PS In case it's not clear, where I'm picturing kids sitting at the peninsula is on chairs or stools in the dining room. They would be facing into the kitchen.

*bump*...
Could someone please help?
Thanks

I'm not a layout person But- for peninsula overhang we have 18" but I have very tall kids - 16" is standard.
I got confused however when you were talking about a door on the left wall. Are you closing it in - because I don't see a door on the left wall. There are cabinets all the way along. The wall of the clean-up sink/DW - you don;t want upper cabinets there? If you were to put 3' of cabinets on either side of the window with glass fronts it would continue the look of the window and be quite light looking. Don't put them across your peninsula.

Yes, there is currently a door to the backyard in that wall where the window is shown above (i.e. to the right of) the range. We're thinking of closing it in to gain storage space and a decent amount of counter on each side of the range. If we don't close it in, we probably only have room for about 12" of counter to the right, and another 12" to the left before it turns into the peninsula.

Based on our heights we'll probably have average height kids. :-)
But I doubt we'll still be living here when they reach their teenage/adult heights. I just wanted to know the standard for resale value and for the comfort of adult guests.

I guess my thinking about uppers beside the sink was... well, two things:
(1) I don't know what to do near the peninsula--just have the uppers end there, so the side of the cabinets faces the dining room? Put uppers over all or part of the peninsula (you say no on that, and I'm inclined to agree)? What options are there that look nice and are practical? If the upper cabinets just end somewhere over the peninsula, where exactly should they end?

(2) To have room for someone to comfortably stand to the right of the dishwasher while unloading dishes into those uppers, I might need to move that peninsula even further into the dining room. I don't want to shrink the dining room any more than necessary. It's about 14 1/2 feet wide (left to right) at the moment--there's currently a wall between the two rooms--and replacing a wall with this proposed peninsula will bring it down to maybe 13 feet. Dishes could go from the dishwasher to an upper to the left of the sink, but I was sort of hoping that any storage to the left of the sink would be more oriented towards baking than everyday dishes, since I was picturing that corner being where baking is done. But that's flexible, of course. Maybe the bottom left makes more sense for baking??

hi... i'm not a layout guru, so this is just an observation. your fridge seems kind of far away. i suppose that's why you have a prep sink where it is, though.

if that is your main prep area between to the left of the stove, are you going to like having your back to everything like that? my kitchen is very small, but i have a feeling that i will want to prep on the peninsula because i want to be part of the house, if that makes sense. there is a prep area to the left of my stove, but it is back farther in the kitchen.

is this a multiple cook household?

maybe take a look at this layout thread that's in progress for some help, too. :)

Here is a link that might be useful: small G-shaped kitchen - layout advice please!

I don't like the fridge opening up into a counter. Or into the john. I'm not sure where you could put it though.

Do you think you'd actually benefit from a prep sink? I'd not consider one for a kitchen that size, but you might actually need it so I'm not judging! Just asking. :)

Bump!

Yeah, it's only because of the fridge that I even thought of a prep sink. The only other place I could really picture the fridge going (so as to not need a prep sink) is along the wall between kitchen and powder room, but that leaves so little counter space, and it just seems like it would feel weird to have this blind corner and this huge fridge blocking my view of the front hall and foyer. I think the kitchen would feel more closed off, even claustrophobic. I did sketch out a floor plan with the fridge to the right of the sink, but that put the peninsula farther into the dining room, and it also would make the fridge visible from the front door, which for whatever reason I don't like (even though it's a pretty fridge, a stainless Electrolux French door counter depth).

I'm thinking it would probably feel fine to prep to the left of the range, although maybe less so if there's a wall of upper cabinets in my face. That's where I prep now, on a ridiculous 18" deep 3-foot-wide counter. But the powder room you see on the floor plan isn't there yet; that will be part of the remodel. Right now the 18" counter is on the kitchen side of a huge ugly triangular island that eats up like 15 square feet of floor space and yet seats only two people and has no storage underneath it. (The previous owners had no common sense, I suspect.) So anyway, when I'm prepping now, I'm not facing a wall; I'm facing a raised... uh... I don't know what to call the raised bit between a counter and the higher, eating-area side of an island. But no one ever sits there--it's a clutter magnet and the stools are uncomfortable--so it's not like I'm facing people while I prep there.

It's not really a multiple cook household. When there are multiple people, it's me cooking and hubby prepping what I'm about to cook... it's not like he's trying to bake a cake while I'm making dinner. I would like it to be possible for him or friends or kids to help cook, which is why I'm trying to put as much continuous counter space as I can--so someone can stand a couple of feet from me chopping vegetables, then pass them to me at the stove, or whatever.

Thanks for the link to the G-shaped kitchen thread. I was reading that with interest, but then it seems like the commenters were trying to suggest ways for it NOT to be a G-shaped kitchen... I started questioning my entire scenario... it was traumatic, haha.

**I don't like the fridge opening up into a counter. Or into the john. I'm not sure where you could put it though.**

You know, it is true that the powder room door could be further down the wall and could open the opposite way (still inwards, just the other direction) if I moved the powder room sink to the opposite wall, basically right behind the prep sink. That might make the fridge less immediately obvious when you walk out of the john; you'd be facing just a wall of floor-to-ceiling stained wooden cabinetry. That would also save money in that the powder room sink and prep sink could maybe share a drain, and the powder room plumbing could be built into the new wall instead of having to chop into an existing wall to install it. *forehead smack*

**Do you think you'd actually benefit from a prep sink? I'd not consider one for a kitchen that size, but you might actually need it so I'm not judging! Just asking. :) **

I actually have no idea. Maybe I've just been on this site so long that I ended up drinking the prep sink kool-aid. :-)
I've never had a prep sink. I don't even have fancy enough friends that I've ever been in a friend's kitchen with a prep sink, haha (but I do live in a nice enough neighborhood that probably some neighbors have them).

I guess what makes me think a prep sink might make sense is that when I try to draw "zones" on my kitchen plan without one, I'm not sure what that lower wall (left/below range) would be. It wouldn't be prep because there would be no sink. Could it be baking? I guess... It is true that you don't wash anywhere near as much stuff when you're baking as you do when cooking, except when you're using fresh fruit, which is often not the case. But then I would be walking all the way across the kitchen with all the things I need to prep for dinner. But it's a lot more common for me to be cooking while hubby is loading the dishwasher than for me to be baking then, so in that regard it makes more sense for the baking zone to be the one right next to cleanup, since we'd get in each other's way less often. But on the OTHER other hand, I prep way more than I bake, and it's nice to have window views while doing so...

The other thing that makes a prep sink seem non-ridiculous is that we do tend to leave dishes in the sink and I have found myself trying to wash vegetables over a pile of dishes, which is annoying (not to mention unsanitary... am I a hygiene freak if I wonder whether the raw eggs from the mixing bowl are splashing up onto my vegetables??). But I guess that problem could be resolved if we had one of those double-bowl sinks where it's a main sink on one side and a tiny prep-sink-with-garbage-disposal on the other side.

Do you have a prep sink? How would you use this kitchen space--where would the zones be--if there were no prep sink?

ideagirl... is the "door" on the right a physical door or just a path?

Hi Ironcook,

Right now it's a physical door 32" wide, because there's a full wall there instead of the peninsula. You can see where the wall is--at the top of the plan, above the toaster, where a bit of yellow wall goes straight up? The kitchen/dining room wall that we currently have is part of that. That's the line it runs along. Then there's the door, then another 8 inches or so of that wall, and then it suddenly juts backwards--the fridge is set into a sort of alcove. We're planning to remove that entire wall and that side of the alcove, since it serves little purpose other than making the fridge even further from the rest of the kitchen than it needs to be.

The fridge has stainless sides (not black), so it'll look fine with one side exposed--in fact I like that idea, because the sides of the fridge are magnetic. (Until two months ago we had a white magnetic fridge and it still seems weird not to be able to use magnets.)

Right now the door between the kitchen and dining room is always open, of course. We're looking at replacing the wall with the peninsula shown on that floorplan, and making the door into just a doorway about 40" wide.

The door shown at the bottom of the layout, in contrast, is just a doorway, not a physical door. It leads from the kitchen into the foyer.

I wouldn't like the fridge there either. i'd put it on the PR/kit wall. is it going to be a CD? if not, you could sink it back into the PR.

then use the space between sink and stove for prep - in front of the window.

Turn the refrigerator so it is facing up, and don't have the rounded end on the opposite counter, where the prep sink is.

The wall that the fridge's back is against is the living room wall. If we turn the fridge to face up, that either eats into the living room by about a foot and a half or eats into the walkway from foyer to kitchen by about a foot and a half. I just think the living room would look weird with a random corner jutting into it like that, and I'm also not totally happy with the idea of having the fridge facing into the dining room--that kind of kills any sense of the dining room as being a dining room and not just an extension of the kitchen.

Meanwhile, that walkway cannot be widened because there's a stairwell on the other side of that bottom wall there, the one the toilet is against. The stairwell runs parallel to that wall and ends where that bottom wall ends. The stairway can't be moved because the other end of it (a small landing) is against an exterior wall, and since it is already a half-stairwell with a landing where you turn, we can't shorten it by making it turn.

So even if we made the ending of that bottom peninsula flat and level with the wall behind it instead of round, creating enough space between the counter and the fridge, we couldn't make the rest of the walkway line up with the space between counter and fridge. You would have to veer left as you passed the powder room. I think it would feel like a rabbit warren... which is not a good thing! :-)

Such are the challenges of older homes. Ours was built in 1935, when fridges were about 1/4 the size they are today.

Hmm. The powder room is luxuriously large for an old house. I had one where I could paint the entire ceiling standing on the toilet. You do have a nice space for the kitchen. I would not call it small since it's bigger than mine (and mine is a good size!).

What about switching the prep sink and fridge (now it's a coffee bar). Sink the fridge into the PR wall. Now it's not really a prep sink though. But it could be a butler's pantry...

Yeah I'm not sure. I have had times where an extra sink would be nice, but just because we let dishes stack up. I find it very hard to imagine me being willing to sacrifice counter and cabinet space for another sink. Maybe if I went with a giant kitchen, but then it seems like I'd just spread the mess. But apparently people like them!

And I've never been in a house with a prep sink either, at least not one that was used. I'm not in the cheap part of town, either.

(Check code--I don't know if it's still the case, but there was a time in my area where you needed at least two doors between a potty and a kitchen.)

If you can knock a hole in the powder room wall to build a shallow cabinet into the back of that corner blind cabinet (assuming you have a good GC or mad DIY skillz) you can put in a little bathroom cabinet for TP. I just hate wasting space. You might consider making the powder room smaller, you know, the type where you can wash your hands while you're sitting...it's VERY period-appropriate!

Eliminate BP3015, allow a 36" opening and pull the refrigerator north approximately 2 feet from its current location. Or, at least enough to put the lower edge of the fridge in alignment with the back edge of the counter with the prep sink on it. (Not even a foot). Then you could mimic the doorway at the bottom of your plan with an opening between the fridge and the pantry area/ powder room area. This would put the fridge in the kitchen and get the powderroom out of the kitchen in a matter of less than one foot.

Hm, I'll look at the layout later and see if that idea looks good to me, Palimpsest. Thanks.

Fori, it's an interesting point about space between potty and kitchen. Although we have friends who live in a relatively new house in a chi-chi area, and they have a powder room that opens into the hallway that runs from their entryway to their kitchen. It's probably 4 or 5 feet further down the hallway than the one on my floorplan, but the only door between it and the kitchen is the powder room door. But it's definitely worth checking.

I like the cabinet in the powder room/blind corner idea. The reason the powder room is as large as it is--well, the width is because of the window placement (and my attitude of "I'll be damned if I'm paying what it would cost to move a window on a BRICK/STONE HOUSE!"). Then the length is because I want that kitchen peninsula to be long and don't really see what we would gain from having the powder room be smaller than a long kitchen peninsula would enable it to be.

I do see what you mean--you'd gain absolutely nothing by shrinking the potty. And really, why graze your elbows if you don't have to?

Do you have a drawing of a little more of the overall space, including more living room, stairs, etc.? And maybe mark the things that can't move.

Not that I don't love your plan, but we must be sure you have considered everything or we'd be remiss!

hi... i was wondering about the "door" because i was thinking you could put the fridge where the toaster is and the peninsula to extend from where the fridge is. that way the "kids" would be closer in eye-view while you prep.

the microwave could go under the counter for your "snack center" in the peninsula, as you mentioned before... i think.

my brain is a little over-loaded right now, but i wanted to pop back in so you didn't think i abandoned the thought! not sure it that gives you any help, though.

Ok, if my photo-posting ninja skills are up to snuff, here comes an image of the ground floor of our house as it currently exists:

This is what it's currently like--the kitchen door is shown as a door, there is no powder room, etc. What you don't see is where stuff is in the kitchen, but it's basically where it is in my proposed plan, give or take a foot or two. The main thing you don't see is the horrendous gigantic triangular peninsula that starts about 34" south of the edge of the kitchen door and eats up so much floor space that all that's left on that side of the kitchen is enough room for two barstools at the bottom left, where evidently people are supposed to sit and watch me cook (the stove, a 30" gas range, is jammed between the top edge of the peninsula and the kitchen door).

Right now what we have in the way of storage is just a single run of 50+ year old cabinets along the top (north) wall of the kitchen. There is no storage in the peninsula, not even a drawer (!!!). We also put an Ikea butcher-block rolling cart along the wall that the kitchen shares with the dining room.

We're planning to rip out the closet in front of the stairs and turn it into a built-in hutch the same width as the stairs; that would liberate the approximately 2 square feet of kitchen space that it pointlessly occupies and help us turn that space into good storage (pull-outs and so on). As you can also see on the proposed layout, we're thinking of knocking out the little bits of wall that create the bottom left corner of the dining room. That will give us a little more room for that whole storage area we're planning, and will also let us make the entry to the dining room wider (it's currently 32").

Just *bumping* because it's already on page 3...

*bumped* once again in hopes that Fori and/or Ironcook could comment on the overall layout...

ideagirl2,
I think you need a powder room added in an old house, if you can make it happen. I can't tell you the number of times that I used THE ONLY bathroom in an old house when I was a casual guest. I live in a part of town with old houses. If you can make it happen, this will add hugely to your daily function. You are absolutely right about the window placement, and the powder room has be where it is and how big it is. Not many other options.

One of the things that you can do it to build a framed opening (or pocket doors) between the LR and DR and similarly matched opening between the kitchen and DR. This will not work with your proposed peninsula as well.
Take it for what it is worth.... I would work on how you are going to work on opening the rooms between the dining and kitchen. you have strange little jogs along the top wall (north wall) of your house. You need to be able to work with that so that does not look odd in your opend up rooms. Once you figure out the design elements to either embelish that odd jogs or somehow incorporate that..

If you close-in the current backdoor, how will you get out to the backyard? Do you propose another door elsewhere, ie dining room? I would put French doors that line up and match the opening to LR. This will visually open up the entire length of the house. The house as a whole has to function before you have a functional kitchen, IMHO. This is probably a bigger project than what you had anticipated but just my 2cents.

Hi Kaismom, thanks!

We do have strange jogs in the north wall... a chimney comes down there in the top right corner of the kitchen, and then of course the dining room is just built farther out into the back yard than the kitchen. Add to that the fact that the north wall of the kitchen will have cabinets and a standard-depth counter on it, and there's going to be a little disconnect: the front of the kitchen counter will effectively be about four feet from the back wall of the DR. One thing I was thinking of doing was putting a built-in hutch in the top left corner of the dining room, built so it is exactly as deep as the portion of the peninsula that sticks into the dining room. You can see part of that hutch in the layout I posted in my first message. We can always use shelves--we love built-ins--and normal people, future buyers who unlike us do not own 4000+ books, might also like having a hutch in the DR.

As for back yard access, we're probably going to turn that DR window into a door. It's about 52" wide or so--I can't remember offhand--so it would either be one door (say 36") with a light or two narrow French doors. Then some of the brick from that wall being removed would be taken around the corner and used to turn the kitchen door into a window, so the brick will match the rest of the house perfectly. There's also a side door on the bottom landing of the stairwell, so we actually have two side doors on that wall (the west wall). Losing one isn't a big deal.

It is definitely a bigger project than anticipated. I was assuming we would stay within the existing kitchen's footprint, but then I realized the dimensions were such that it would be pretty cramped if we put a normal-depth counter against the east and west walls (where would we stand to load/unload the dishwasher, etc.). I definitely want counters on those walls--lack of counter space is a big issue in the current kitchen.

Also, my original idea was to put a breakfast nook where the powder room is shown, but it makes more sense to put a powder room. That raises the question, where do you feed small children breakfast? At the massive round antique oak dining table that cannot even be seen from most of the kitchen working areas? Um... no. So a peninsula open to the dining room started looking like a good idea.

Idea girl, what a great house! It looks like there's lots of potential to your space. Here's a couple of little ideas to share with you:

-As I look at it, I'm wondering if it would be helpful to put the stove on the bottom wall. Several reasons: That way when you are standing at it, you at least have a your dining area and peninsula sort of off to your side, rather than to your back, which would make visiting a bit easier. It would give you a longer run of work space, which sounds like one of your goals. It would also give you lots of cabinet storage along the length of wall where the stove was previously located. I'm concerned that with the stove where you have it located, that your baking area is going to be filled with dirty dishes (or is that just my kitchen?-LOL) that will have to be cleared out before you bake.
This brings the stove closer to the fridge in your drawing, which is handy for last minute whatevers that you want to add to the meal you're cooking on the stove.
If you still want to have a prep sink, one could potentially go in the corner by the stove, similar to the one Circuspeanut has. That would be safer for unloading hot pots of pasta, at least.

Unfortunately I think this last one puts the left hand side of the range (when facing it) too close to the traffic pattern with inadequate set down to its left.

It also eliminates set down for the fridge. I could see someone knocking into a pot handle on the range in this instance.

Ideagirl2,
Since it costs nothing to play on paper, I would come up with some options of taking interior walls downs and rejuggling the space. For example, I would turn the dining room orientation so it is longer N/S than W/E taking space away from the LR. Then I would encroach the kitchen into the current DR. I have no software to do this. Maybe others can pitch in.

Thanks, folks. I think Palimpsest is right about the lack of set-down and potential for knocking into pot handles... other than that, though, moving the range there was an intriguing idea. I know someone else on these boards has a mirror over her range... I might do that to be able to see and feel more connected with people in the DR.

As for taking down interior walls... I can barely tolerate the idea of taking down the kitchen/DR wall, because we have pretty plaster walls with patterns or brush strokes that could be replicated only at great cost (if at all), and hardwood floors that are continuous throughout the ground floor (even under the ugly vinyl some lunatic years back put in our kitchen). So, move a wall, and oops--there's a big scar on the floor that only 75-year-old oak can fill.

Putting dishes in the peninsula's base cabinets so kids can reach them is a great idea.

The other ideas I've played with are putting the fridge where Laughable suggested the range could go, or putting it to the right of the sink (where the DW is). It's a counter-depth fridge. There are drawbacks to both those plans--there would be barely any room to the left of the range if I put it down there, and only about a foot of clear space to the right of the sink if I put it there. On the other hand, it would let us turn the area where the fridge is now shown into a snack area--maybe four feet of counter on base cabinets, and then the pullouts to the right of it to maximize the storage space.

Argh. There are pros and cons to everything. I guess it's just a matter of which cons you can deal with best.

Ideagirl, I like the first layout on this post best. The time you are facing the stove is actually much less than the time that you are facing the sink. On one of the FAQs, it breaks down the amount of time at the sink, range, versus prep. I think you will be fine with this layout. Most people do not have the range/stove top facing the other members of the family.

I think you will find the kitchen storage bit tight in this kitchen if you are planning on staying a long time and setting down roots. Do you have a basement that can take some of the larger rarely used stuff like large turkey roasting pans, Christmas dishes etc. As the kids get larger, you will be buying boxes of stuff... (cases of drinks, cases of instant oatmeal, cases of Pelligrino etc in our household.) This type of living seems to become the norm for Americana.

Another option is not to aquire... I don't know which camp you fall into. Otherwise, you need to put in as much uppers as you can, IMHO. You will need to really maximize your corner storage. You got two corners that will eat up a big chunk of your storage.

I think it is too tight for the bottom of the G to stick out into the walkway. I would end it at the wall of the powder room and think of giving up the prep sink to save space and increasing storage. Personally, I prefer to have storage over prep sink in a small kitchen. Each to his/her own. Just a different opinion.

Having used many insufficient kitchens in my life, the lack of counter space and the lack of storage are the most glaring problems when they don't work well. I have never thought that the lack of prep sink was what was glaringly wrong with the kitchen.

Ideagirl2 (what happened to girl 1? What was her idea?) I wanted to think about a different layout, but need the first floor plan with dimensions. Is the floorplan you posted earlier in this thread, of the entire first floor, accurately to scale? If so, can you email it to me, the full resolution version? The version on photobucket is too blurry to use. You can email me via GW, or simply use my GW username at earthlink.net.

Speaking of storage, what are the pros/cons of lazy susans and those pull-out corner thingies? Why does everyone seem to hate lazy susans?

John, I'll send a legible floorplan. The whole first floor one is to scale, but that's not much use if you can't read the measurements...

Kaismom, we have a basement that's getting progressively more organized--I'm talkin' 6-foot-tall, 2-foot-deep wire shelves with stuff stacked on them! I amaze myself lately, haha--and we're also planning on putting an upright freezer there. But as you suggested, we are going to need more basement shelves so that the ones nearest the basement-to-kitchen door can be dedicated to cases of San Pellegrino and the like. (Our garage is integral so groceries come in through the basement.)

Also, am I delusional for thinking that the storage in a remodel with anything like this floorplan will be more than adequate? We've lived here for a few years now with NOTHING but a run of base and wall cabinets along the north wall, two tiny uppers perched high on the east wall to the left of the DR door, and only one (one!!!) drawer. (And this drawer, which is somewhere between 50 and 70+ years old, is hard to open!) Seriously. Our trash can is sitting over by the fridge and our recycling goes in cardboard boxes under the aforementioned hideous triangular peninsula. We have pretty Asian bowls displayed on bookcases because there is no room for them in the kitchen. The idea of having multiple drawers--dedicated drawers, one for each purpose!! Omigod!!--just makes me swoon.

My DH is on the accumulator side and I'm on the not-accumulator side. I tend to operate like, "Oh, that's a cute timer/pie slicer/set of measuring spoons, but I already have a timer/pie slicer/set of measuring spoons. So I guess I can't get that." I have actually given pans to Goodwill because some relative gave us a better version of the same kind of pan as a gift. And I'm the one who cooks; I can't really see him buying kitchen stuff spontaneously of his own volition. So hopefully the kitchen won't morph into clutter hell. Our one great weakness is books...

hi ideagirl2,

not sure if my previous idea was rejected or not. anyway, i'm throwing it out there again. i hope it's even structurally possible!

some people really like their super susans (no pole). i think the blind corner thingies aren't very well liked by people who have tried them, from what i've read.

hi again... pinch_me just installed some after-market lazy susans (with pole) and posted pics. it looks like you can put a lot of stuff on them. i linked to the thread below.

Here is a link that might be useful: Lazy Susan Thread with Photos

Hi Ironcook,
Thank you! You must be a Photoshop ninja.

I will mock up your idea and then do the 3D walkthrough in Chief Architect to see how it looks/feels. I did have an earlier layout with lazy susans in the top left and bottom left corners, but for some reason Chief Architect drew them as huge, with diagonal doors over them instead of the corner cutout shown on some of the susans in the thread you posted. Thanks for posting it, by the way. I didn't know until I read it that there was even such a thing as a lazy susan without a central pole. I haven't seen a modern lazy susan anywhere... I didn't even realize they came with those corner cutouts. Duh! :-)

How do people with undercounter microwaves deal with small children? My concern with that is the basic "kid puts stuffed animal/random objects found on floor/etc. into microwave and wrecks it." I was thinking about having one of those sort of hutches, or not an actual hutch but like a built-in top half of a hutch that sits on the counter, with shelves, with the microwave up on a shelf and maybe the toaster below.

PS Johnliu, I sent a layout to the email you indicated (earthlink), but no response... did you get it?

ideagirl2, please don't feel obligated about the layout; it was just an idea for you to try. i'm not a layout guru! just have a lot of my own trial/error experience and learning from this site.

i didn't learn about the susans until i came to gardeweb, so not a "duh". :)

funny, when you mentioned snacks for the kids, i figured you wanted them to learn to do it themselves. i forgot to consider the age they might nuke a stuffed animal!

my guess is some microwaves come with a child-lock, but probably it's a hassle. up on the counter is probably easiest. under-counter is probably best if you want to spring for the drawer-style, anyway.

the best spot for the m/w is probably dependent on how you use it most. some people prefer it near the fridge, others by the stove, and some where the kids won't be in the way using it.

Ideagirl2- I'm late to this party, but I like your first layout, very much! I think it's charming and would be a very nice kitchen to cook in and visit with the cook :)

Here are a couple of pictures I just found, while researching my kitchen. They may not be exactly your style (I see your looking for a 'woodsy' art deco) but hopefully they'll give you some ideas, especially for uppers and alternatives.

Also, if you have a load bearing wall, between kitchen and dining room, just put a post on the end of the peninsula...this can look really nice, if done right.

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