Planning Walkways and Clearances in Compact Kitchens

Single-cook walkway 900mm, two-cook walkway 1200mm, in front of a dishwasher or oven 1100mm to allow the door plus a person. These are not ideals, they are the point below which daily use becomes irritating.

Fridge doors, oven doors and the kitchen entrance door frequently conflict in compact Thai kitchens. We plot every swing on the drawing, because a 70mm overlap that looks trivial on plan becomes a daily annoyance in use.

Two cabinet doors meeting at an internal corner will foul each other unless a filler is planned. Getting this right costs nothing at the drawing stage and is close to unfixable once the carcasses are made.

When clearances cannot be met we change the layout rather than shrink the gaps. That usually means dropping to a single run with tall storage, or converting an island into a peninsula to free a walkway.