You can run around in your kitchen, but you can’t really hide in it if it’s this fully transparent setup designed by Dutch office MVRDV. The see-through glass kitchen is meant to give way to a “more healthy, if not sexy” idea of food. The rather unforgiving arrangement debuted at the Venice Architecture Biennale, and its makers suggest that the transparency of the kitchen will lend itself to the pursuit of transparency in the cooking process, both in terms of preparation and disposal.
Known as the Infinity Kitchen, every single unit and shelf is completely transparent, including the tap, sink area, and work stations. According to MVRDV, this newfangled kitchen “hopes to develop better cuisine by making the processes that go on in our kitchens physically transparent; whether it be food choice, food care, kitchen care, waste choices, or the preparation of food itself.”
The brain child of architect Kengo Kuma and media artist Au Yeung Ying Chai, you’ll be able to see the Infinity Kitchen until September 30 of this year in the Università IUAV di Venezia Ca’tron.
In explaining the thought process behind the kitchen, MVRDV co-founder Winy Maas said, “I see this as part of a wider dream, this kitchen. It is part of an environment, if not a city, that is transparent and therefore accessible. Imagine if not only our kitchens were transparent, but the walls through to the neighbor and the next neighbor even. This would create infinite perspectives in our cities. It would make within our claustrophobic environments possibly a view, into the direction of the mountains or the sea.”
While not everyone will want to hold hands and jump into this imagined future together, if you’re fully confident in your organizational abilities, the Infinity Kitchen may be a challenge you’d be interested in. But if there’s anything you need to hide about your cooking process, stick to the traditional cabinetry.
