Welcome to TKO.

My friend has a very similar layout and it is fantastic.
1. I'd suggest putting an overhang where you have the prep sink, so that people sit at a small L, instead of in a line; easier to talk that way.

2. Which would mean you'd push the prep sink a bit down from the edge.

3. I would round the other corner of the island also, so you don't jab yourself going into the livingroom.

4. You can get a 48" range that has 2 ovens under.
OR you can still get a 36" rangetop but put a 30" oven next to it. The benefit is that 2 people can cook at the same time (bake and stirfry), AND you don't get the heat rising while you're stirfrying.

5. 9.5" sink is plenty deep, especially when you add in the thickness of the countertop.

6. I'm wicked short and am planning barely any upper cabs (just around my hood).

Where will you put the trash and Microwave?

Good luck,
Amanda

{{gwi:2107261}}

I don't know that this is any better, but it might contain something you could use. I left an issue with the ref placement - which I'll get to.

1. The entrance to the pantry and the path from the "mudroom" is eccentric.
2. The filtered water faucet isn't near any dishes.
3. People have to invade your alpha-cook territory to get a beer and then probably cross it to get a glass for the beer.
4. The intersection of the mudroom path and the doors to the deck use a lot of space.

I put a really awful, out of scale, elevation of the cleanup wall at the bottom. This treats the over-sized window by giving the appearance of a piece of furniture that you moved in front of the window. It has a bit of a raised back to prevent water from going over the edge into the window.

I don't know how much of the mudroom is new or old, but I'd consider moving the entrance to the kitchen from the mudroom to the other wall and doing something else with all those walls. You have enough room in there for another complete kitchen but its mostly used as hallways.

The issue with the ref has three parts. When you have a crowd over, some part of the kitchen needs to be drinks service. In this drawing, the cleanup sink becomes the designated place, with access to the ref and the dishes. The second part has to do with the direction the ref doors open if a single door ref. If they open towards the cook, it'll be not so wonderful for visitors and family members. If they open towards the cleanup sink, it'll be bad for the cook. The last piece is that people poaching in your ref will clutter the aisle to the pantry. Both of the last two parts are the same in either drawing.

You might consider a couple of things:
(1) Whether a set of strategically place ref drawers could help out the plan.
(2) Whether you want to build a bar/coffee bar/snack bar with filtered water, access to ref, micro and dishes out of the main working area to offload some day to day and entertainment needs.
(3) Whether it would be better to MOVE the cleanup sink up towards where the dishes get used (dining room and deck).
(4) Decide if you want separate ovens
(5) In the original drawing, change the pantry door swing.

• First...with this new design you will have a lot of counterspace...so I think you can easily give up 30" for a tall oven cabinet for either a double oven setup or a MW + single wall oven.

Second, lower island counters...be sure you have enough room under a lower counter for the plumbing for a sink...check with a professional on this. IIRC, there are minimum lengths for some pipes...but I'm definitely not an expert!
Also, be sure you have a deep enough overhang for comfortable seating. The NKBA recommendations for seating overhang are a minimum of:

• 18" for table-height seating (30" high)

• 15" for counter-height seating (36" high)

• 12" for bar-height seating (42" high)

If your island will be lower than 36", then I recommend an overhang of 15" to 18"...the lower the counter, the larger the overhang. Pantry cabinet...if you have a good sized walk-in pantry, then I would not get a tall pantry cabinet. They aren't the most efficient storage for pantry items b/c they're so deep. Even with roll out tray shelves things can get lost. Think about a 24" x 24" raised surface with things stacked on it...easily seeing and getting to those items in the middle (or even the back) can be iffy. I think the better idea is the tall oven cabinet.

If you need to store a few pantry items in the kitchen proper, use a drawer. You might even consider a drawer for storing baking supplies if you bake often enough to take up prime storage real estate for them.
Refrigerator...if your refrigerator is a counter-depth or standard-depth, you will need to be sure the doors of your refrigerator extend out past the counters on the side...that is, if you want to be able to open the doors fully! So, you can recess only up to the refrigerator carcass (box).

Also, plan for a 36"W x 72"H refrigerator even if you don't have one now. Refrigerators narrower than 36" and shorter than 72" or so are become less and less common. Plan for the future since refrigerators, unfortunately, no longer outlast remodels. You will most likely need a new refrigerator 10 years or so from now, even if you're buying it new now. So, make the recessed area that size as well as build the "surround" for the refrigerator with an alcove that size.

If you are not going to have any upper cabinets on the wall with the refrigerator, then consider building in the refrigerator with walls instead of finished end panels. When you have upper cabinets, I think finished end panels look better, but when the refrigerator is "stand alone", I think dry-walled walls look better...they don't make the refrigerator stand out and scream "refrigerator". However, walls are approx 4.5" wide, so you will need 9" of space for those walls.
Remember, too, that counters are actually 25.5" deep, not 24"...they extend approx 1.5" past the cabinets so they cover the doors and a little bit more. This is to protect your cabinets & doors from spills...the overhang directs spills past the...

Wow, you guys have given me a lot to think about and process. Thank you!

Unfortunately, renovating the mudroom & pantry is not on the table right now. We built those rooms out of our garage last year and, while the layout is a little awkward, we were limited by a number of factors, including storage needs (for garbage and other things that were previously in our garage) as well as window locations in that space and structural considerations. I'm attaching a more detailed drawing here, for clarification.

Also, we have a laundry room on the second floor adjacent to the master bedroom, so we don't need to include that in this renovation.

huango, the trash & microwave are two of things I'm still mulling over. It occurred to me that we might want two trash cans, one at each sink. I'm also trying to decide if we should install two garbage disposals. Where do people normally place the disposal, at the dish sink or prep sink? I've never had one before and can't wait for it!

bmorepanic, I see what you mean about traffic flow during a big party. I guess I don't usually give my guests access to the fridge (I'd be more likely to put out a cooler of beers on the deck, eg.) or the dish sink (it would probably be filled with dirty dishes). We had toyed with the idea of a pantry & mudroom arrangement similar to what you drew here, but ultimately we needed more storage for things like our bikes, garbage cans, recycling bins, paint cans, and other messy things, which are now living in a walk-in closet to the left of the mudroom door.

Where my husband marked "filtered water" on the original drawing, we were thinking of setting up a coffee & microwave station similar to what you described. I don't know if we have enough space to also include a small fridge setup there. As I'm walking around in our current space and envisioning the new one, I'm worried that we might be trying to include too much as it is. But maybe I'm just so claustrophobic in my existing kitchen that I have trouble getting perspective. :)

buehl, I like your idea of swapping the tall pantry cabinet for a wall oven cabinet. I was thinking that we should have some in-kitchen pantry storage, for cereal boxes and other daily use items. But maybe a drawer would work for that. I am concerned about the height of a tall oven cabinet, though... the upper oven always seems too high for me to reach. Can you adjust the height of where you hang them? When I look at them in the stores, they always seem too high for me. That's why I was thinking of installing two wall ovens side-by-side instead.

For the island, I'm envisioning the work surface to be about 30" inch high, with raised bar seating (42") on the other side. But now I'm re-thinking that because of the prep sink situation. In addition to the plumbing issues, I'm worried that installing a sink in a 30" high counter might be...

I understand about the Mudroom, etc. I wasn't sure what was back there, so I went with what most people have...including a Laundry Room.

If you're OK with the pantry being located where everyone goes through (including your DS's friends in a few short years' time), then it works for you!

Upper cabinets...You might consider putting in upper cabinets on the range wall. I know you say you can't reach much past the first shelf, but that first shelf will provide you with quite a bit of storage plus you can put less used items in the top shelves. Also, many people here have invested in a folding step stool and actually built small alcoves/cabinets to store them. (Storage ideas range from a narrow base cabinet to toekick drawers to hanging on hooks in a pantry.)

Tall pantry cabinet...Tall pantry cabinets won't be that much easier to access than upper cabinets. Yes, you can make them pullouts, but you still need to be able to reach to the top to get things.

Trash pullout...If you notice in the layouts I did, the trash cabinet is located such that it's accessible from the Prep Zone, Cooking Zone, and Cleanup Zone...so two are not needed. With limited cabinet space (no uppers), I wouldn't have two trash pullouts if I could avoid it.

Garbage disposal...usually both sinks, but if only one, then I recommend the prep sink. I'm speaking from experience...I made the mistake of only putting it on the cleanup sink and I regret it...I use it more for prepping than cleanup (I have to go over to the cleanup sink sometimes b/c of the GD there or else carry peelings, etc. over to it or the trash. No, I don't compost...I keep talking about it but have not done it.)

Coffee/Beverage center...unless you extend it out to the left, you don't really have enough room for everything you want there plus work space (counter) for using the MW, coffeepot, etc.

Island...unless you're really short or have very long arms, I would not go as low as 30". 33" maybe, but not 30"...that's too low for a sink & working at a sink. Probably good for rolling dough, but not most prep work.

I would also not raise the seating...a nice big one-level expanse of work space is one of the biggest advantages of islands (and peninsulas). If you break it up, it becomes no better than a regular counter run with the disadvantage that the raised counter usually extends an inch or two into the workspace of the lower counter...so there's actually less work room. It can also become an issue for faucet placement if you reduce the available depth w/the raised counter overhang.

Fireplace seating...yes, I think you have enough room for a sitting room type of setup.

Wall ovens...there's usually a minimum distance the oven has to be off the floor, but after that, it's up to you how far you up you mount it. Keep in mind that a wall oven mounted under the counter is lower to the floor than an oven in a range.

Are the deck doors an addition?

Whacha doing in front of the fireplace?

Do you envision seating or perching?

About ref access -- my stepmother thought that way too. But what happens is every single bloody one of my close relatives (and there are tons) walks right through the cooks way to get to the ref - in spite of there being coolers and a drinks ref in another part of the house. Some of it is to about ice and some of it is because she sets out food for the early crowd on the island.

At the filtered water spigot, you might want a drain, a trash or compost container of some sort and storage for glasses and cups. Otherwise, they'll be coming for your prep sink and the dishes at the other end of the room.

Cereal is another thing that don't fit well in drawers if you have a lot of it. dh has his cereal "collection". He buys extras in whatever size in on sale and might have 4-5 open at a time. Yeesh! I was going to do the drawer thing but postponed measuring the cereal boxes until just lately (setting the heights of the pantry shelves).

It turns out a cereal box is taller than my large stock pot/collander/steamer combination with the lid in place on top on the whole mess. Some of them won't fit even in 12" deep drawers unless placed on its side and I wouldn't do that with an open cereal box.

We have a sizable cereal box collection as well, and the boxes are huge, so I want to plan for that. I had been thinking about something like this. They cost a small fortune, but seem very practical.

The sliding deck doors are an addition, but they're replacing a double-width window. Presently the only access to the deck is through the dining room, which is great for serving, but not so great for hauling out trays of raw meat to the BBQ.

buehl - thanks for all the detailed advice. I like the location for the trash that you suggested. Would an 18" cabinet (as in the drawing) be a good size for a trash/recycling combo unit? I was thinking of putting in a pullout with two small cans, one for trash & one for cans/bottles. (I, too, will someday start composting. But it hasn't happened yet for me either.)

I'm not sure about the tall cabinet vs. the upper cabinets... I like the compactness of the tall pantry, but, yes, there will still be shelves that I can't reach. There are always shelves that I can't reach. LOL.

My husband says we can't put a double wall oven next to the fridge, because it shortens the life of the fridge since there's a heat source right up against it. Thoughts or experience on that?

I think we will plan on putting in two disposals. They're not that expensive, considering how much convenience they add to the kitchen. I wasn't sure if putting in two would be overdoing it, but I guess that's a common thing now.

For the island, I was using the guidelines in the layout section of the forum's FAQ to come up with the 30" height (I think it says to measure from your elbow and then subtract 10"), but maybe I mismeasured. Either way, that's too low for the sink. So I think we may need to re-conceptualize the island entirely. I really want a nice long stretch of low counter for rolling dough, but if that makes the counter unusable for anything else, then... I don't know what to do there. My husband suggested building a rollout section that can park underneath a standard height counter. It could pull out for baking and have storage underneath for flour, sugar, etc. I've never seen a kitchen with anything like that before, but I like the idea... maybe the best of both worlds.

(BTW, my husband is a carpenter and will be building all of this custom cabinetry himself, so we have a lot of flexibility in cabinetry design.)

I was planning a bi-level island because I'm concerned that if the island is all one level, it will be a big eyesore from the sitting room/fireplace area. I like the idea of having that raised counter to hide the mess in the kitchen work zones. But I agree that having an extra-wide one level counter is more useful for working. Maybe I could make the work counter extra deep to make up for losing that space to the bar seating?

Thanks again for all the help!

Just be aware that those pantry units are photographed with rice boxes, not cereal boxes.

Would you be interested is a passthru shelf? The way I've seen them implemented is as a bar-type shelf outside of the window - could have a few stools and the shelf is maybe 14-16" deep. We are put in a sliding window as part of our (not done yet) remodel - opening and reaching through the window is a breeze.

A bit ocd, perhaps, but if the clean-up & dishes were up there in a cabinet run across that opening, it'd be a great coffee bar and you could keep the cereal in the pantry.

We have a combo trash-recycling in a frameless 18" cabinet. It holds two 50 quart cans with just enough height left for a drawer overtop. We are putting a container for compost and spare trash bags in the drawer.

Yes, 18" is sufficient for a double-bin trash pullout...it's what I have. I use the front bin for trash and the back bin for recyclables.

The "ideal height" calculation is to subtract 6" (not 10"!)

A raised height counter will hide some mess (but not all) from those sitting down by the fireplace, but for those standing up, walking by, or sitting at the counter, the "mess" will be in plain sight. Additionally, anything sitting on the counter taller than 8" or so will also be visible...even when sitting down at the fireplace. A better idea is to keep the "mess" on the back counters where they will fade into the background and not be noticeable.

For workspace, making the lower level deeper will help, but it's the 40" or more depth that's so great...crafts, baking & cooking projects, homework, school/science fair projects, wrapping gifts, etc. [Plan ahead...your DS will be school-age b/f you know it and there be lots of homework & projects!]

By the time you use 42 to 48 inches at the island to seat anyone comfortably, you have 6 feet left in front of the fireplace. I think this is very tight. I would mark it out and see. If this does not work out well, you may end up with dead space that becomes a wasted space.