December, rg11 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
451 
An Ingenious Kitchenette 
The Clever Studio Device Designed to Conceal an Ugly Gas Range When Not in Use 
By W. T. Phillips 
a small apartment must oftentimes resort 
occasionally produces something so com- 
mendable that it cannot fail to interest others 
who, themselves, may be looking for just 
the sort of thing to fit their own require- 
ments. The owner of an attractive studio apartment and 
bath had but one room at her disposal, to be used for a 
living-room that should combine the conveniences of dining- 
room and kitchen as well. Now, it is always a difficult thing 
to make a kitchen look like a reception-room—it is even 
more difficult than to make the folding bed of the Victorian 
era pass for a grand piano. However, I think the reader 
will concede that the illustrations of the tidy kitchenette 
here reproduced indicate actual success on the part of the 
studio owner in disguising the little gas range upon which 
the studio meals are cooked, and delicious ones they are, too. 
Instead of attempting to make the range appear in the 
suspicious guise of some improbability, the deviser of this 
ingenious contrivance had the carpenter around the corner 
make a four-sided box-like affair—bottom, sides, floor and 
back being stationary—and then a double folding door in 
front and a top that was divided in the center and arranged 
to swing back on each side by hinges, and finally a rest on 
the top edge of the opened front doors was added. ‘The 
reader will notice that the gas range rests on the floor of 
this little cupboard, and not upon the floor of the room. 
The low casters make it possible to move the whole con- 
veniently to permit cleaning operations, since the range 
receives its supply of gas through the long rubber hose at- 
tached to the gas-jet just above it, to one side. The gas- 
hose is disconnected when the range is not in use, and coiled 
against the wall on a hook back of the range-cupboard and 
hidden by it. One might almost imagine, on seeing the 
doors closed, that the cupboard was a closet in miniature 
for downy linens, instead of a range that can roast a turkey 
on Thanksgiving day as well as any of its bigger neighbors. 
Kitchenette holders who feel a sense of household incom- 
pleteness without an electric stove, may not have to be told 
that a cupboard can cover it in the same effective manner. 
An exquisite Japanese print, by Utamaro, hangs just above 
the range-cupboard, and a cover of embroidered crash 
linen is thrown over the top of this ingenious bit of fur- 
niture. A bowl of dull green pottery resting upon it is al- 
ways filled with sweet-scented flowers, that take their turn 
when the well-ventilated studio throws open its windows 
to let out the too tenacious fragrance of the savory feast 
passed by. In the right-hand illustration the corner of a 
stationary washstand is shown, but this and the wardrobe- 
closet to the left of the left-hand illustration are always hid- 
den by attractive screens that seem perfectly to fit into the 
decorative scheme of the apartment. Of the ornamental 
articles in the living-room, not connected directly with the 
cupboard, the Oriental rug squarely in front seems the most 
necessary to complete the project of transformation. The 
hand that placed it there surely belonged to one conscious of 
giving the final touch in doubling the possibilities of the use 
of one room. It is readily seen that the shifts can be made 
easily where immediacy is involved, without exciting any inti- 
mation of household jugglery in the little “kitchen corner.” 
This shows kitchenette cupboard, open and ready for use 
When closed the cupboard completely hides the gas range 
