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Johnny Grey (born 1951) is a British designer, author and educator specialising in kitchens. He has authored five books.
Grey studied architecture at the Architectural Association from 1970 to 1976 (AA Dip Arch), with tutors Jeremy Dixon and Mike Gold. One of the first kitchens he designed was for the food writer Elizabeth David, his aunt.[citation needed]
Whilst studying architecture, Grey focused on craft aspects of historic buildings. He also dealt in and restored 18th-century furniture alongside his brother. After graduating he made furniture and kitchens in his family's barn in Sussex. His career took off after a 1980 Sunday Times article, "Why this awful fixation with fitted kitchens?".[1][2]
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, and the studio has worked for residential clients all over the world.
Grey ran a showroom and studio at the San Francisco Design Center from 1990 to 1997 and currently collaborates in the U.S. 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 (NICA) and Newcastle University.
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 Kitchen concept in 1984. Made from freestanding furniture, this was an unorthodox idea for its time.[3][4][5] The now-widespread use of willow baskets as drawers was first invented 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.[6]
Grey includes a central island in his designs wherever possible.[7]
Grey incorporated Alexander Technique theory in kitchen design with individually customized dimensions for counter tops and sink and dishwasher placement.[8] Dedicated work surfaces, or task-driven areas, further this approach.[9][10] Low-level counters for smaller appliances (and children's cooking) and raised-height dishwashers are now widespread in kitchens.[11][12]
'Soft Geometry' describes Grey's move towards curved furniture inspired by the relationship between peripheral vision and body movement.[13][14] In the mid 2000s his meeting with neuroscientist and sociologist John Zeisel brought new insights into making kitchens into 'happy spaces'.[15][16][17] 'The living room in which you cook' (2014) restricts the culinary zone to leave room for other sociable activities.[18] 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.[19][20][11]
Grey's first book The Art of Kitchen Design (Cassell 1994, in print for 14 years) 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 (1998). Grey's Kitchen Culture was published in 2004 with English, American, Russian and Asian editions.
In 2012 Grey became Visiting Professor of Design and Kitchen Culture at Buckinghamshire 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.[21] It was launched in 2013 as a blended format, the first students graduating in 2017.[22][23][24] He resigned from the university in October 2020 and has no connection with the current course.
In 2017, Grey collaborated with Sevra Davis, director of education at the Royal Society of Arts, and Professor Peter Gore and Patrick Bonnet from the National Innovation Centre for Ageing in Newcastle, to extend accessible design education into kitchen design and assist with changing the language of disability and ageing design to focus on multi-generational design. They developed the Student Design Challenge: Eat, Share, Live. 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 2019 with the next RSA Student Design Challenge, Beyond the Kitchen Table. 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 Company Drinks and Marsha Smith, a scholar and activist.[25]
Grey received the Simon Taylor Lifetime Achievement Award (2008) from Designer Kitchen and Bathroom for outstanding contribution to the British kitchen and bathroom industry.[26] and Designer Kitchen and Bathroom’s Service to Industry Award in 2016.[27][28] In September 2021, Grey was awarded a Special Achievement Award at the kbbreview Retail & Design Awards.[29]
