Huh?
1st day of demo?
To me, that means it's a blank slate!
Any empty room is a room of possibilities!

Exactly why I think I got this idea. The problem is the cabinets are all ordered and being made and I believe our GC has ordered the header (which if I changed the plan we would not need).

So talk to him.
You never know what's possible until you say it out loud.
Just fussing to yourself doesn't get you anywhere except wondering.

A few things might cost you, but on the whole, is it better to make a few changes than life with "if only I'd ..."?

If your new idea results in a better, more functional layout, do not let the fact that you have already begun the process stop you from exploring it! You will have to live with the results a LONG time, and it's better to have to pay some restocking fees for some items up front and then have a better result in the end.

Now, on the other hand, if your idea just gives you equal functionality with your original plan, it may not be worth stopping the process for.

Post the two layouts for some help in sorting this out. Many heads are better than one!

But I'm sure I'm not alone in suggesting you get on it right away!

Just remember - your money, your reno, your way. So, if your room is still empty you can still talk to your GC and see if your new ideas make sense. They may not make sense but you will never know until you voice them out loud to someone.

Not in the same ballpark as a kitchen, but I tore down a half-wall between my family room and an old wet bar and was all set to move a full wall back about a foot. My significant other walked in and said "Why are you putting the wall there? Why wouldn't you put it here?" I thought about it overnight, agreed he was right, and changed the location of the wall. Exactly what live_wire_oak said. If a new layout will be a significant improvement, look into it. Call your GC and ask him to hold off briefly while you reconsider. If your new plan will be better and save you money and you'll end up spending a little money on restocking fees, sounds like you'll be off better in the end.

Thanks everyone, actually during day 2 of demo today the GC discovered something that might give us everything we wanted in the original design. We are tearing down a dormer wall and thinking it was supporting the 2nd floor we had columns in our design. Now it appears the wall may not be supporting anything and there is already a very good support system in place!! So possibly no columns and no header!! This would be a dream come true, so we'll see what happens.

Looks like you never know until you demo- so I'm glad I didn't think of my new design awhile ago or else we may not have ever known this about the dormer wall.

We poked holes to try to make sure we could do what we were thinking about before we set the plan, but it sounds like folks do that and still get surprised. You are fortunate to have a good surprise. Hope it all works out for you.

I am in exactly the same state -- gutted kitchen, everything all ready to go, and I'm up half the night thinking "what have I done?"

But I trust my architect, and I trust the last 9 months I've spent agonizing over every decision. I think I'm just anxious with the anticipation of what it's actually going to look like.

That, plus the deep pain in my gut I feel every time I consider the expense of this whole endeavor!

I did the exact same thing, took out two pocket doors to open up the room with the intention of putting a half wall up where one was. I liked the openness of the opened up area so much, I changed about 1/2 of my kitchen design to accomodate it. And it improved my layout and was less expensive. I am a slow DIYer so it worked for me because my cabinets were not on order yet.

I made changes as we went along. We discovered the HVAC could route through the basement and added a pull-out pantry instead of rebuilding the wing wall
We also added a pocket door!