5 Kitchen Faucet Types That Add Style

A touchless kitchen faucet lets you turn on the water with a wave of your hand, which prevents the transfer of mess and germs. We’ve all sliced up raw chicken, walked to the kitchen sink, and touched the faucet. Yuck. Now you’re cleaning your hands, your work surface and the sink. Touchless kitchen faucets are the invisible helping hand we could all use in the kitchen.

Available from top brands, you’ll find slight variations in how the faucet turns on the water. Some touchless kitchen faucets require a gentle tap with the back of your hand instead of motion. You’ll also see fun features like battery-operated design (so no need to hardwire) and automatic shut-off to aid in water conservation.

A bridge kitchen faucet features two separate handles. One is for hot water, and one is for cold water. A pipe runs through the middle forming a bridge between the two handles and the central spout. A beautiful design, a bridge kitchen faucet looks especially charming in a farmhouse-style or traditional kitchens and works best on a sink with enough room for the spout and two handles.

Before you buy on aesthetics alone, remember that to regulate the water temperature you’ll need to turn both the hot and cold knobs on a bridge kitchen faucet. Some homeowners find this style works best in a kitchen where you have access to two sinks. Use the bridge kitchen faucet for handwashing and dishes and install a more functional single-handle faucet near a prep sink.

Add a little European flair to your kitchen with a pot filler faucet. This design is gaining momentum with interior designers and in American luxury kitchens. Pot filler faucets allow you to fill a large soup or stock pot with water at the stove instead of lugging it from the sink. Genius, but it’s an investment. The price of the fixture plus installation can run from several hundred dollars to over a thousand dollars.

Pot filler faucets makes sense for the enthusiastic and frequent home cook but needs to be professionally installed (unless you have pro-level plumbing knowledge) to prevent issues like leaks. If you’re building your dream kitchen and spend a ton of time cooking, this might be just the decadent extra touch you’ve been looking for, so treat yourself.

There’s beauty in simplicity, that’s why the single-handle kitchen faucet will always be a classic. Not only is it easy to turn it on and off, but temperature control happens on one handle, too. Since it only needs one hole in the sink to install, it’s a DIY favorite. If you don’t want to invest in a touchless faucet, a single-handle kitchen faucet is easy to turn on with the back of your hand or wrist when necessary.

In fact, the ease of the handle and temperature adjustments makes single-handle kitchen faucet an ideal choice for people with arthritis or hand and finger mobility issues. Its affordable price point makes this an accessible option, which is why you’ll see this design in most kitchens. Since it’s so common, brands make single-handle kitchen faucets in a variety of designs and finishes, so it’s easy to find what you’re looking for.

Dial up the drama with a high-arc kitchen faucet or a gooseneck faucet. Defined as having a height of over eight inches from its base to the top of the faucet, this design offers ample room for dishes underneath. It’s much easier to fill a pot with water when you have extra clearance. Since a high-arc kitchen faucet is more visible, it pays to splurge on your favorite finish.

If you’re stumped about which goose neck faucet finish will work with your appliances and other hardware, think about the tones of the metal. Warm tones like bronze, brass and gold all work nicely together. Cool tones like nickel or black can be mixed. Black fixtures are an exception, since this color will work with both warm and cool tones. If you’re mixing finishes, consider keeping style (the shapes of the knobs and hardware) consistent, or at least related. So modern with modern, or traditional with traditional.