In my defense, I said I thought the fridge is OK as shown if there's no prep sink...I had misidentified a cutting board in the layout you sent me for a prep sink. ;-)

The island definitely grew since I last saw the plan. It seems to crowd the table and is quite deep. I think this shrunk your work aisles, too. 36" is good in front of the cooktop, but kind of tight in front of the dbl oven.

I really think you'd do better with less island so the room isn't overcrowded. How about 30" dish drawers and an 18" trash pullout that opens toward the sink on the end of the island? (Mine does that and I can reach it easily from stove and sink area...Handy for both zones) This would make your island 4' instead of 5' deep. I think if it were mine, I'd also feel more comfortable if it were shorter so that people can get to the laundry/basement stairs/powder room more easily around the table.

You could have dbl the pantry space against the laundry wall as long as you have a door stop, so the door knob doesn't hit the pantries.

Rhome! Bless your heart, I should have known that you would be the first to respond!! I love the idea of a door stop. I'm going to do that, definately.

I have a drawing going for modifications and I did shrink the island down to 4 feet wide. I agree that it will be better, and I made the aisles 42 inches wide. My KD made them almost 5 feet and I'm thinking that will be too wide. What do you think? I also made the island shorter--that means only 3 kids can be seated there, though--but in a pinch, someone could perch on a stool at the other end if they really wanted to. My son often brings home 3 friends (even number for gaming), so then there would be 4 kids at the bar for breakfast. For some reason, my kids are really excited about the island seating. For awhile, I thought about doing away with it to make room for storage on that side--but I hate to disappoint them. Do you think it would be too long if I added just another 12 inch overhang on the end to accomodate kid #4?
Thanks...
Cj

I think the f ridge is fine where it is (by the door? to the left of the sink?) it looks like a good layout to me. (I don't know that much tho).

do the pantries along the laundry room wall need to be floor to ceiling? or could they be upper cabs/base cabs with a counter? if so, then put the mw there - so the kids can get to it w/o coming into the clean up/cook area. you might also put a prep sink there for the boys to get a drink, wash their hands before making popcorn - and after eating it - and wipe up the counter top. Also, for alternate prep if your kids are going to be helping.

5 ft wide aisles are, at the least, overkill, and, to me, just too far to walk back and forth. And your kitchen isn't big enough for that if you want the table in it. 5 ft would be great between the island and table, but not between the perimeter and the island.

Can you post the layout showing the island narrower so I can better judge the length issue?

Hi, sorry it took me so long to get this up. The excavator came by today and I'm still trying to get a last minute survey done on the property. It's a madhouse, and they haven't even started digging yet, but that's another post.

Here is the layout with suggestions to date. I'd also incorporated suggestions from the last thread, so we can go forward from there. I'm not set on anything quite yet--so if anyone has ideas, even if they're radically different--I can still think about them and incorporate them. I've been trying think of other ways to lay out this kitchen, but seem to be stuck here--and maybe that means that this is "right".

Thanks so much, everyone who posted before and especially you, Rhome for your ongoing help!

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Gratefully,

Cj

Considering the aisle in front of the dishwasher is still a bit narrow, so could benefit by moving the aisle south a few inches, I don't think I'd want the island any larger. If you could do with one less cabinet so you'd have 2 larger, or if you could do with 3 slightly smaller cabinets under the island, you could possibly eek enough space for overhang on the south end...Wouldn't have to be the whole 'recommended' amount to work for you. Otherwise, with stools like we have (backless and fairly plain), you might be able to squeeze the 4th kid in. We used to fit 4, 5, or on rare occasions, 6 stools and kids into a 7 ft bfast bar run in our last house. But maybe with the table so close, they'll just opt to migrate there when there are more than 3.

How do you feel about an irregularly shaped island? It looks like you have plenty of room between the pantry and the north end of the island. Something like the shape below might give you space for one more at the island in addition to your dish drawers. Also, I like having a counter across from my fridge for landing space.

There was a thread recently with different shaped islands, but I think the forum gremlins ate it.

{{!gwi}}

Also, what kind of doors on your refrigerator? (French, side hinged, side by side?) Just checking so you don't have interference with the back door swing.

Could you get the garbage pullout under one of the sinks, and slide the dish drawers over to be even with everything else to gain your fourth seat back?

I usually don't plan for a full complement of seating at an island or peninsula when there is table adjacent. (I think it can be considered redundant function, if the table seats four to six, I may plan 2-3 at the island).

However, you explained a good reason for wanting it.

Chicagoans, thanks for your input. The fridge will probably be a french door, maybe Amana. With the short door, do you think there might be an issue? I don't anticipate that the back door will get that much traffic--usually, the kids will come in through the mudroom. I hope. It just seemed that there should be a way outside from the back of the house, so we included the door. Now, to take a look at that island...again...

And Rhome, you're right I could do without the full overhang on the far side. That's probably what we'll do, and the shortest kid will most likely perch there.
:-)

Cj

Palimpsest, I'm glad you said that. I've been thinking it's redundant, but also don't want to rule it out too quickly just because the kids want it so badly. As a compromise, perhaps we could arrange 'official' 2-3 person seating and have a couple of bar stools handy for when they just really want to sit at the island. I do need the island long enough to hit the oven area, because that's my baking zone and I bake often enough with big enough recipes to really need that space. Thanks!!

Desertsteph, I like the idea of putting the microwave in on of the pantry spaces--that was something that hadn't occured to me. Thanks, I'm going to look closer at that option.

Cj

I think the French Door fridge is the best solution for that spot. It looks like the swing of the short door will be fine. Plus I like how they look. :)

I echo what rhome recommended: move the island down to give you more room between island and DW.

I looked at 16 remodeled kit chens two weekends ago during a remodeled home tour. Several had dish drawers in the island across from the DW. Not one of them had enough clearance to have both dish drawer and DW open without one smacking the other in the process. I wrote down aisle measurement for one of the kit chens - 40.5". An extra 3-4 more inches of aisle space (and they had the room to do this) and this overlap and its potential door dings would have been avoided.

Good catch, Lisa, about the dw and dish drawers conflicting.

This probably comes under a personal preference thing, but I really don't like upper diagonal corner cabinets that don't have cabinets on the adjacent wall on both sides. It looks like a connector that doesn't connect anything to me...kind of awkward in appearance, plus being deep and more difficult to access because of the reduced opening. I would, instead, run a regular cabinet flat along that stove wall, ending its side against the window wall. Then you can open it all the way...the full 2 ft... and see everything.

You also don't have your lower lazy susan drawn at a full 3 ft from the wall in each direction...Want to be sure you are planning accurately and won't be disappointed by the reduction in size of the cab between lazy susan and the stove.

Wow! That WAS a good catch, Lisa. I wouild be soooo unhappy to finally have my dish drawers and then not be able to use them. I'll see if I can figure out how to make the lazy susan correct, too, thanks Rhome.

Cj

Aw, shucks, thanks (and you're welcome).

This potential hiccup never would have occurred to me before I started thinking about putting my dish storage in the island across from the DW. I could so easily have ended up without enough room. But now that I know, I'll be measuring how much room an open DW door needs and how far out a dish drawer will extend and making my aisles large enough for both to be open without hitting with a bit extra for good measure.

OK, a little wider aisle on the sink side to make sure I can have the DW and the drawers open at the same time....door stop, microwave perhaps in a cab on the laundry room wall...anything else you can think of? I'm going to meet with the KD soon and discuss this some more, and then I'll be baaackkk..... LOL. Thank you all for the suggestions.
I've made Rhome's suggestion my motto: Don't make any sudden moves!

Cj