I would never attempt to "contrast" the whites. I think it would be very hard to do so without one of the whites looking dingy or at least "yellowed." If you're concerned with whether the moulding will stand out enough, trust me, just the difference between flat and semi-gloss will make it stand out. JMHO

kitschyKitch: Thanks for your reply! Good riddance is the route we're heading! It's amazing how so few cabinets are without a crown (unless they're modern). I only found a handful of pics online. detroit_burb: I just measured. We have 82.5" between the bottom of the soffit and the floor. The soffit is a whopping 12" tall! GreenDesigns: Hmmm - staggered heights. That is a very interesting idea! I didn't think of that. I'm not sure if I would like the look of it in our L - but, we will have cabinets on the opposite wall too. I could probably get away with it here. Hmmm... Good food for thought. Thank you! Should the small appliance run be part of the L, or is it okay for it to be on an opposite wall? This is the wall opposite the L. I could make the white uppers with the space below it the shorter cabinets, and put appliances there. Hmmm... WALL OPPOSITE THE "L" THE "L" Emilner: Ah! Your soffit is 12" too! I will ask my DH if we could possibly reframe it. (He's been working his butt off for a year and a half now renovating our fixer upper house and still has a LOT left to do. I think I remember him telling me that the pipes come close to the bottom of the soffit in some places, and even if they don't, I'm not sure if he'll want to take on the task of reframing the entire soffit just so I can have my crown molding, but I will (gently) ask!) aliris19: Wow, that was a really informative thread! Thank you for it and for your thoughtful reply! The two things that stuck in my mind were the photo showing 15" inches as ideal for someone 5' 10" (DH is just shy of 5' 11" and I'm 5' 7"), and someone saying that an OTR microwave (which we are planning on getting) needs 18" (ack!!) - hope that is wrong!! Lol! It seems that the main purpose to have 18" is for small appliances. We don't have a tremendous amount of counterspace as it is, and aside from the coffee maker, I don't think I want them cluttering things up. So, they will most likely be stored away in a cabinet until needed. If that's the case - I guess my only "need" (want) for more space is for a crown. And like you said, there are other ways to go about making it look nice. We should probably mount the cabinets flush first and see how we like the look. So many decisions!! Thank you all again for your replies!!!

Thanks for all the comments! I've been scrolling through picture after picture and it seems like there are a lot of ways people do it. Crown all the color of cabinets (my least fav), white and gray crown and then only crown on the cabinets. I have till Monday to decide but I've used this picture as inspiration for my stove wall and I noticed they have two colors and it doesn't look bad IMO?

why not do the walls, crown and ceiling in a bright white? Decorators white, super white, are all bright whites. Then for the baseboard and window trim, do a soft gray, or sage or blue or even charcoal. they did the crown w/these two