Johnny Grey
Johnny Grey is a British designer, author and educator specializing in kitchens. He has been prominent in kitchen design since the 1980s, aiming to make kitchens the sociable heart of the home. He runs Johnny Grey Studios, which has designed kitchens since 1978, has authored five books, and is visiting professor of design and kitchen culture at Bucks New University.
Early life and education
Grey studied architecture at the Architectural Association from 1970 to 1976, with tutors Jeremy Dixon and Mike Gold. One of the first kitchens he designed was for his aunt the food writer, Elizabeth David.Career
Early kitchen design
Whilst studying architecture, Grey focused on craft aspects of historic buildingsHe also dealt in and restored eighteenth century furniture alongside his brother. After graduating he made furniture and kitchens in his family’s barn in Sussex. His career took off with a 1980 Sunday Times article, "Why this awful fixation with fitted kitchens?".Grey's 'Unfitted' style of kitchen uses original freestanding furniture combined with ergonomics that create friendly spaces experienced like traditionally furnished rooms. This contrasts with the fitted style of wall-based kitchen cabinetry.
Johnny Grey Studios
Grey's studio adapts interiors into sociable kitchens, "living rooms in which you cook", that are linked to the garden and outdoor spaces. Architecture, product and lighting design form the work, which is based on insights from neuroscience. Each project is an individual case.The studio has worked for residential clients all over the world - from Burgundy, Barbados, Cyprus, Jersey, Dublin, Melbourne, Mustique and Rome, to Zurich.
Grey ran a showroom and studio at the San Francisco Design Center from 1990 to 1997 and currently collaborates in the US with Kevin Hackett of SiolArchitects. Over thirty JG projects have been installed across the country, including showcase houses in San Francisco and New York.
With a focus now on socially aware design projects for corporate and charitable organizations, Grey is currently working with the 4G Kitchen Consortium and the National Innovation Centre for Ageing and Newcastle University.
Design innovation
Grey has been responsible for a range of innovations in kitchen design that permanently altered the way kitchens are lived in, manufactured and sold.In the late 1970s he adapted the end-grain butchers’ block for domestic use, incorporating it into a piece of furniture, often with a drawer or two. He launched the Unfitted Kitchenin 1984. Made from freestanding furniture this was an unorthodox idea for its time. The now-widespread use of willow baskets as drawers was firstinvented by Grey in the Unfitted Kitchen. Willow baskets in cabinetry were registered for copyright by Grey jointly with Smallbone in 1987, though Mark Wilkinson objected that basketry can be traced to historic African applications.
Grey brought the aesthetic of the diner counter into his kitchen designs by including a central island wherever possible. These islands blend form and function with level changes and a variety of work surfaces in a body-friendly shape.
Grey incorporated Alexander Technique theory in kitchen design with individually customized dimensions for counter tops and sink and dishwasher placement. Dedicated Work Surfaces, or task-driven areas, further this approach. Low-level counters for smaller appliances and raised-height dishwashers are now widespread in kitchens.
'Soft Geometry' describes Grey's move towards curved furniture inspired by the relationship between peripheral vision and body movement. In the mid 2000s his meeting with neuroscientist and sociologist John Zeisel brought new insights into making kitchens into 'happy spaces'. 'The living room in which you cook' restricts the culinary zone to leave room for other sociable activities. Eye contact as key to design was another neuroscience-inspired idea, alongside the identification of each kitchen's 'sweet spot' as the location for a key piece of furniture such as the central island.
Collaborations
Smallbone of Devizes contracted Grey in 1986 to develop concepts for their company, resulting in a collaborative version of the Unfitted Kitchen launched in 1987. In 1990 Smallbone bought designs for a new Inlay Collection that included the bedroom and bathroom.Grey has also worked as a product and furniture designer, producing a bedroom collection for Heal's and the Conran Shop.Author
Grey's first book The Art of Kitchen Design includes the social history of the kitchen. In 1997 Cassell published The Hardworking House, a collection of essays on the history of home design. In 1997 The Kitchen Workbook was also published in a series of home design books for Dorling Kindersley, later incorporated into DK’s The Complete Home Design Workbook. Grey's Kitchen Culture was published in 2004 with English, American, Russian and Asian editions.Education and teaching
Johnny Grey is an advocate of university-level education for kitchen designers, with the aim of creating a kitchen design profession. He participates in the initiative to create apprenticeships for the kitchen sector.In 2012 Grey was appointed Visiting Professor of Design and Kitchen Culture at Bucks New University. He wrote their kitchen design foundation degree course with Professor Alison Shreeve. The programme covers interior design, architecture, furniture and product design, design history, kitchen culture, marketing, social media, business and project management. It was launched in 2013 as a blended format, the first students graduating in 2017.
Within the School of Design, Craft and Visual Arts, Grey creates links between the kitchen industry, design professions and tertiary education. In 2016 he founded the with Craig Matson, a registered charity for the funding of kitchen design education and provision of bursaries. The Trust joined with the chaired by . It is establishing an apprenticeship Home and Kitchen degree, setting the kitchen in a wider cultural, research, educational and commercial context.
Grey has collaborated with Sevra Davis, currently head of fashion, architecture and design at the British Council but then director of education at the Royal Society of Arts, and Patrick Bonnet from to extend accessible design education into kitchen design. Together they developed the . Grey obtained sponsorship from AEG, Blum UK, Blanco, Kesseboehmer GmbH, the Office of Disability Issues and Symphony kitchens to fund the challenge. It was followed in 2018 with the next RSA Student Design Challenge, . Students were asked to devise convivial spaces for people of diverse ages and needs in which to prepare food and eat, entertain, engage in hobbies or work and enjoy being together. In 2020 Grey obtained sponsorship from Legal and General Capital for the RSA’s Cultivating Community brief to explore re-imagining common spaces and building diverse communities around food, taking the principles of kitchen design into the public realm. Social Eating workshops were run by Grey in Barking and Nottingham, in conjunction with and scholar-activist .
Research, public talks, and consultancy
Grey has spoken at conferences in the UK, the US, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Canada on design, creativity and innovation. These include The Arrival of Kitchen Living ; Space, Architecture and the Brain ; Senses, Brain and Spaces with John Zeisel ; Global Furniture conference and the Long Kitchen. In 2015 and 2016 he spoke at the Smart Kitchen Summit in Seattle.In July 2017 Grey became design ambassador at the National Innovation Centre for Ageing where he worked with a team developing the Four Generational Kitchen, a home space for people of all ages and abilities.
In August 2017 he addressed the Smart Kitchen Summit in Tokyo on the 4G Kitchen and brought to its counterpart in Seattle a delegation including Professor Peter Gore and NICA director Patrick Bonnett. Grey also spoke at Bond Custom in San Diego in October 2017 on the Recreational Kitchen and the role of play, innovation and decadence in high-end design.
He has worked as a consultant for the kitchen industry since being commissioned in 1997 to head a media campaign for Jennair, ‘Turning Kitchens Into Living Rooms’. The tour brought 43 million consumer impressions and won media awards. A further campaign ‘the Kitchen of the Future’ was launched at the Royalton Hotel. Electrolux USA commissioned NKBIS kitchen concepts for booths in 2005/6 with Grey as design spokesman. A design tour on the theme of Sociability and Sanctuary in the Kitchen was organised in 2006 by Hettich, New Zealand NKBA, Fisher and Paykel and the Australian Housing Industry Association, taking in five Australian cities and Auckland and Vancouver.
In June 2019 Grey spoke at the Whitehall and Industry Group conference on . As part of a new series Grey ran an online workshop on the hosted by Mike Wolf, founder of the Smart Kitchen Summit. He appeared in a short introducing the idea of the evening kitchen, with a published by the Spoon describing a kitchen design that summons all five senses to create a warm, welcoming environment.