
The alternative post for this was going to be "why design students never cease to amaze me". Designed by Kristin Laass and Norman Ebelt from Germany, this clever project (spotted on freshome) is called "Small Type" and it has the wonderful and extremely practical ability of fitting in almost any interior - even your studio apartment.
Measuring only one square meter (or a little over ten square feet) when closed, this compact kitchen serves as a table, a refrigerator, an oven, a sink and a storage space.
Not only do I love how compact and well-thought out this product is - it looks great too. It's just another way to prove how little we need to get by.

It's hard to turn on the oven when it's sweltering inside and out. I've been eating lots of take-out and sandwiches because I can't bear to roast in my apartment. As the hottest month of the summer heats up, The Kitchn has compiled a great list of design moves that cool your cucina.
- Install a ceiling fan. This time of year, blades should rotate counterclockwise to move air downward.
- Install a countertop toaster oven or microwave if you don't already have one. This will allow you to do some cooking without the use of your larger oven or the open stovetop. If your kitchen is crowded, you can even just use the appliance seasonally and store it away in the cooler months.

Sometimes a renovated kitchen doesn't have to mean breaking down walls and relocating to a different spot in the house. When I spotted this kitchen reno on CasaSugar I thought it was a great example of smart, small changes on a tight budget.
The homeowners chose custom panels for our appliances so that they would disappear into the cabinet wall. They installed a discreet but powerful exhaust fan in the ceiling above the new range and tucked the microwave under the counter in order to keep the sight lines at eye level clean and unbroken.

That's right. Paper. They really have figured out a way to recycle everything for kitchen surfaces.
PaperStone products are FSC-certified and made from 100% post-consumer recycled paper. Sound crazy? Here's how it works:
"Made from recycled paper that has been saturated with our proprietary PetroFree(tm) phenolic resins and selected natural pigments on our treater lines. After trimming to length, resin-saturated sheets are stacked and moved into a press where they are fused together under heat and pressure. Paper sheet count determines the thickness of the finished panels."