A Jonathan Leaman Kitchen

Patras, Greece

Add To Collection

Other Projects by Myrto Kiourti

Add To Collection

AKRA

Add To Collection

The girls' Cabinet de Curiosités

Add To Collection

The flying box, Upper level extension

A Jonathan Leaman Kitchen

Patras, Greece

Firm

Myrto Kiourti

Type

Residential › Apartment

STATUS

Built

YEAR

2021

SIZE

1000 sqft - 3000 sqft

BUDGET

$50K - 100K

This photo shows an apartment I renovated in 2021, in the city of Patras, Greece. Instead of a conventional living room, the space features an outsize kitchen anchored by a table. The project’s title, “A Jonathan Leaman kitchen,” draws inspiration from Jonathan Leaman's painting titled “A Jan Steen Kitchen.” Leaman’s work is an homage to Jan Steen’s earlier painting, depicting the interior of a Dutch household. Leaman pays tribute to Dutch painters who saw domestic life as an art form.
In the early 20th century, Gerrit Rietveld, following the Dutch tradition, conceptualized architecture as a three-dimensional painting, not merely representing daily life but poetically reconstructing it. By relying on my concept of Emotional Functionalism, I follow up on Rietveld’s steps and integrate elements from anthropology, sociology, and psychoanalysis into architectural design. I envision the residence as a theatrical stage, inviting people to play the leading roles in their own lives.
Jonathan Leaman’s painting, displayed at Tate Modern, portrays the kitchen of his childhood home in London. It interprets the home as a sacred and mysterious laboratory for the production of children or, metaphorically, as the womb of humanity. The artist’s mother, resembling a witch, is depicted cooking over the stove. In the foreground, a recipe book suggests that a child can be created by cooking its flesh. Next to this cannibalistic recipe, we see a lily which stands for virginity in Christianity. On the rear wall, a modified version of Sandro Botticelli’s “The Birth of Venus” replaces the goddess of love with a conjugal bed and two children. The painting also includes a friend of the artist with whom contact has been lost. Leaman’s work criticizes the home as a mechanism for isolating and disciplining bodies for reproductive purposes, referencing Jan Steen’s portrayal of the moralizing role of the European home.
Jan Steen's painting “A Merry Family” hangs on the wall, in the foreground of my project’s photo. This painting captures, while also criticizing, a vibrant and profoundly social scene in a 15th-century Dutch household. In my project, the residents try to establish a balance between the discipline necessary to sustain a family and the freedom and sociability that make it enjoyable and liberating.
Standing to the left is the resident of the house, staring at the camera. She is not a mere blurred figure suggestive of the space’s scale or the model the architect visualized as the inhabitant. She is Eleni, wearing a shirt from a carnival costume she designed herself. As a performative practice, she theatrically prepares the five festive meals of the year on the day of the photoshoot: Christmas soup, New Year's pie, Carnival's fish salad, Easter stew, and Sunday roast. This recreates the unusual meal diary her grandmother prepared in the village for her grandson who returned from abroad. “This meal symbolizes emotional generosity,” says Eleni.
Petros, her partner, stands in the background with open arms. He grew up in this very apartment. After his parents passed away, the new couple valiantly decided to continue the family history by residing in the same place. His mother had adorned the space, lining the walls and floors with care. They emptied the house of all furniture and possessions, performing this purge with courage and tenderness. The city group “Crew 94 – The Hive,” a kind of urban family to them, ceremoniously relocated the old house's objects to Achaia Clauss, a place integral to Patras’ identity. To this day, during the Carnival, wild and masterfully disciplined Dionysian dances occur here, marking Patras’ trademark grand urban festivity.

Petros looks at the camera from his bar, which his father once commanded from the same location and layout. This was the starting point for various feasts and celebrations extending beyond the house, reverberating throughout the city.
Adjacent to him is his childhood room, now an office. Between Petros, manning the bar, and Eleni, preparing food at the kitchen counter, friends gather around the sprawling dining table, embodying a closeness that replicates that of a family. This large table witnesses frequent gatherings for meals, sewing clothes and theater costumes, planning city initiatives, urban games, cultural events, and political actions, such as campaigns for the mayorship of Patras. With a significant and independent political presence in the city for years, Petros and his political faction garnered 15% of the votes in the recent municipal elections.
Eleni's closest friend, the family's soulmate, and support, reclines on one of the numerous beds in the house, situated in the foreground alcove to the right. This area serves as a living room or bedroom, based on how the wooden panels are positioned. Likewise, the office can be transformed into a bedroom. The apartment foregoes sofas, opting for beds instead, as friends often are hosted here for a few days rather than just passing through.
Elpida rushes towards her mother, a pivotal figure in the composition. She emerges from the rear section of the house, where her spacious room stands as a miniature dwelling, far more than just a bedroom. Her mother’s bedroom is located at the opposite corner of the house, intentionally offering a thoughtful and supportive distance rather than a separation. The child's room contains a semi-double bed, allowing Elpida to cuddle with her mother whenever she wishes. Typically, the couple's friends, often helping to tidy up the kitchen late at night, depart, letting the couple sleep peacefully into the domestic cocoon that Eleni has woven over the years.
In contrast to the punitive, denying, and cannibalistic recipe of Jonathan Leaman’s mother, Eleni offers her own recipe: “The family wishes to have generous relationships, intelligent boundaries, sociability, and freedom. You should not isolate the house from the city.”

Photography: Nikos Psathoyiannakis
Construction: Thanassis Kremidas

Product Spec Sheet

Were your products used?

Join as a manufacturer to add your products.

Collaborating Firms

Was your firm involved? Add it now.

Team

Were you involved? Add yourself.

Keep Exploring Architizer by Creating a Free Account or Logging in.

A Jonathan Leaman Kitchen

Patras, Greece

Other Projects by Myrto Kiourti

AKRA

The girls' Cabinet de Curiosités

The flying box, Upper level extension

A Jonathan Leaman Kitchen

Patras, Greece

Product Spec Sheet

Collaborating Firms

Team