Thanks, Mnerg, this does give a better idea of things. I'm still obsessing over the door to the backyard, though, because it so utterly screws up the kitchen. A visual connection to a pretty backyard is something I totally understand, but how does that relate to the door? Why not just put a nice big window there? I agree with Marcolo that ripping out a built-in buffet is a sin for which you will be eternally punish-ed (I'm prouncing punish-ed as two syllables, like Shakespeare, to dramatize just how punish-ed you would be). So the obvious solution is to either (a) live with the existing side door in the kitchen and don't worry about having a door directly to the back yard, or (b) add another side door towards the top end of the dining room (perhaps even convert that window, which I'm assuming is a fairly wide two-pane window, into a French door or a single door with a side light). How often does a person feel the need to lunge directly into the back yard from their kitchen? Is it really so inconvenient to go out a side door and walk around the corner of the house? I mean, additions are expensive--that's a lot of money to spend just to make your kitchen a couple of feet longer (the stairs and eating area have more space, but the actual kitchen--the part with the counters--barely has any more). If you're going to spend that, you might as well get a kitchen that actually feels larger (instead of just feeling six feet further north) and, above all, is really functional with great storage, rather than only marginally better storage and a feeling that it is crushed between the eating area and the back yard passageway. If maintaining an actual back door is critical, then since you're going to the trouble and expense of doing an addition anyway it makes much more sense to expand sideways (west) as well as up (north). Bump it out six feet north AND a couple of feet west, and all of a sudden you have room for a much, much better kitchen. One other possible solution--again, this falls into the "since you're doing an addition anyway" category and may be crazy under the circumstances--might be to carefully and lovingly remove the built-in buffet, bump out the north wall of the DR by, say, 4 feet more than you bump out the kitchen, and have the backyard door open the way it does now (i.e., from the west rather than the north) and enter straight into the DR. (The buffet would be on your left as you walked into the DR from this door.) In this plan, the pantry would simply be relocated to the south side of the DR door. But unless that somewhat crazy idea gives you everything you could ever want and need, so that it justifies the expense, I would still think that simply closing off the back yard door and replacing it with a window will give you the best kitchen here. Keeping the back door but turning the island into a peninsula so you have a U-shaped kitchen ranks second, as far as I can tell, but it would probably leave you with a kitchen that was about 10.5 feet wide including the counters, or 6.5 feet wide including just the floor. If that's a size you can live with--and admittedly, having it open to the passageway from the back door really opens it up--then it's still way way better than leaving the door AND the island as they appear in the current plan.

"My question, though, is why the rear addition has to be shaped that way. Did I miss the reason? I don't think there's anything there with a foundation suitable for supporting a bathroom." Marcolo, the spot we're talking about for the PR off the kitchen (next to a back door) currently is interior space (pantry and rear entry) and has a small closet-like basement room (fruit cellar?) under it, that juts out beyond the main square of the rest of the basement. (There are windows above the dining room buffet, BTW.) The proposed area for a new back "hallway," in johnliu's plan, is above the current stoop, now a big cement chunk with a balcony over it. I don't know what's under the stoop for footings, or what would be needed to enclose that stoop as interior space, but Anne has the rough cost numbers from the GC. My understanding is that there is a substantial (though not insurmountable) cost savings to closing in just the stoop instead of squaring off that top right corner of the kitchen. I'm going to try to draw up three things, if I get time today: 1. John's plan with the area previously given to the PR used for eating, instead, somehow. (This would assume that the PR can go in the foyer or that they'd choose to forgo one on the main floor.) 2. Marcolo's suggestion (so far as I'm understanding it) of a PR on the left side of the kitchen space, next to the stairs, and the kitchen squared off at the top right corner. 3. PR at the back of kitchen as has been discussed, kitchen squared off so the fridge can be moved up, to see what that looks like and gains for us.

Wish I could draw it and show you the changes but here's an idea that popped into my mind... Let's start at the door leading to the deck. When you come in immediately you will see a door to your left which will be the half bath...on the right where you have the radiator and the dining room door there will be a mudroom/cubby section...just a small bench and hooks/cubbies for all those things you need a place to store...so essentially we have closed the dining room door off and moved the "kitchen wall" out the depth necessary to accomodate the half bath...just a pedestal sink and toilet. So when you come in the back door you will see the bathroom door on left, mud area on right and a framed opening leading to the kitchen. Take out those windows! Say goodbye. Open up the entire wall of the dining room which will hopefully have it's own window and allow natural light to come in. Use the new wall you've created by bumping out for half bath and use that space for cabinetry as well as the space where the windows used to be. Put a 74" island or as big as you can fit...you can store your dishwasher/sink and drawers as well as having an arched bar overhang for additional breakfast eating. This portion can hang over into the dining room if need be...use the dining room as your main area now for eating and have an open concept. Have a wide enough opening for the dining room to make it around the island (42 inches usually) but still leave enough wall to put your fridge on that side wall or double ovens or a floor to ceiling pantry...for that you only need 26 inches plus room for trim on your cased opening... Put in 6 recessed cans with 2 pendant lights over your island and you'll never miss those two windows... HTH! Tara

One of your layouts shows the top (North) wall at 28'. However, based on the actual "squares", you only have 26'. I used the 26-foot measurement. (It's the "November 3, 2018" layout, 5th comment.) ( Yes I made an error on the width of the addition although we can alter the width up to a certain amount, ) You did not account for wall thicknesses for the bathroom walls. So, I assumed that the bathroom is: ( I measured the actual floor space in the bathroom so we have exactly 6'x6' of floor space in the bathroom) -- 6'0" wide (East/West), including the bathroom walls -- 6'3" deep (North/South), including the bathroom walls – I took this from a note on one of your layouts It does not appear that you accounted for counter overhangs in your layouts (1.5" counter overhangs in front of the base cabinets) ( Yes I forgot to account for them , My plan was rough and just relies on whole 6" amounts LOL ! ) Between the bathroom walls and the counter overhangs, I think you have less to work with than you show. ( see above about the bathroom . I think it will be OK ) You're keeping the Dining Room, correct? I'm asking because a 36"D table is not really deep enough for dinner use. It's fine for a Kitchen Table used for quick meals or snacks, but it's not deep enough to hold serving dishes, etc., as well as table settings. It's also too shallow if anyone is tall or has long legs. (We learned both the hard way!) ( We have always had a 36" wide dining table . That's what we have in our " real" DR too. It's always been fine for 48 years so we'll be good with that. I guess it's just what you are used to . :) ) It also has tight aisles on the North and East sides.I added a 7" bumpout to the window wall. I originally had deeper counters overall on that wall, but the aisles were just too narrow. -- When there's a DW (or DW Drawers) on an aisle, IMHO, I think the narrowest functional aisle width is 45" to allow someone to pass between an open DW door/drawer and the island. It also might allow you to have the dish storage drawers in the island open at the same time as the DW Drawers are open. (More later.) (I will have to think about the aisles wrt to the DW. There isn't a time that we will be having the DW open and anyone will be walking back and forth so I think that won't be an issue. I will have the DW either one standard or the drawers open and unload to the drawers in the island as well as to the only open shelves above the DW . I am planning on all windows to the counter in the rest of the " L".....either side of the cooktop as well. This may change but it is something we are thinking of. As long as aisles are at least 36"-40" I'm good with that. That's what we had at our other house and it was fine. We like to pivot with a small step between the countertop and the island. We use the island as the primary prep space unlike so many that prep next to the cooktop. Will have to give all of this some thought with the new space !! You have given me SO much to think about !! ) -- See MamaDadaPaige's and ErikaNH's windows in this thread:[https://www.houzz.com/discussions/counter-height-window-pictures-please-dsvw-vd~2484108[(https://www.houzz.com/discussions/counter-height-window-pictures-please-dsvw-vd~2484108) The cabinets and counters along the cooktop wall are 3" deeper than standard. This allows more workspace and storage. I added a 9" wide Utility cabinet between the refrigerator/freezer space to ensure you can open the freezer or refrigerator door fully. If you don't need it, then you can add the 9" to the 15" cabinet/pullout next to the sink and put in a 24" cab/drawer base instead. I added depth to the island – if you're going to be rolling out dough or doing other tasks that need a lot of space, I think you will appreciate deeper workspace. It also allowed the addition of more cabinet space – for the extra dishes and crystal. (You can finally get them out of the boxes in the basement!) With that added island depth, a seat could be added, so I added one seat to the island in case you want to sit down while working at some point. It's configured so it doesn't interfere with the Tea/Coffee/Beverage Center since the aisle between the Center and island is only 42" wide. ( I need the pantry cab area to be deeper so that I can have my mixer and grain mill sitting on a main shelf with 2 taller drawers below and shallower shelves behind doors above it. It has to be a 17" tall space x 18" deep at least to hold those. So the island can go back to 36" wide.) ( We are only 2 so we don't need but a short 4'-5' run of area for our mudroom. One bench and a few pegs is all we have now and it's fine.I love the idea of cubbies ! Will definitely do those. There should only be a 48" walkway from the " new " sitting room into the addition .) I also added an 8' row of 18" deep cubbies with seats/benches and drawers under the seats/benches. It could be just one long row, but I thought 2 to 4 cubbies might be nice for some separation for each person. I also thought the cubbies would look nicer than just hooks on a wall. You can add doors, if you'd like to hide any mess. You still have a 53-inch wide aisle (52" if you add doors) – I think that's plenty of aisle width. Oh, note that I closed up the 65" doorway by 13" to accommodate the cubbies. The doorway is still 52" – as with the aisle, I think it should be wide enough. Sliding door to the garden…I was deliberate in its placement. You’re a bit short on aisle space, but if the table and door are placed as I show them, there should be plenty of room to use the sliding door – there's approx. 48" of aisle space between the ovens and the table. If you want even more space, you could move the table against the East wall and add a bench for that one seat. It would free up over 30" of space. The aisle between the table and the North wall is tight, but if you put the sliding side on the left, then it should work. (I was having the ovens well away from the cooktop so that DH will be using that North wall all alone and I will have the ovens and the baking/pantry cab with island to do my thing, If you can think about how that can be made to work. ) . Other items: Coffee/Tea/Beverage Center: It has the under counter refrigerator you wanted. I added a sink since your layout said "wet bar". I recommend a prep sink instead of a bar sink so you can use this space as extra prep space – it has plenty of counter space and a water source. I added a narrow trash pullout (1-bin) since (1) it's always best to have some counter space between the sink and counter edge to minimize splashing and knocking things off onto the floor and (2) I don't think an 18" wide sink base is big enough for a trashcan underneath. (A third reason is that I don't like trashcans under sinks – but that's my personal opinion!) I added a shallow (9" deep) upper cabinet to give you additional storage for the paraphernalia associated with a Coffee/Tea/Beverage Center as well as add extra storage overall (in case the 61"W cabinet under the island isn't big enough for your extra dishes and crystal!). The aisle between the table and Center is only 46.5" wide. This is because of the items I mentioned above (bathroom wall thickness, etc.). It's probably fine when it's just the two of you, but you might consider moving the table back against the wall . Refrigerator/Freezer: I wasn't sure how much space the Twins needed, so I added some space. I know they're 32" wide each and you need 2" or so on each side plus you probably need a bit of space between them, so I used 71" total space. If you don't need that much, add it to the cabinets on the right! ( The TWINS don't have any space between them. So they are 64" with the allowance on either side for opening. I messed up on that at the last house and couldn't get the bins out of the freezer !! YIKES ) . Work Zones/Storage You have three or four Prep Zones: Primary -- between the sink and range Secondary -- to the left of the sink and in the Coffee Center. Both have direct access to water Tertiary -- in the island. There is no direct water source in the island. Baking workspace I think this is where the island excels. It gives you a large workspace for rolling out dough, decorating cookies/cakes, etc. Trash pullout I put it in the island so it's easily accessible from the primary Prep Zone, the Cleanup Zone, the Cooking Zone, and the Baking workspace on the island. ( I would rather have two wide drawer bases in the island for all of our dishes except what will be on the one set of open shelves on the wall above the DW . I don't need another trash pull out with one in the coffee area and one between the cooking and the sink. DH will kill me if we have that much trash LOL ) Cooking Zone: It has plenty of landing space and workspace There's room either to the left of the ovens or on the island Pot & Pan storage is under the cooktop I recommend storing pot holders in the top drawer between the cooktop and the ovens. ( I will have drawer stacks all along the North wall....one in the prep area to the left of the cooktop. one beneath the cooktop and then I had planned the equal 42" area to the right of the cooktop with another drawer stack. We will have a hanging long bar behind the cooktop for the skillets and utensils as we had in our other kitchen.. DH loves having everything right out there where he can see it. . Need to look more at your plans. Your details are SO much better than mine !! ) ( Cleanup Zone: The Dishwasher Drawers (DWDs) are out of the Prep Zone. Dish storage is in the island across from the DWDs Optionally, you could have one upper cabinet for storing glasses. It's offset enough that the DWDs won't be in the way of getting into the upper cabinet. ( OK>.....THANK YOU THANK YOU !! You and mamagoose have given me SO much to work with !! I really appreciate it and my contractor will too. I have leeway as to size of the addition both length and width. I need to print out the floorplans you both have come up with and spend time thinking about it all. The bathroom will open into the walkway /mudroom area. The new sittingroom/old kitchen will have builtins on the sittingroom side surrounding the door. These will be for display of my wood bowls and books. ) .