Rehilete Kitchen Concept by Alberto Villarreal and Michel Rojkind
by Harry / November 25, 2011
From @_AGENT_, a pinwheel ("rehilete" in Spanish) shaped kitchen island. Agent was one of nine Mexican design and architecture firms asked by Mexican home appliances brand Mabe to develop kitchen concepts to showcase new product lines for the kitchen.

(Click the images below for full sized images)


Says Agent, "The Rehilete concept is based on the idea of understanding the kitchen as a cycle... [the] concept contains 4 stations (or 'wings'), which are intended to have dedicated functions, as part of the kitchen cycle: compost/harvest, preparing, cooking, eating."


"The premise, is that beyond looking at the actions of preparing, cooking, eating and waste management as separated events (sometimes even happening at different zones of the house), these have to be understood as interdependent stages of a larger cycle."


"The idea is also to shorten the gap between food and its origin, bringing a compost/ harvest station to the same room where food is prepared, cooked and eaten."


"The cycle includes 5 phases: 1) growing and harvesting vegetables and herbs, 2) preparing, 3) Cooking, 4) Eating, and finally 5) reintegrating organic residuals to the compost bin (which later becomes fertilized dirt to seed again). The sinks, having the most recurrent function in all stages, are located at the center of the island."


"To accentuate the different functions of each cycle phase, the 4 stations are designed with the most appropriate materials and temperature according to their function (wood for the eating station, Corian for the preparation & compost/harvest stations, and stainless steel for the cooking station). The stations also include storage space and units for the elements required on each phase."


"As opposed to a regular kitchen that uses the walls to allocate all the storage and working space, AGENT's concept concentrates all the action in a central island with the 4 wings. As an experimental yet visionary proposal, the concept presents new opportunities to generate architectural spaces from the inside-out, where eating, cooking and farming happen at the same central space of a house. Aesthetically, the concept was inspired by the dynamism and cyclic movement of the Pin Wheel." More at Agent.

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