is in harmony with your neighbourhood
  • minimises its impact on your site's landforms
  • makes the most of solar access and other natural features.

Planning requirements

Your local council's district plan will contain regulations on the height, shape, distance from the border, and other characteristics of any building in your area. The regulations can be flexible or, for example, in the case of heritage areas, they can be very specific. If you are planning a new home or renovation, consult the district plan or discuss any special requirements with your designer or council planner. Some committees hold pre-application meetings to make recommendations and evaluations of the proposed design.

If you are planning to build a new subdivision, the developer may have implemented additional rules and requirements, in addition to the rules and requirements of the committee, you must also comply with these rules and requirements. Make sure you understand the developer conventions so that you know what can and cannot be done in your section.