I think I like the second one with the coolers under the open area, but do you need 2 fridges there? Would one bigger one in the center be workable, then you could have two larger base units and bigger drawers, etc. I'm not sure that lining up lowers with uppers width wise is visually necessary, unless you prefer that level of symmetry of course. The door image you posted in gorgeous!

Here, while waiting for my trim guy to finish I played with your image a litte. One bigger fridge in the center with an integral front panel and two larger base cabs flanking.

Feels a little less 'busy' down there?

Hollysprings said: "The word is fake.. only when you are getting overcharged does it become faux." HA ha, lol. That's durn funny, lol.

I still think it's a pretty door, though. However, cleaning the dust out of those deep grooves might get old.

Don't feel you have to enforce vertical symmetry with the need to line the coolers up with the stacked bottles. If slightly wider ones are cheaper and would work, the go with that without a qualm. And i think having them the same dimension actually weakens the overall design, a bit.

You'll notice that in colored picture, the bottle stack and the cooler doors don't line up, and it still looks well-balanced. Notice, too, that there's even an optical illusion-created discordance between the stacked bottle rack on the right and the strongly vertical-orientation of the glass-paneled doors to the left on the other side of the TV. So just making those two sides match didn't result in an eye-sweet balance, no matter what the tape measure may say.

In your case, I think the strong apparent verticality of the coolers' slab doors may make them seem narrower than they actually are, creating a top heavy look to the wine racks above. This violates the general sense we have that things should be bolder, and stronger-appearing on the base, and successive layers should get lighter, narrower, smaller, or whatever.

In our second drawing, with the coolers moved inward, the optical-illusion of their narrowness is resolved.

Also it may just be artefacts of the layout but the D-shaped raised trim pattern on the sides of the narrow lower doors strikes me as unattractive. Also door hinging should be book-matched, or disguised to look that way.

HTH

L.

I originally had the coolers centered but in a previous thread it was stated that it would be easier access to have the coolers not centered as that would be where you would stand while preparing. I like the 2 coolers better centered and may go back to that. I want 2 separate coolers as I want to store red wines at about 60 degrees and whites and beer around 40 degrees. I only need one set of drawers in this case as I will be storing stuff like a blender, a coffee maker, liquor bottles, etc. I plan to do the pull out shelves at this point.

Annette

Would put the wine cubbies on the bottom, a little cooler (heat rises).

Have you found 18" coolers? I have 18' Ulines, and could not find replacements, so we made the spaces with fillers to accommodate 24" ones. I have one for wine, and one for soda and coffee.

Nancy

I would love the wine storage on the bottom but with 8 German Shepherds in the house, it's too risky that one will do a slide by and take out some bottles!

sprigroz, Summit and Marvel both make an 18", there was one other brand but I can't recall who it is now.

Annette

I ruled out partial overlay from the get go as that is what is common around here in the cookie cutter builder grade kitchens That's what I have in my kennel kitchen, ok for storing dog bowls and such but the frames totally get in the way. Unless there is another type of partial overlay that I'm missing. I never understood why people wanted that stile down the middle of the cabinet?
Part of the wine storage will actually be liquor bottles, I'm not going with actual cubbies, rather open racks like this-

I guess I should have explained a bit more, I'm not strictly going with the exact dimensions shown. I have a total of 9.5 feet along the wall I'm planning to use. I would like to keep it around 7.5 feet (90 inches) but can go up or down in order to make it fit. The 2 dimensions I'm kind of stuck with are the fridge (15 inch units are the most available and cost effective, I need 2 to allow for different things I'm storing) and the size of the wine/bottle holders, which need to be about 4inch square. I will used cabinets for odd sized stuff but most can fit in that size. IKEA planner is the easiest to demo with but very limited in that there are no 12 inch units and 24 inch uppers all have one door. Which is why some of my examples have hand drawn stuff.
This is one of my plans from earlier-it would have 2 18 inch upper solid door and 2 27 inch uppers with glass doors.

Annette

Eight (8) German Shepherd Dogs - very cool! However, knowing that, I think you need MORE wine storage. :-)

Based on your concernes, I like the faux inset full overlay. Simple door design, but with some detail to keep it from being boring.

I think the faux inset is pretty ingenious but I'm with deedles in that keeping it clean (dog hair from 8 GSDs!) would not be fun and if you want inset, just get inset. If you don't because of money or practicality, just get full overlay. No one besides GWers, KDs and Old Home Snobs know or care about the difference. And even this Old Home Snob got full overlay.