Stir it up: Alpes-Inox’s Liberi in Cucina system

Advances in technology have created the possibility of users experiencing design products the way they want them – and, indeed, has fuelled the expectation that individualisation should come as standard, so to speak.

When it comes to the kitchen, Italian manufacturer Alpes-Inox has boldly gone off-menu. Long known for its built-in stainless steel appliances that display an enviable material quality – the addition of a nickel-chrome alloy lends the products a high-end, almost silver tone – it now offers architects and planners a different way of shaping kitchen environments.

Modularity in design is nothing new. Think 1960s and 70s sofa landscapes or IKEA’s almost ubiquitous storage systems. But the kitchen has long been wedded to the concept of the fitted kitchen – an inflexible, efficiency-led spatial organisation that owes much to the rationalism of modernism.

Alpes-Inox’s Liberi in Cucina system – the clue is in the name – frees kitchen specifiers from the constraints of the fixed and permanent structure, allowing them to create an altogether more architectural interior field, one characterised by a series of supremely configurable (and, importantly, reconfigurable) service elements. For the system comes in the form of freestanding, connection-ready kitchen modules, each dedicated to a separate function such as cooking, washing, food prep and storage, which can be moved around and augmented over time, according to the user’s changing needs.

We increasingly hear the term disruption used to describe game-changing business models or technology. In the kitchen, Alpes-Inox’s innovation disrupts the conventions of planning by giving the user a stake at the design table; the spatial versatility of the Liberi in Cucina system means they become as much author of their ongoing designed environment as its professional specifiers.

Innovation comes in the form of materials, too. The Liberi in Cucina line features units made of a stainless steel containing 19% nickel and 10% chrome, delivering a very particular silver-satin function that performs in both aesthetic and utilitarian terms. As the key component of the system’s material language, it can – according to specification needs – be counterpointed with Corian, marble stone and various types of wood in the form of countertops, doors and drawers. Customisation doesn’t stop there, however. Modularity means, of course, different permutations when it comes to assembly – both horizontally oriented and vertically – but with bespoke, special sizes possible within this system, it’s possible to create truly unique kitchen spaces, spatially effective and intriguing and resolutely architectural.

There are two schools of cooking. The first, the recipe-following kind, where exact measurements and timings are everything, producing dependable, predictable results. The second, a more wing-it-and-see, follow-your-instinct kind of approach, which can lead to surprising, creative results. Alpes-Inox’s paradigm-shifting Liberi in Cucina line speaks to both: in-house, precision-led manufacturing that allows users to dispense with the design cookbook and listen to their gut.

Free your mind and your kitchen will follow.

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© Architonic