The designer: Darren Taylor of Searle & Taylor

Photos Paul Craig

The story: Celebrating its 35^th anniversary in 2026, Searle & Taylor is the longest-established premium independent kitchen studio in Winchester. The company has been designing traditional bespoke and contemporary kitchens for clients in Hampshire and beyond since 1991, and now offers a full home refurbishment service, making cabinetry and joinery for every room in the home.

Owned by Darren Taylor, who started the business aged 18, Searle & Taylor has a long-held reputation for thoughtful and intelligent design, meticulous planning and precision installation together with award-winning customer service. Its capacious two-floor showroom in central Winchester features an array of beautiful traditional, Shaker, Scandi and contemporary kitchen displays, together with a home bar and two walk-in pantries. Having extended the showroom in 2024, its new Garden Room includes a contemporary open-plan kitchen and media room display with bespoke banquette seating.

Designer Q&A:

Q) What was your brief from the client?

This kitchen was designed for clients that live in a five-bedroom 20^th Century timber-cladded country house, a style that is particular to properties in Hampshire. Wanting to keep with the wood-drenching theme within the home, their brief was for a pale wood in-frame Scandi-style kitchen with an island and a home bar in the adjacent dining area.

The rooms benefit from having dark oak-framed leaded windows so it was agreed that black accents would be incorporated within the design to complement this feature. Our clients also wanted luxury appliances, handles and accessories to complement the cabinetry.

Q) How did you answer that brief?

I suggested using blond oak throughout for the in-frame cabinetry for this kitchen, as it is a beautiful pale timber and is used a lot in Scandi homes. This includes blond oak veneered carcases and a mix of 30mm thick panelled door fronts, or vertical slatted blond oak veneered door fronts and end panels, set within 8mm cock bead frames. The same materials are repeated on the fronts of the solid oak dovetailed drawer boxes as well, and all were hand-crafted.

The first design consideration was how to make best use of the space. The long 6.4m x 4.4m room has panel doors to the garden at the end of it, a feature window and a recessed wall to the right. On the left-hand side I designed a run of cabinetry that begins with the cooking zone with housings for a Gaggenau oven, combination microwave and warming drawer, next to a double door dresser cabinet with fluted glass fronts. This leads to the sink run, with the sink and tap directly beneath the leaded window, with a matching double door dresser cabinet to the right of it.

Q) Tell us about the island and additional storage

At the centre of the room is a 3.2 x 1.4m island. On the task side are cutlery and storage drawers on either side of two deep pan drawers at the centre, all with long black handles that are horizontally placed. There is a 3.2m worktop on the island with an L-shaped extended overhang at one end to accommodate a seating space for four counter stools. On the facing side are two double-door cabinets.

The tall cabinetry within the recess on the right-hand side of the room features blond oak panelled door fronts in two double-door configurations with long black vertical handles. The left-hand double doors open to a fully integrated larder fridge and an integrated tall freezer with icemaker, both by Gaggenau. The right-hand set of double doors open to a double pantry cabinet with bottle racks and integrated shelving.

Q) Which products did you use and why?

At the design stage, we had a meeting with our clients at our Winchester showroom, where we presented appliances and accessories that are on display.

Our clients like to cook and entertain and they loved the look of the luxurious Gaggenau Vario 400 ovens that were on display and they also liked the cooling and wine cooling appliances by the brand, so these were specified for their kitchen.

We have a Novy Panorama Pro 90 vented downdraft induction hob on display, which has a concealed ventilation tower that rises when extraction is required. Our clients ordered the 120cm version with five zones that is flush-mounted within the worktop on the island.

Our clients wanted a pale worktop so we suggested 30mm thick Lucern Lake quartz.

To complement the leaded window, we suggested a black Quooker Flex PRO3 tap with Cube function above a Villeroy & Boch Farmhouse 80 ceramic double sink. We always recommend Quooker taps, as they are energy-efficient and water-saving and with the Cube function you get hot and cold filtered water, 100° boiling water and filtered sparkling water, all from the same tap.

For durability and longevity, our clients chose two integrated 60cm dishwashers by Miele that flank a shallow depth cabinet directly beneath the sink.

We recommended the M’Quvee wine fridge for the home bar, as it is stylish, preserves wine very well and has a soft-close door.

Q) Which design elements do you think make the scheme so successful?

The fluted glass for the dresser cabinets perfectly complements the fluted blond oak doors and drawers, while the panelled tall cabinetry adds a stylish point of difference. The black and tan elements work so well together and we loved the design continuing into the dining room with the fitted home bar.

Q) Any advice for anyone who may be planning their own kitchen?

Always set a budget in advance, and do research to define the style and finish you want before you meet with a kitchen designer. At our initial meetings we go through a very detailed client brief to build a picture of our clients’ lifestyles to make sure that they have a kitchen that is perfectly suited to them and their requirements, even down to whether they are right or left-handed.

The details:

Kitchen by Searle & Taylor

Appliances by Gaggenau, Novy and M’Quvee

Sink and tap by Villeroy & Boch and Quooker

Hayley loves: the sophisticated use of timber which, with the matt black accents, creates a warm and inviting space with a Scandi feel.