Ear to the ground with Steve Taggart, Area Sales Manager, North East England

Ear to the ground with Steve Taggart, Area Sales Manager, North East England.

“Early autumn is traditionally the start of a very busy period in the KBB sector which runs until early December. What better than a brand new kitchen or bedroom for Christmas, asks our Area Sales Manager for the North East of England, Steve Taggart?

Steve’s been sharing his thoughts on what’s topical and trending at the moment, so let’s hear some more from him…“

Space is at a premium in many homes, especially in new build properties and we are seeing all areas of the house being put to good use, such as fitting out under the stairs to make cupboards. These spaces typically use drawers on full extension runners.

Lots of new build bedrooms aren’t that generous on space especially second or third bedroom and this is where our Glide Sliding Doors do a great job.

Glide Sliding Doors

Manufactured with premium aluminum tracks, Glide sliding doors offer superior motion quality.

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Making space and using it wisely.

In the kitchen, we’re seeing a move away from typical pull-out larder units, these are typically a set of wirework baskets that are attached to the back of the fascia door. By design these are where the whole larder unit comes out to meet the end user, you have no choice on what storage part you need to access.

Space tower larder units can be fitted out with a set of internal drawers that can be customised if need be depending on the customer’s requirements. These drawers offer a greater storage area and load bearing capacity on the runners offering a far more practical approach to the accessibility of the goods being stored in them, as each drawer can be accessed individually from all sides.

BLUM SPACE TOWER

One of our long standing trading partners, Blum, has lots of finishes and solutions in their Space Tower range, offering a good choice to the end user from a design point of view. Remaining in the kitchen, pocket door systems are being talked about and requested more often and I reckon we’ll see lots of these solutions installed over the coming years.

Basically, these are door sets that can be closed when the kitchen isn’t in use. These will typically be installed in modern living scenarios, such as apartments and studios etc, where the kitchen, dining, working and living areas have been merged into a single space.

Once the kitchen isn’t in use the doors can be closed concealing the kitchen and enabling a more relaxed and aesthetically pleasing living area. Blum has launched a pocket door system called REVEGO coming to HPP soon that I’m sure will get more and more popular over time.

Staying with storage, kitchen designs that have typically featured a lot of base storage cupboards with doors, we’re finding these are being replaced by drawers. This gives the end user far better usage of the storage space and enables easier access to goods that would be stored at the back of a cupboard as the drawer brings the internal storage out to meet the end user.

Laundry rooms and boot/cloakrooms are also proving popular. But don’t forget to get your designer to incorporate the dog’s bed in the new design – we can’t have our furry friends feeling disappointed and left out!

Trending products and colours.

Other products and colours that are trending at the moment are slatted wall systems, mainly used on feature walls. There are a lot of manufacturers developing media walls out of MFC and incorporating the slatted look into the design. Our Cordoba door from the Aspire range design fits well with this idea and will get more popular over time.

Fluted and reeded panels are definitely on trend at the moment too. As well as feature walls, these products and designs work for media walls through to bathroom furniture facias amongst other uses.

Slat Wall Systems

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Aspire Range Cordoba Door

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Popular colours at the moment are most definitely all shades of green and also shades of pink. These are being mixed for contrast with EGGER and Kronospan’s natural woodgrains and metal and stone reproductions so realistic its’s difficult to tell the difference between them and the real thing.

EGGER WORKTOPS

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KRONOSPAN WORKTOPS

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When it comes to sinks and taps, although chrome is still popular, colours have moved towards the likes of brass, golds, copper and matt black, especially on handles. And lots of bar handles have incorporated a tactile knurled feature into the finish.

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