If you can break the habit of rinsing dishes before putting them into the D/W, having the second one across the aisle shouldn't be a problem. The owner's manual on every D/W made tells you to SCRAPE the food off the dishes. But 98.4% of D/W owners RINSE their dishes. And it's often necessary because they also don't know how to properly load the dishes to ensure that they get clean. But if you first learn how to use your D/W, having it across the aisle shouldn't be a problem.

Bob

Maybe I should scan the layout and post it, but part of what I have been trying to figure out is what it's like to use a dishwasher that's not right next to your sink.

I have read a bunch of other threads where people talked about how they use their two dishwashers and it seems pretty clear that people prefer having them on either side of the sink. This avoids having to keep a dish drain out and cuts down on having to hand wash the stuff that doesn't fit.

If you really cook, then you always use a lot of pots, pans and reusuable plastic containers, not just plates and glasses. We are doing some handwashing almost every day because the dishwasher is too full. We expect to see both units run regularly.

There's another thread about whether a sink needs to be centered on a window. My current sink is slightly off center and I never noticed until this issue came up with the architect. That's why I wonder if it will bother me as much as an inconvenient dishwasher would.

I agree that posting your layout will help, californiagirl, and completely agree with the ideas you've gathered from previous threads on the subject. The 2 dishwashers should be where you will use them most, hopefully, not saving 1 for only rare uses. But how convenient the architect's suggestions are depend on your layout. Perhaps if they're both in convenient spots and easy to reach from the sink (where dirty dishes land, whether you rinse them or not), it'd be OK.

Yes, you hire an architect for his artistic vision, but, as a group, they're not famous for knowing great kitchen function, and you have to love using your kitchen, not him. You'll want to consider form and function...per your priorities.

One way to disguise the off-centeredness of the sink would be to locate your faucet either at the center mark or 'way' off-center in the balancing direction. For example, if your sink is a large single, put the faucet off to the side or back corner on the 'long' side so the sink + faucet combination is centered.

Or, if your sink is a double, get a 1/4 - 3/4 sink and put the divider at the center line.

A third possibility is to add runnels to your countertop to 'extend' the sink in one direction, or get a sink with a built-in drainboard. The drainboard/runnel part would still be 'part of the sink' but could be over a dishwasher.

I'm totally with you about locating your two DWs on either side of the sink. I use both of my DWs all the time and don't have a problem signalling family members whish DW is 'up' for use. Our signal is that the DW that is accepting dirty dishes has the door slightly adjar. A closed DW door means either that it's empty or clean-to-be-emptied.

Another vote for the dws on either side of the sink. Let your architect worry about symmetry in his own house! Your kitchen is for cooking and cleaning, not for his aesthetic satisfaction. I have seen more stupid ideas from architects and designers that don't cook.

I fear you will be driven crazy by water and worse things dripping all over your floor if you have the dw across from the sink. Bob suggested that simply not rinsing first will solve that problem, but I respectfully suggest that it won't. What about when you need to dump out a glass, a mug, a cereal or soup bowl, a vase? You don't want to have to dry it before taking it across to the dw. Drips all over the floor are not only a mess, they are a safety hazard.

Everyone is different, and there is no law that says function must always come before aesthetics (especially if you don't cook much), but that would drive me a LOT crazier than the sink not being centered relative to the windows.

Anyway, I don't think it's going to look bad at all; the lack of symmetry will only really be apparent when someone is standing there (think about it; all that other stuff is low). When I have sacrificed symmetry, I found I never even noticed it. And a good architect ought to know a few tricks to correct any imbalance visually. For example, where does it say that the sink, and only the sink, must be the central focal point? What would happen if you put a tall orchid, a pendant light, or something else visually interesting (that won't waste space) in the middle instead? Let that guy rise to a challenge!

I posted a picture of my D/Ws in another thread earlier today and there's discussion from another poster besides myself about adjacency to the sink (see link below). As I said, for those who can't imagine washing dishes before putting them in the D/W, not having it right next to the sink seems impossibly inconvenient. But learning to use your D/W as it was intended will save you time, water and energy. As for emptying glasses before putting them into the D/W...not necessary. Just dump the contents into the bottom (to avoid splashes). Unless your glass contains straws or those goofy mixed drink umbrellas, it's simply not a problem. The pump from your D/W pushes all liquids out anyway before the cycle actually begins.

Bob

Here is a link that might be useful: Another GW Kitchens thread on D/Ws

Oops, I pressed "Submit Message" too soon. I meant to say, "...for those who can't imagine NOT washing dishes before putting them in the D/W, not having it right next to the sink seems impossibly inconvenient."

Bob

I have a DW on each side of my sink and my sink is off center b/c of that. And I would do it again in a heartbeat!

My thoughts are pretty much along the lines of rhome and sweeby. I'd place the DWs for the best function and ease of use -- relative not only to the sink but also to where the clean dishes will be put away. The placements the architect is suggesting might be plausible -- they might be awful. Hard to judge the functionality without a layout.

I have two and they are either side of the sink. I had no other options. But the cabinets on either side of them are different by 3 inches and it isn't noticable. So I'm wondering just how off center things would be. I think having a faucet stick up in that window in a place that makes sense will probably mean more than where the hole in your counter is or where the DWs are.

You could really drive your architect bonkers and tell him you want them on either side of the sink, so put in a 24 on one side and an 18" on the other. That might ring his symetry alarm hard enough to get him to try to figure out how to make the pair of 24s look more balanced. ;-)

Okay, here goes my first ever try at posting images on the board. One pic shows the dishwashers on either side of the sink. The other shows where on the island the architect originally wanted a sink and dishwasher, but now he is suggesting on the other corner of the island, behind the person standing at the main sink or to the right of the person standing at the main sink, next to the range.

BTW, he is showing a triple bowl sink, but we will have a large single bowl.

I apologize in advance if these are too large and will go back to Photobucket to resize them if necessary. Also, sorry they are crooked. My son did the scanning because he has the software on his computer.

I was not going to log in this morning, but I had to say that the DW and sink placement under the windows bothers me a whole lot less than the prep sink in a corner behind the pantry door. I don't like that at all.

And what happened to that third window on the right? I think that change is throwing everything off kilter anyway. By taking one out onthe right and leaving hte left, you've broken any symmetry before you even look at the sink placement. If that one had to go, take out hte one on the left and just have one large window in the center.

If it has to be 2 windows, and you want the DWs on either side of the sink, line the sink edge up with the center of the divider between the windows and find a visual element to add a vertical element on the other side.

But get that prep sink out of the corner. Seriously.

I would center the sink on the large window, keep one d.w. to the left of the sink and put the other d.w. to the right of the sink just around the 90 degree bend in the counter.
The prep sink will be fine where it is, unless there will always be someone working the prep sink and someone going in and out of the pantry at the same time, but my guess is the pantry door will be closed most of the time.

One, DON'T split them, like in the first plan. Been there, done that and it's not a good idea. I could see having one to the left of the sink and one immediately to the left of the stove, because one person can still easily access and tend to them both, and it's easy for inserting things used at the stove...The downside of that is if someone else is unloading that dw and the door is open, you'd have your path from the stove to the cleanup sink blocked, and sometimes I like to be able to dispose of a dirty pan or utensil right into the sink.

Like Lascatx, I'm confused about the window change, too. I don't know why the dw's can't flank the sink if you want them to. They do fit. I like the suggestions about helping out the overall look with faucet placement if you can.

Also, where do you plan to store your dishes?

Well, clearly I've been outvoted, although I will say that to me having the sink off-center would visually drive me crazy for eternity.

gellchom: you may feel that "Your kitchen is for cooking and cleaning, not for his aesthetic satisfaction"--but as this forum demonstrates, aesthetic satisfaction is a big reason many of us do kitchen renovations. Look at the incredible amount of energy and time folks put into choosing just the right slab for countertop, the obsessive discussions of glazed versus unglazed cabinets, the over-the-top custom hood enclosures--clearly for many the kitchen has to look great AND cook great. I want to love looking at my kitchen as much as I love cooking in it (how else could you justify a $13K Lacanche range otherwise?).

edinct: I like your suggestion. Not perfect (what to do wtih that corner between the two DW) but a good compromise.

lascatx: I second your opinion on the prep sink. I hate that location. When I prep, I want landing areas on BOTH sides of the sink, and DON'T want a door pushing me out of the way repeatedly.

californiagirl: why did you not like the original architect's layout, with the second DW by a prep sink in the island? Seems like a better location for the prep sink, and answers all the concerns about dumping out glasses, rinsing, etc (though I agree with montalvo that no rinsing is really needed in general).

After a big meal at the lake house, we love using our prep sink (which is large enough to wash pots in) as a second cleanup station, and having the DW by it makes perfect sense to us. We have spec'd our second DW by the prep sink in our upcoming main house kitchen redo as well based on that experience.

What rhome is suggesting is one of the things I expected to see, and I would prefer that to having the second one at the far end of the island. We considered splitting ours and putting one in the isalnd, but we decided we would always be trying to figure out where to put or find things and ruled it out before we even got to the idea of unloading the clean dishes and hiking around the island. Splitting them only makes sense to me if their use and function are divided as well. I don't think that's what most of us want.

The problem with the prep sink in a corner is not just the proximity to the pantry door. That's probably the least of it, although in my kitchen the kids would often be looking in the pantry for a snack while I'm baking or cooking. I don't like any sink right next to a wall. When rinsing fruits and veggies or hand washing -- a lot of what you do at a prep sink, you are likely to get splatters -- the finish on that pantry wall will be a constant challenge. And you only have one side to set anything down. It makes prepping and cleaning more limited. I can also imagine bumping elbows with that wall or door, but my right elbow seems to be looking for things to bang into lately. Ouch!

And then there's the fact that I don't want to spend half my kitchen time in a dark corner. It's my kitchen and I should getthe best of it, not be banished to the corner folra timeout from everyone else in the house. Isn't it cpovey who has posted that studies show 60% of your kitchen time is prepping? I want that on the open island, and I dont want to be dripping or slopping between the island and sink (if I don't, I'm sure the 3 guys in my house would). I want the best view, the ability to see and talk to people around me and I want room to work.

If that's the only place you had for a prep sink, I'd consider a round one to pull it away from the wall as much s possible in the cabinet, but you still have a backs to everyone kitchen. That just seems so cold and uninviting. That second sink was in a great place before -- why change it?

Thanks for all the great thoughts! Hope I get some more advice after some clarifications.

I was rushing off to an appointment when I posted the pics this morning so I forgot some other caveats, things that you smart TKO posters have noticed. Some of these drawings were showing alternative possibilities, like eliminating some windows so that we would not need steel reinforcement of the house corners. We've getting the steel ($$) and keeping the wrap-around windows (more $$). The main sink is facing the rear of the house, the south face, and it overlooks a 1260 acre arboretum. We live well inside the city but have turkeys and deer in our yard almost daily. That's why there are so many windows and so few upper cabs in the new kitchen.

At the bottom of the plans you can see part of our current galley kitchen, which becomes a butler's pantry between the dining room and the kitchen. There are lots of upper cabs in there. So our main scullery area, with the big sink and dishwashers, is actually somewhat far from the dining and breakfast tables. We really wanted to concentrate the messy scullery aspects of the kitchen functioning into one area but reward the person doing prepping and scrubbing with a view. Yes, the dishes will have to be stored in drawers and in upper cabs that are farther from the dishwashers but closer to the tables. That's what I have kids for. They are slow to stack dirty dishes but quite competent at unloading clean dishes.

Edinct, the architect's latest suggestion (no drawing) is to put the second dishwasher where you propose, at a 90 degree angle next to the range. The corner cab is supposed to have the trash cans spinning around in it. But I am worried that placing it next to the range will sometimes block my path to the sink and the trash. Also, I don't know what it would be like to load the dishwasher from the front. I've always loaded a dishwasher from the side. Has anybody got that kind of arrangement who can comment?

The smaller sink is another bone of contention between the architect and me. He wants it in the island. Having seen this arrangement in other homes, I am inclined to leave the island like a large table, without utilities, and try to locate utilities along the walls. On the other hand, I know it's too far from the refrig to the main sink or the butler's pantry sink. Hence, a "prep" sink. I didn't really see this as such a large sink, the way he's drawn it, but I did think it should get a garbage disposal and a pull-out trash.

I would have liked to center the small sink below the window next to the pantry, but he wants that window to function as a pass-through for items related to the built-in gas grill outside. (You can see the grill in the top pic.) That's why he stuck it in that corner that lascatx rightly notes is a bad place. The window on the other side of the range/grill won't work as a pass through because it is over a window well for the basement below. So how important do folks think this pass-through idea is? Sink in island versus sink under window near pantry?

Back to the symmetry issue, I was thinking about a large farm sink but maybe I should go for a more typical sink where the fact that it is not centered is not so noticeable.

Sweeby, you have some great ideas for disguising the centering problem and you are in favor of dishwashers on either side over perfect symmetry. What do you think? Should I give up the apron sink so that the asymmetry is not as noticeable?

Montalvo/Bob, thanks for that link to pictures of your kitchen and others. Really helped me see more clearly how it might look. Do you use the compactor? We had one two houses ago and never used it, but yours is in a better location.

We use the compactor although we don't have to separate our trash for recycling in our community; the city does that at a central facility. Our trash can is just outside the garage downstairs and although we have an elevator down to the garage, it's nice having to haul trash downstairs only once or twice each week. We have a separate container for glass bottles that we keep in the pantry because we were told that the compactor's life would be shortened by half or less if we compacted bottles. DW also keeps a small waste basket in the cabinet under the prep sink in the island for items she doesn't want to put in the disposer. When that's full, she dumps it in the compactor. Contrary to experiences that some have reported with compactors, we've never had problems with odors, although I typically carry fish/chicken bones down to the garage trash can separately.

Re: the prep sink, if you use it as much as DW, I think you're going to prefer it to be somewhere with a view (either out a window or into the FR) rather than having to stare at a wall. My wife spends most of her kitchen time at that sink. She's got lettuce and other veggies in SZ drawers on one side with and two drawers on the other side have stainless screen bottoms for tomatoes, onions, potatoes, etc. With everything so handy, she never needs to leave the sink area. Her prep sink is in the island and has the same view as her main sink.

Bob

This isn't to say you should have it that way or not, but my parents' house had to have the dw at a 90 degree angle to the sink (I lived there for 6 years, and they did for 20+ more)...It was fine to load it from the front. Slightly more possibility of dripping on the floor, but not a terrible situation, by any means.

I'd definitely want the prep sink in the island. We have ours in a corner of our island, so we can prep from both sides.

It would bother me not to have the big cleanup sink centered on the window. If you decide to put one DW at the corner, check out the dishwasher drawers, which should be easier to load from the front. I'd have the other one conventional.

We have 2 DWs, one on each side of our cleanup sink, but we also considered putting one of them in the island. The one closest to our hot zone gets used for prep & cooking tools, plus entertaining overflow, while the other DW is the primary one for dishes, glasses, & flatware, with storage located across the aisle in island drawers.

Where you plan to store the items when they come out of the DWs should factor into where you locate the DWs. You don't want to be walking back & forth across your kitchen for storage.

I haven't read all the replies but we have two dishwashers OPPOSITE each other in our kitchen and it works really well. We scrape and don't rinse so there is no dripping on the floor BUT you can't have both dishwashers open at the same time for unloading etc. I would do it again because while form should follow function in this case you have a viable alternative and you can maintain form with no sacrifice to how your kitchen will function.

BTW, we have the prep sink in the island but we almost never use it to scrape the dishes although we could. Our clean up sink is better positioned for both DW's.

Looking at your plan I would put the DW on the short side of the island opposite the other one (you'll have the same issue of not being able to open them both at the same time) and move the prep sink over to the other side of the island as well.

Where's your fridge? If it is on the wall opposite the sink one, then you may want to keep the prep sink where it is on the island to avoid a trek while working.

I am in the symmetry camp - I want that sink centered on the window! When we first saw the house we recently bought, my first comment upon seeing the kitchen was, "The sink is off-center.". I didn't say "That fake brick is nasty" or "I think Mike and Carol Brady used those same cabinets". No, the sink was off-center - and by less than two inches, it turns out.

Besides lending a sense of imbalance, an off-center sink says to me that the space was poorly planned and the sink had to be shoved over to fit other stuff in. Which, in your case, is exactly what would happen.

Happily, you mentioned another possible solution - The Butler's Pantry! The BP is a great place for a DW as it naturally sees the most use with big dinners and entertaining. Those are actually the same times you will need the 2nd DW. I would put it there.

Nicole

I have 2 dishwashers, and I would recommend putting them either on both sides of the main sink if you are going to leave the prep sink by the pantry. The reason is that you want to be able to load up the second one as the first is full/running. You will see that the way you do dishes changes, you don't keep dirty dishes in the sink any longer, you just go right into the 'dirty' dishwasher. Also, you want to arrange your cabinetry to make it easy to unload. You don't want to have to walk clear across the room to put away a fork.

In my own personal kitchen, I have two sinks and two dishwasher, one next to each of the sinks. (Also have a small prep sink and third dishwasher in another area.) So i would recommend you move the second sink back to the island. That way, you can face the room while washing veggies, etc., which is a big plus. Then to the right of the prep sink, close the window to the backyard, you have another dishwasher, close to the first dishwasher.

I have to say again, I put my 2nd dishwasher in the butler's pantry/buffet area in our last house, and even though it sounded like a great idea, it REALLY wasn't. The only reasons it was barely doable, was the size of our family/number of workers doing dishes at a time, and that we had a pass-through close to both of them, so transferring things back and forth to arrange the dishes in the dishwashers, or putting things away that ended up in the 'wrong' dishwasher wasn't so much of a pain. Otherwise, there would have been lots of running back and forth. Also, one that is out of the way and gets used less has a tendency to have dirty dishes forgotten in it, and they smell and grow mold quite quickly. Yuck. As I said, been there, done that, and in our new kitchen they are where one person can deal with both at the same time when necessary. I also wouldn't want it so that I couldn't open both at once. When there are a lot of dishes, you need to be able to fit small items where you have small spaces left, and large items where you can arrange for them. There could be lots of closing and opening to make sure everything is loaded as efficiently as possible.

I'm not clear - are you talking about having 3 DWs -- 2 in the kitchen and another in the butler's pantry? I've seen plenty of DWs put at 90 degrees or at an angle to the sink. That works fine. I think I would prefer that to one to the side and one behind on the end of the island. That could work too, but I'd prefer to be able to turn left or right to laod. Think about the times when you've done a big dinner. I like standing in the middle and being able to have them both open at times. If the DWs were opposite each other, you would have to close one to open the other and possibly go back and forth a few times to get everything loaded.

If you have that gorgeous view, definitely put the prep sink in the island. Enjoy it! We have our in the corner and can reach it from either side or the end and we still have most of the island open for working or laying out a buffet. It also sounds like this kitchen will see it's fair share of entertaining (or should). You might want to pick a prep sink with that in mind. I think round ones look great filled with ice and drinks or wine. :-)

I look at layouts in terms of balance rather than symmetry. What bugs me is that the sink shoved over with 2 windows instaed of 3 is neither. I think the windows bother me as much as or more than the sink placement, and even I am not sure that I can get comfortable with that.

Lascatx, all the windows you see in the top drawing will be there, so that window symmetry issue is okay. And I'm only planning two dishwashers, none in the butler's pantry. We have the kind of very hard water that etches so none of my real china, silver or crystal can go in a dishwasher.

I guess I wasn't thinking of the smaller sink as a "prep" sink so much as a place to wash hands or get running water near the refrigerator. Do people really find that they use their second sink for prep? Gizmonike, I do see how putting it on the island corner allows people to get access from two sides, especially if we put in a faucet that swings. And ice in it during parties also seems appealing, lascatx. It will sure make the architect happy to put it there.

I think I was hoping that with two working dishwashers there would be no reason for the main sink to be crowded with waiting dirty dishes and I could use it more easily for prep. What happens now is that sometimes it has dishes (usually cooking-in-progress pots or pans) that won't fit in the half full dishwasher. Two dishwashers seems to offer you more flexibility to clear your sink and counters quickly.

For those of you with two sinks right near your main sink, is that how use them, alternating during normal times and maybe running both at once if there's a lot of cooking or entertaining?

I sound like a dishwasher hog in this thread, but in my defense we lived from 1997 to 2004 with no dishwasher and I didn't mind. But it bugs DH that there are always some dishes waiting to be cleaned, either because there is no room or it's already running. The two dishwashers seemed like a good way to address this. But I know if they aren't placed properly they won't be used and he'll complain. That's why I turned to the kind hearts and brilliant planning minds of this forum, a really amazing resource. I can't tell you all how grateful I am for your help.

Huge vote for prepping at a second sink! Looking at your layout, I'd be disappointed if I ended up doing all my prep by your main sink: if that is the case, then you have only about 2 feet on either side of the sink for prep space, not a ton, and it's on 24'' base cabs so you really only have two 4 sq ft areas to prep.

I love having a larger prep area for my "mise en place". I would die knowing I had that wonderful island to prep on, but no running water and disposal to use. I would have moved the prep sink further towards the center of the island allowing ample space on either side and also forward towards the middle of the island.

I also think that layout may work better with the appliance layout. I'm not great at architect symbols but is your refrigerator along the wall which is shared by the kitchen and the butler's pantry? If so, then it's a LONG haul from your main sink to the fridge. While "work triangles" are not very trendy these days, I don't think that long a run from sink to stove to fridge is optimal. Putting prep sink into island cuts the length of the triangle in half.

And, if you like to cook with someone else (like I do with DW) then having two working sinks allows for two prep areas to be going simultaneously, and creates two partially separate work triangles again, minimizing traffic congestion.

So...my vote: sink centered on windows. One DW by that sink. Second sink in island with DW by that. Ample space by second sink to allow prep, with garbage and disposal in island to facilitate prep.

Another vote for the prep sink in the corner of the island. We have ours that way and it's tremendously useful. We placed the faucet at the corner for easy use from both directions. We do all our prep there, as well as it being handy for hand washing, filling water pitchers, etc. Pot for the stove (and dishes for the microwave) get filled and drained there. We also do our baking and smoothie making nearby, so it's handy for adding water to projects, washing sticky hands, and rinsing tools. The main sink is for dirty dishes, and occasionally for use while cooking if someone else is busy at the prep sink...The dishwashers are on either side of the main sink with the trash pullout across the aisle in the island.

Did you see that brilliant reply I made? It was here just a minute ago, and then it was gone! I hate it when that happens!

Seriously, YES, a prep sink is great for prepping and working constantly in your kitchen if your layout and placement support it. As pointed out above, without a prep sink, you'd be treking from the fridge across from one end of the island around and to the sink across from the other end of the island, then back to the range or your work area. With a prep sink, you have one work area on the fridge end of the kitchen for prepping and cooking and another on the main sink end. It is a kitchen where a prep sink makes a lot of sense -- but not in that corner with your back to everyone and your wonderful views. Our kitchen neeeded a prep sink for similar but different reasons. We wanted to move the cooktop out of the island and the only way to do it was to put it on the opposite side of the island from the sink. We had to add a prep sink to make it functional. We needed it, and it works well and all day long.

Personally, if your architect cannot rework the windows so that the sink would be centered under one, I'd put that second DW next to the range, and I'd put cabinetry panels on both of them. The range then gets the focal point on that wall without competition from a slab of stainless. Besides, its so much cooler to surprise people with two concealed DWs than to hit them over the head with the fact that you have them as soon as they walk into the room. ;-)

Try to stand at your current sink - or find a kitchen display or even an appliance store and try to imagine loading both of the DWs at the same time. We do that on a nearly daily basis as one DW fills and we move into the second one. I would not want them where they could not be open at the same time.

Does it bug anybody that the range is not centered against the island? It's centered on the wall, of course, and between the windows but while the architect is thinking about centering the sink on the picture window I'm wondering if I will sit in the family room and think the range and hood are misaligned.

Lascatx, you reminded me of this other simmering concern when you mentioned the making the range the focal point. Am I wrong about this?

You all have me thinking harder about the role of the prep sink in my cooking life. This may require a review of the trash placement and cutting board, too. Aargh!

No -- I think you'll be okay. Sinks are more difficult because those silly faucets and other things we put around them stand up and call attention to them.

Your island is centered with the aisles, and there just isn't much you can do about the aisles and walls being different unless you want to revisit the corner pantry, the range wall windows, etc. The edge of the island lines up with the edge of the range, so they match up on edges instead of centers. Thay may actually work out for you when you look at the hood and the lighting over your island. If they were centered the same, they might fight each other. Just keep that view from the family room in mind when you make your choices.

BTW, I think I like the windows either side of the range better than the wrap in the corner.

Just think -- you will have a kitchen where people may actually firght to get to do the dishes. :D

I agree: while the sink/window issue would annoy me greatly, I think the range is a different story and is fine where it is. I also like the staggered arrangement so that if you do put a prep sink in the island you won't have two people working back to back.

clinresga: Sorry, I sure didn't mean to be criticizing anyone or stating a RULE that is true for everyone. If you look back at my post, you'll note I wrote, "Everyone is different, and there is no law that says function must always come before aesthetics (especially if you don't cook much)...." I, too, often choose looks over practicality.

Bob, I still disagree with you. It isn't just umbrellas in drinks. How about soup and cereal bowls that aren't quite empty, vases or pitchers with a quart of liquid, etc.? You aren't going to dump them into either the bottom of the dishwasher (there's no disposer down there) or the trash. Even water glasses would be a problem for me: bending over to dump them at the bottom so there wouldn't be splashing would wear out my back.

Which brings me back to my beloved ergonomic theory of layout. I'll put aesthetics of, say, a beautiful countertop material over easiness of keeping it looking pristine: the extra work is worth it to me. But I won't put aesthetics ahead of my back and legs -- I want to grow old cooking in this kitchen -- let alone safety. I don't think that ground fault interrupter outlets look so great, either, but I have them!

Someone said that something like 60% of your time in the kitchen is prep work. I don't know where that statistic came from, but I bet that refers to percentage of COOKING time, and perhaps cleanup after cooking, not ALL kitchen work. I know I'm a broken record about it, but I think people, especially kitchen designers, forget to take into account all the time you spend doing things like unloading groceries and the dishwasher. I do those almost every day.

When you are loading the dw, you often do just a few things at a time, but when you unload it, you do it all at once. So if you only think about LOADING, you may underestimate the impact of poor placement. I.e.: putting glasses INTO the dw two at a time is no big deal, because even if there are a lot of them, the dirty glasses have all collected next to the sink. But what about when you put away clean ones? You can only carry two at a time. If the cabinet is across the room, that's a lot of trips.

I have a suggestion for weighing the aesthetics vs. pragmatics that has helped me in similar situations: look at some other kitchens, preferably real ones in your friends' homes, but also in magazines. Here, the question is symmetry, so look to see if in fact that sink really is always centered anyway, and if not, how you like the look, and how the owners made it work. I bet you will find that a lot of rules get broken to no ill effect -- there are a lot of variables in how a kitchen looks -- and you will get some ideas, too.

Have fun!

gellchom: no criticism was taken, and any defensive tone was likely the result of my residual guilt over our Lacanche range purchase.

Love the rest of your latest post. You make great points, esp regarding location of DW near storage. That's as important as my issue of locating prep area near fridge.

gellchom, I'll second clinresga on your latest post...some very good points.

But regarding dumping food into your D/W, you may be unaware that most D/Ws' drains are routed into the disposer. In addition, most D/Ws have a trap in the bottom that can/should be cleaned periodically (unless you wash your dishes before loading as most do!). And dumping a quart of water into the bottom of your D/W when loading is no problem whatsoever. What I described is the way I've loaded dishes for years...it works. And it saves a lot of effort not to mention time and energy.

Bob

Bob, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree about dumping food into a dw. Mine doesn't route into the disposer. Even if it did, I'm not sure I would want old food and milk lying around in there until the next time I ran the dw -- we run ours almost every day, but some people take a few days to make a whole load. I think I'd be grossed out by the looks, let alone the smell, of all that stuff collecting in the dw.

I do sometimes pour out a little bit of water or coffee into the dw instead of the sink, but if it's more than a little, it splashes too much. As I wrote above, I don't want to wear out my back reaching down to dump out glass after glass at the bottom.

I am one of the two dishwasher people and I run them alternating or both at the same time. So i load one. Say it gets filled already with posts and pans, lunch dishes, yesterday's dinner dishes. I run it whenever it is filled and start loading the next. After sunday dinner when we have 8 people eating dinner usually they are both filled. I have a large family and I probably run 12 loads a week, six each dw.

My third dishwasher is pretty much just used for party overflow.

I was also one of the people who suggested a sink in the island.If you are a serious cook like I am, you may use TWO sinks to prep at the same time and need the third for dirty stuff. Say you are making pasta with blanched veggies. You need two strainers in one sink to catch the hot water, plus a pan of ice water in the second sink to blanch the veggies. Similarly, if you may have a sink full of veggies in bowls of veggie wash... when they are ready the second sink has the sprayer on and you pour the bowls through the strainer and leave them spritzing for awhile.

This has all been great for getting me to think more clearly about how I cook and how we clean and put dishes away. Nobody in my house wanted to hash this out with me, but I really want to get it as right as possible. Thank you very much to all who posted thoughts.

Insecure1, I blanche veggies regularly and often run into the conflict between dumping the hot water from veggies and pasta and the need for the ice bath. Sounds like I should make sure that second sink is truly useful to a cook but not back to back. I notice that on another thread people mention there are plumbing issues getting the faucet and disposal into the island when the sink is large. I'm even thinking about a dishwasher in the butler's pantry/bar now.

If anybody else wants to share how they use two dishwashers (or three!), this is the thread for it!

Here's a question, because it's been on my mind for ages: Where is the trash pull-out if you have a dw on each side of the sink? I know I scrape my dishes into the trash before loading them into my dw. I do not rinse, just lightly scrape. I'm not so into putting much down the disposal. Right now I have one dw, but I'm dying to have 2, mine gets run up to 4x a day. Glad to see a discussion of how to arrange them.

My trash is under my sink, on a rev-a-shelf pull-out bracket (which is nice, because it includes an area for trash bags, Comet, Brillo, etc.). But I am STILL looking for a little elbow-type piece of hardware to attach, one end to the cabinet door and one end to the bottom of the pull-out, so that the thing will roll out automatically every time I open the door. When I ask at Lowe's for such a thing, I just get a weird look. But I saw one in a friend's house once, so I know it can be done -- unfortunately, they moved, so I can't go and figure out how it was done.

So once again I will offer a reward for anyone who can find this for me! A semi-valuable prize (something decent, I promise).

Good luck!

zillapgh, our trash pullout is straight across the aisle from the main sink. It's in the island, which makes it fairly convenient to the prep area and rangetop as well as the cleanup area.

That's so funny I have EXACTLY that thing right now! I bought it years ago, more than 10 at IKEA. Everyone who comes by loves it and more than one person has told me that they've scoured IKEA for it. It's a shame, it holds 2 wastebins, and when I pull the cabinet, a nifty track runs underneath the two bins gliding them out to me. What's better is that on top is a built in lid that covers both bins when they are in the cabinet, and so the trash cans slide back under them when you close the door. Less smelly! They are not huge, in fact they can even be lined by a target store plastic bag (when you purchase an item). Sorry I can't point you to where you could get this now, but I think the secret might be in a gizmo mounted from underneath the bins...

Still, I'd like 2 dw on either side of the sink, with a full height pull out trash... in island across? Would that be awkward to turn around? Or does everyone just keep it under the sink when they have 2 dw there?

We do have it that way with our 2 dishwashers on either side of the sink. We already turn to the side to load the dishwasher, so having the sink on one side and the trash pullout on the other works just great.

I was going to put my trash and recycling in the corner cabinet, with one of those rotating gadgets that holds three bins. Is this a bad idea? Should it be on the island?

My trash and recycling are under the sink and I have a trash pullout on the other side of the island.

My trash pullout is in the island across from my DWs and main sink. It is easy to use when prepping and when scraping plates for either DW.

You mentioned in your post last night that you were considering moving one of the DWs into the pantry/bar. I've had my two DWs for almost a year now, and I can honestly tell you that whatever I'm looking for is never in the first DW I check. It would drive me crazy if the two DWs weren't next to eachother.

But then again I use both DWs for everything. If you're planning on using 1 DW for cooking and eating dishes, and the other for just bar glasses, then it may make sense to put 1 DW in the bar area. If that's the case, consider a dishdrawer there. But if you plan on any content overlap, keep those DWs together.

I just read this thread, as we are also installing 2 dishwashers for the first time. I think it depends alot on how you plan to use them. In our case (empty-nesters) we plan on using the 18" dishwasher primarily during the week, when it is just the two of us. I've placed it near a sink (centered on the window) in one of the perimeter workspaces. The full size dishwasher is next to the sink in the island (also full size), and I expect to use that when we are entertaining, or when family is visiting. My hope is that for clean up, the island sink (which is closer to the stove) will be the one where one of us (me) washes pots and pans, while the perimeter sink ends up being the spot for dirty dishes, which will hopefully be loaded by DH!

I will second helenjoan - I just read this long thread and wondered why it hadn't been mentioned before:

*Why* are you installing two dishwashers?

- do you generate so many dishes at one meal that you need two just to hold it all?

- do you just want to alternate, and avoid putting dishes away?

- do you have two distince uses for a DW? e.g. bar and kitchen?

- or does it just seem neat to have two?

I have a stack of DDs, and that is working out fine for me. But there are only two in my household.

I second the notion that convenience for unloading is at least as important as convenience for loading.

@Paul -- If there's one thing I've learned as I plan our addition it's that how you live really matters in the design decisions. In our case, we live in the kind of active city neighborhood with lots of kids and teenagers and adults constantly coming and going in the house. We live across the street from a country club we belong to and close to schools where our children and their friends go, so that generates a ton of traffic into the house. We use the front door around here more than the garage doors. And we would cook even more if we had more room for everything.

So we generate about 1 1/2 dishwashers worth of dishes a day. There are always people generating more dirty dishes while the washer is totally full and running. I wash most cooking and storage items by hand because we don't have the capacity we need. Given that we will now have the space for two dishwashers near the main sink, we decided to do that. But we know that the unloading spaces are not as convenient because we have chosen windows over upper cabinets.

The last child is still four years from going to college, but when that happens, we actually hope to do more formal adult entertaining. It's hard to imagine an empty nest right now, though. Maybe at that point we'd switch out one of the units for drawers.