13 Tiny Kitchens That Prove Interior Design Beats Square Footage

The big kitchen promises everything and delivers distraction. The small kitchen promises nothing and delivers precision. These 13 homeowners found out the hard way — or the easy way, depending on how you look at it — that good interior design has nothing to do with square footage, and that even a single row of kitchen cabinets, placed right, can outperform an entire remodel. Their kitchens are small. Their cooking is better for it. These are the kitchens that proved it.

• Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous! 🤩 Love your style and personality! © BurningManHigh / Reddit
• I truly love this. You leaned in and went bold and I love it! © overthishereanyway / Reddit

All inclusive rental made bills simple, but cooking was a nightmare. I totally understand constraints, limitations, budget. I felt so limited having to make two burgers at a time when before I had a flattop and propane grill in a 4-bedroom house.
My anxiety was through the roof just trying to prep a salad, because no way was I spending $9 for a tiny pre-made one. Knowing all the counter space I had in the past. Clean as I go? How?? That’s when I mounted everything to the wall. But also limited here. My manager said I could only use nails here. Fine, I’ll use nails alright. Pantry? What pantry? That’s when I decided to use (not pictured) the dresser as a pantry. Do not let constraints slow you down from experiencing the joys of cooking.

• That’s fantastic, congrats on your ingenuity and dedication to making it work! And thanks for the encouragement, we all need a bit of that these days. © Lochylass / Reddit
• Well done! Those meals look wonderful! © Gotta-Be-Me-65 / Reddit
• What restaurant was this again??!! 😋 You might be budget, but that looks far from budget!! 👏 © RJKimbell00 / Reddit

• This is genius and I love the funky shape and everything about the kitchen!!! © mackling102 / Reddit

• We knocked a wall through last year. Full home renovation — doubled the kitchen space, new furniture, new kitchen cabinets, new interior design, everything we’d always wanted. It cost a lot. It looked exactly as planned. Six months later my husband said “something’s wrong with the kitchen.” I said nothing’s wrong. He said “I know. But something’s wrong.” We couldn’t name it. Everything was right. Then our nine-year-old said it.
  She said “in the old kitchen I could see your face when you were cooking. Now you’re too far away.” That was it. The wall we’d knocked through had separated cooking from living. Small kitchen, everyone in the same four meters. New kitchen, everyone in different parts of a large room. We renovated to bring the family together and accidentally put them further apart. We added a low piece of furniture across the cooking area, just past the new kitchen cabinets — nothing structural, just enough to bring the proportions back. Our daughter came in, looked at it, said “better” and went back to her homework. Nine years old. Knew immediately what a year of home renovation hadn’t figured out.

We just replaced white cabinets. They show every speck of dirt and smudge of anything. Wouldn’t ever have white cabinets again.

• Looks absolutely fantastic! A fantastic midcentury-inspired design, beautiful finishes, and excellent use of a small space. You did a beautiful job! © BrontosaurusTheory / Reddit
• Looks awesome! I used to have a galley kitchen like you and it’s amazing how much more open it is when you open up a door way! You did a great job. I love the cabinets. © Fit-Olive-4680 / Reddit

Recently put the finishing touches on our little kitchen. It was a slow process but we waited to pull the trigger until sales came up. Ended up costing about $5000 for everything. Most expensive things being new appliances (GE) for $1900, thanks to Home Depots Black Friday sale. Then the quartz countertops were $1850.

Spraying the cabinets was by far the most time consuming but I like how even the finish is and I can still see a hint of texture from the wood grain in the right lighting. Obviously, new cabinets would have been great but the diy route only cost me about $250.

My wife picked all the design options and I just did my best to make it look like I knew what I was doing. It was the first time I’ve done many of these upgrades but I’m pretty happy how it turned out for the budget.

• You did a very good job. It looks great and proves you don’t have spend a fortune for results. You should be proud. I’m a painter and think you did a great job on the cabinets. © Temporary_Let_7632 / Reddit
• Congratulations, 5K got you a complete make over. Good job!! © EntildaDesigns / Reddit

• I love this. Fantastic job! © TheJessicator / Reddit
• Unlike many, we love galley kitchens. Maybe not perfect for the 100 person holiday party you don’t host, but so useful for the actual usage of a kitchen. Nicely done! © NorthSide_Flooring

We found a place that will save us $10k/year, but it’s going to take some work. Plan is to be here for a few years to help save for a real home down payment.

This is the kitchen project. Owners budget was $800, and we went a bit over, but plan to live here for 5 years or so, so worth it. Reused the wall cabinets from old kitchen, and there was some in the laundry room that we moved over. Appliances from Marketplace, and $650 including the fridge. (Ours, so they go with us when we move) The rest is all new.

• That’s really impressive work on a tiny budget! Props to you!! © Western-Finding-368 / Reddit

• Our realtor said our 60-square-foot kitchen would hurt the sale. We renovated anyway, betting on interior design over square footage — built-in bench seating, a fold-down table, floor-to-ceiling cabinets. At the first open house, a couple stood frozen in the doorway. The wife turned to her husband and said, “This is bigger than our kitchen at home.” Their kitchen, it turned out, was nearly twice the size.
  They offered twelve thousand over asking that same afternoon. Our realtor called a week later, laughing: “I’ve shown three houses with kitchens twice this size, and buyers keep asking why they don’t feel half as good.” We walked her through it — hidden storage under the bench, the table that folded flat, cabinets built floor to ceiling instead of stopping short. She still tells that story to every seller with a small, awkward kitchen. It was never about the size of the room. It was about making every inch work harder than it had any right to.

The countertop is called contact paper. It probably won’t last longer than a couple of years but it was inexpensive, light, and really easy to apply. The sink is a residential faucet. We had to get a fitting to convert from the RV plumbing to the plumbing in the faucet, but I think it was worth it.

• That is gorgeous! I would never get tired of looking at that backsplash. Y’all did an awesome job. © Specific-Button1521 / Reddit
• Fantastic job! I love the backsplash, counters, and cabinets! © SarcasmReigns / Reddit

• What a difference! Kitchen looks great! Sink looks so much better under the window. The range hood looks amazing too. Love your cabinets too! © Limegreenchuckles / Reddit

• Ooh love the redesign. It’s creative with how the layout changed. © momopeach7 / Reddit
• This is such a beautiful remodel and I absolutely love the green. Our kitchen gets installed on Monday and I’m so excited. We did a pale green!! © mikaa_24 / Reddit

Nobody who’s cooked seriously in a small kitchen wishes it were bigger. They wish their bigger kitchen thought like the small one — every piece of furniture placed with intention, nothing wasted, nothing in the way. These 13 homeowners understood that — some on purpose, some by accident, some after an expensive home renovation taught them the long way round. Good interior design has nothing to do with square footage — it has everything to do with patience These kitchens proved it one meal at a time.

Read next: 10 Backsplash Upgrades That Made the Kitchen the Best Part of the House