Design Firm Puts Cooking Back in the Kitchen

TORONTO, ONTARIO— For many kitchen designers, creating a kitchen for a celebrity chef might be the most intimidating of assignments, something akin to designing an opera house for Luciano Pavarotti.

But Kevin Fitzsimons isn’t easily intimidated. He’s fashioned himself into a kind of “kitchen designer to the stars,” and has the credentials to back up that claim.

Besides, sometimes even a master chef can find himself in a desperate situation. When Art Smith, Oprah Winfrey’s personal chef, bought a century-old brownstone in Chicago, he knew he needed help.

“I went to his place, and his kitchen was just a disaster,” says Fitzsimons, president of Fitzsimons Design + Build in Toronto, Ontario. “This was a candidate for America’s ugliest kitchen. Everything was wrong with it.” There was the floral wallpaper, and the cobblestone floor with “10,000 coats of wax on it,” he notes. “The spaces were tiny and the appliances were archaic.”

Fitzsimons and Smith have been friends for some time, so it was natural that the two would team up for this project. “I told him ‘you need help, and I’m going to design it for you,’” Fitzsimons comments. “Half a million dollars later, it was done.”

A Trio of Spaces

The redesign’s results are nothing short of remarkable.

Fitzsimons conceived the new kitchen as divided into three distinct areas. “We gutted the kitchen and the dining room and made it larger, and ripped out the laundry room and turned it into the pantry,” Fitzsimons explains. “Then I got sponsors and manufacturers involved in supplying products.”

The main cooking area has a camera installed into the ceiling, as well as an LCD monitor, so that Smith can create cooking shows from home. The kitchen has been designed to house dirty dishes out of sight under the bench and away from the camera, so it functions as a working studio set.

The Varenna Poliform kitchen, with Ovangkol finish and white carrera top, includes a section where guests or viewers can sit on stools and watch as Smith prepares his masterpieces.

A second area contains a desk where Smith, a cookbook author and television personality, can sit and write cookbooks, as well as draft and create recipes.

Then there is a butler’s pantry, which is also a fully functional laundry area. It includes a wine storage area and cheese cave, and is home to a variety of upscale appliances including an ice cream machine and pasta maker.

The collaboration of chef, designer and manufacturers has wowed those who have seen the new kitchen showcased. In fact, the design won a recent Viking “Featured Designer” award.

Clients and Celebrities

Fitzsimons has been in the design business for the past 22 years, starting his first design practice even before finishing Toronto’s Humber College with a degree in interior design. “I don’t know how it happened,” he says of getting his start. “I got a client right away and then it spread by word-of-mouth.”

Two years ago he formed the new company, Fitzsimons Design + Build, clearly reaching out to a very discriminating clientele. Although he has business offices in Toronto and New York, his practice extends across the continent, specializing in high-end clients who want only the best the industry has to offer. Most of those are residential clients, although some of his practice deals with renovating office spaces.

“There’s definitely the celebrity aspect,” he confirms. “Most of the homes I work with are over 5,000 square feet. Right now, I’m doing a 30,000-sq.-ft. castle in New Jersey. It’s pretty upscale stuff. However, I’ve worked with everybody.”

Getting to know celebrities has created a star-studded word-of-mouth network.