This Characterful Kitchen Is a Host's Dream – It's the Perfect Blend of Style and Function and Is 'Full of Sneaky Storage Solutions'

Some kitchens are purely functional, while others prioritize the aesthetic appeal to the point that practicality is compromised, but this one manages to find the right balance of form and function.

Designed by Michelle Gage, we recently toured the full Pennsylvania home, which is bursting with color, pattern, and all-round whimsical charm. The kitchen, though, stands out as a masterclass on designing the heart of the home in a way that's optimized for cooking and dining, full of clever storage, along with beautiful stylistic choices – not least the blush pink cabinets.

'The kitchen was the main space the clients originally reached out for,' says Michelle Gage. 'They are excellent home chefs and bakers with a global palette. The kitchen needed to be able to function at a very high level for all its preparation and storage needs.'

Designing an old home comes with unique challenges, and for this pink kitchen, it was the non-straight edges to be expected in a building of this age. 'This is the kitchen of an over-100-year-old home; the walls and ceiling are not perfectly square, and there are a lot of funny jogs in the perimeter from things like an old chimney and previous alterations that have been made over the last century,' says Michelle.

Despite the tricky starting point, the goal was to create a space that was as functional as it was beautiful, 'while working with the existing architectural quirks.'

'The homeowners love to cook and bake, and with a young family, we wanted to design a beautiful, eat-in kitchen that is a joy for them to live and create in.'

To do so, the space required a complete overhaul. 'The sink location and the cooktop location remained the same, but locations for the refrigerator, ovens, tons of cabinetry, and the banquette were new. We also completely overhauled the kitchen lighting and electrical plans here to create layers of counter-level, overhead task, and overhead ambient lighting.'

'We took the little window nook by the old chimney as an opportunity to add in extra deep lower cabinets, and a custom little cabinet framing out the window for additional storage,' says Michelle. 'We wanted to keep the countertop a standard 24" here to keep this area an effective workstation, and there was the depth for it.'

'We added in a tiny little lamp with a patterned shade for additional work-level lighting and a hidden in-cabinet electrical outlet.'

'We got creative in how we laid out the cabinetry and appliances to design in more storage and create more visual calm spatially. We truly used every space for a drawer, shelving, a practical hook, or lighting,' says Michelle.

'A stretch of wall with some funny jogs became the new home of the refrigerator, double ovens, and clever storage, including a full-height spice cabinet.'

'The deep drawer under the double ovens has interior measurements compatible with housing baking dishes – jellyroll pans, quarter sheets, pie dishes, cake pans. We ensured that oven-opening heights were compatible with comfortable use.'

'At the end of this section by the coffee nook, there is a 7"-deep cabinet with adjustable shelves – just the right depth for storing dry and canned goods, like pasta and flour, as well as spices and dried herbs,' Michelle explains.

Zoning in interior design was important when imagining the layout. 'It's a pretty long space, so we zoned out the functional areas: prep and baking, washing and clean-up, direct heat, breakfast and coffee nook, and the dining banquette. Each zone has the storage capacity and setup for all the tools or appliances you'd need within arm's reach or at most a few steps. That cozy feeling can come with a well-planned kitchen, so everything you need for a task feels comfortably close.'

'We maximized accessible kitchen storage for the priority items: tools and ingredients the client would want to be able to access easily and regularly, but tucked in functional cabinetry or hooks into every nook we could to have tiered levels of accessibility.'

While a functional approach to the kitchen design led the way, it adds visual appeal in equal measure, not least with the playful kitchen color scheme. 'Us and the clients envisioned this space as pink from the jump,' says Michelle.

They settled on Benjamin Moore Monticello Rose HC-63 for the kitchen cabinets, a dusky rose hue. 'It was important to us that the pink here be as sophisticated as the rest of the home's color palette. The color selected has a warm and dusty undertone, so it isn't too vibrant or saturated.'

Elsewhere in the kitchen, the color scheme is balanced with Benjamin Moore Lacey Pearl 2108-70, a pearly white, used on the walls, trim, doors, and ceiling. 'The natural light coming into the space was also a factor in the color selection,' Michelle says. 'The kitchen windows face west and north, so it's pretty much always receiving a diffused natural light throughout the day, getting magical toward the early afternoon.'

What's more, the warm color scheme of the paint colors and materials keeps things feeling cozy. 'The pink selected for the cabinets, the tile, and the wall paint color all have warm undertones.'

The kitchen flooring was designed to be both practical and in keeping with the vintage-inspired aesthetic. 'It is a ceramic tile made to look like slate in a custom design,' says Michelle. 'We created a floor pattern sequence riffed off a traditional slate French tile pattern, so it has an old-world feel without being too regular or easily predictable.'

'The banquette is a family-centered dining space: a cozy corner where they can gather in the kitchen for homework or meals or a hundred other moments in the day.'

Add Whimsical and Cozy Charm to Your Kitchen

From the patterned café curtains and wallpaper to the cozy decor, there's so much inspiration to take from this kitchen. Below, you can shop for decor pieces to help create a similar feel in your own home.

This kitchen is a lesson on designing a space that is, above all else, functional for the people using it each day, yet without holding back on fun decor and cozy decorative details. While there are lots of ideas here to inspire your own kitchen design, take a look at the leading kitchen trends for 2026 to keep things feeling current.