A kitchen designer takes her talents outdoors to create this ultimate entertaining space and a practical place for cooking outdoors. Leigh Hunter is a certified kitchen designer, but she has recently turned her considerable skills to outdoor kitchens as well. "There’s been a real shift recently to cooking outdoors, so it was only natural that I would end up designing some outdoor kitchens," she says. When keen outdoor entertainer Otto came across Leigh’s imported Italian outdoor wood-fired ovens in the local paper, he knew he had to have one. But, after thinking it over for a while, he decided that if he was going to install an oven, he might as well get an entire outdoor kitchen while he was at it.

"I thought a wood-fired oven was a great idea, but then I thought I might also want to do a stir fry or barbeque, so I looked at the idea of having an entire outdoor kitchen," he says. Fortunately, Leigh was just the woman to consult, and she came up with a very practical design. The finished product has the pizza oven separated from the rest of the unit by a walkway that allows easy access to Otto’s herb garden. "We like to be able to harvest herbs from the herb garden to use them immediately in dishes that we cook in the oven or on the barbeque," he says.

The pizza oven itself features a concrete inner oven imported from Italy. It’s a partial DIY model that is mortared together, and Leigh and Otto modernised the shape slightly by squaring off the base and sides, in keeping with the style of the house and gardens. The rest of the outdoor kitchen unit comprises a three-burner hooded barbeque, a searing station, an ice box for drinks and bottles, drawer units and also a rubbish-bin cabinet. The unit was constructed using Hebel block with stacker stone adhered to the outside. The stacker stone features throughout the house and garden, and unifies the design. Otto is exceptionally pleased with his new kitchen outdoors, and plans to semi-enclose the space so he can utilise the facilities for cooking outdoors in cooler weather.

The pizza oven itself features a concrete inner oven imported from Italy. It’s a partial DIY model that is mortared together, and Leigh and Otto modernised the shape slightly by squaring off the base and sides, in keeping with the style of the house and gardens. The rest of the outdoor kitchen unit comprises a three-burner hooded barbeque, a searing station, an ice box for drinks and bottles, drawer units and also a rubbish-bin cabinet. The unit was constructed using Hebel block with stacker stone adhered to the outside. The stacker stone features throughout the house and garden, and unifies the design. Otto is exceptionally pleased with his new kitchen outdoors, and plans to semi-enclose the space so he can utilise the facilities for cooking outdoors in cooler weather.

I’m a certified kitchen designer and because lately we’ve had a lot of focus on barbeques and outdoor kitchens, I became involved in projects involving outdoor kitchens as well.

The men get much more involved when it comes to outdoor kitchens. They love it. And obviously there’s a difference in the materials we use because we can’t use normal timber or plastic cabinetry. Outdoor kitchens need fireproof products, and you need to consider that they’ll often be exposed to the elements.

It all started with the pizza oven. Otto just had to have an outdoor wood-fired oven, and everything else grew from there. He thought that, since he entertains a lot, he might as well expand the oven area to include facilities for all sorts of meals, from barbeques to wok stir fries.

The idea was to blend it in with the architecture and style of the house, by linking it with other features on the property, such as the stacker stone. Then it was just a matter of ensuring it had all the features Otto wanted, and enough room to work.

It is constructed using Hebel block, which is a light, fireproof material that is easy to cut into the right sizes. The brown-toned stacker stone is adhered to the outside to give it the appearance of being made from pieces of stone. The appliances themselves are incorporated into the overall unit by placing them where they will best suit Otto’s needs.