archive dive hexagonal skyview kitchen 1969 - Expert design-inspiration Guide 2025

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Archive Dive: Skyview Kitchen

Welcome to Archive Dive—my new excuse to obsess over the absolute treasures hiding in House Beautiful’s 130-year-old archives. Every month, we’ll dig up a favorite story from the past (epic room makeovers, wildly bold design swings, and style moments that were way ahead of their time) and talk about why they still resonate today. It’s part history lesson, part design deep-dive, and 100 percent a love letter to the iconic taste that’s defined HB for over a century.

—Jo Saltz, House Beautiful Editor in Chief

Interior view of a living space with large windows overlooking a patio and garden, featuring modern furniture and decor.

Ezra Stoller

With a view of Lake St. Clair, a contemporary Illinois home by William Kessler graced the cover of our September 1969 issue that featured Skyview Kitchen.

A hexagonal kitchen would be unique even today. Indeed, for the September 1969 issue of House Beautiful, then-editor Sarah Tomerlin Lee was focused on homes that broke the mold. An “idea tour” of five new houses anchors the issue, all of them contemporary and unexpected, with this aptly named Skyview Kitchen serving as a punctuation mark at the end of the issue. Architect Raymond D. Reed, a Harvard grad known for his energy-efficient homes and great love of the outdoors, designed it as part of his family home when he took a position at Iowa State University. While not large, the creatively shaped space allows multiple people to comfortably mingle and cook—an essential for Reed, as he and his wife had four small kids when they moved in.

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Interior view of a compact kitchen with wooden cabinetry and a large hexagonal skylight, featuring a floor plan diagram.

Julius Shulman

Whenever an architect plans for his own family, he can be more adventurous in his design. Raymond D. Reed, head of the Department of Architecture at Iowa State University, designed this compact kitchen in the shape of a hexagon to alleviate a sense of enclosure. Opening the ceiling with a huge skylight is another device to enlarge the vista in what is essentially a very small space. Only six feet in diameter, the flowing hexagonal design not only eliminates sharp corners but also creates the appearance of more space.

The grandeur of nature is part of this kitchen. The skylight admits a flood of constantly changing daylight and at night provides light from fluorescent tubes recessed behind the fascia below the roof. Clouds, stars, and floodlit trees all add their beauty.