I have some pics on another post about the diagonal upper cab.

I can re-post them is it would be helpfull.

Also I have not added the measurements for the window or other door which leads to the balcony because there is nothing that can be done there...

sorry for the double post :(

This is the chimney. The box beside it will be reduced in depth, inside is a pipe (the stack?) and it is only 6" in depth.

the range wall...

"I know that there is not much that can be done here..."

Just wait. The layout gurus will be all over this. I'm not one of them. But remember a small kitchen allows you to get higher end finishes if you like. A small compact efficient (high end if you like) kitchen is certainly something to love!

I would do the L shaped upper in the corner, btw. If nothing else, it will feel roomier rather than having a cabinet in your face in the corner.

Bee

Thanks Bee! By the way I saw pics of your kitchen and it is fabulous!
Seriously I get depressed looking at all these gorgeous kitchens!

Good Things come in small packages. Remember that.

Oh oh oh I remember a kitchen from a few years ago that i LOVED that was about the size of yours. I will find it. I will. In the mean time, don't lose hope: There are lots of things to do in a small space and the constraints of your beautiful doors and chimney will light up at least a few GWers that I can think of. This will be fun!

Next to the 60" Fridge wall area are two doors: the door next to the big window must go to the outdoors, like to a balcony. ( Y ? / n ? ). The other door must go to the front. Can this door be moved? Right now, your kitchen area has a diagonal walkway across it.

My guess is that your building is about 2 miles from downtown Montreal.

David- are you a Montrealer too?I'm in the Plateau...

Yes you are correct the door next to the frige leads to outside balcony.

The other door going into the kitchen is coming from the dining/living area. I can't move that door.
The kitchen is a tiny extension of the original house.
Behind the kitchen is a small bedroom that needs to stay that way.

I know you've mentioned not including some measurements because "nothing can be done there", but perhaps you could include them anyway. There are some amazing layout gurus here who might have some ingenious ideas to help you out. The more information you can provide (exact measurements of: doorways, windows, window heights, location of: plumbing, electrical, gas) the more likely you'll get some great ideas from this group. You've specified the structure can't be changed. Can the plumbing or electrical be moved? Also, what do you want in the kitchen exactly? Do you need a seating area? Is there any way for external ventilation? Where exactly do the doors lead (dining room, outside, etc)?

This view is looking into the kitchen from living room. To the left is the wall with the fridge on it. Right beside the fridge is the outside baclony door.

External ventilation can be added. The ceiling will be removed to be re-done and outside ventialtion will be added. I am on the third and top floor, the ventilation will go into ceiling and out toward the window side of the house. I was thinking od adding a microwave/ventilation over the range. I know they aren't the best but really there is limited space.

Plumbing can't really be changed. I's like to add a dishwashing machine. There isn't really room for seating, maybe a tiny table beside the window.

I want to add cabs to the ceiling to maximise storage.
Basically any improvemnts will help, it doesn't get any worse lol.

The doors: The one beside the range lead to my daughter's small bedroom. It is a few steps below the kitchen and has an attic sloping ceiling.

The door heading into the kitchen is fron the livingroom. The kitchen is in the back of the house. My dd's bedroom being the last room of the house.

The door beside the fridge leads outside to a small balcony and staircase.

The fridge will be changed. I'm thinking stainless, and the kind that are counter depth and taller so that it doesn't stick out as much.

The window is 45" wide and the door beside it 39" as is the one beside the range.

what is the width of the doorway on the lower (fridge) wall? the depth of the chimney space?

total upper wall 122"?

what is the width of the window on the R wall? the doorway? the measurement of wall space between window and doorway? between doorway and bottom wall?
measurement from window sill to floor?

how wide will your fridge be?

I'm no layout guru,
but I love your tiny space!
Lots of light, the doors and chimney and wood floors are awesome!
Looking forward to the designs to come.
Good luck!

Can the window be made shorter, putting the bottom at least at counter height?

I love the trim. Try to preserve it if possible.

Hi, Geomeg. Living in a great metro area, do you feel you need (or definitely want) a full-size refrigerator? Do you use an oven a lot? How big does it need to be?

Regarding "pushing the stove in," regardless of where it might end up, I'd strongly replacing the stove with a cooktop and separate oven. Cooktops fit totally within a standard 25" counter top, no sticking out. Also, same cooking-area width but potentially less bulk width. Very nice for compact spaces, including no need to move the stove to enough to get behind to clean under and around it, a real plus in any case but especially in small kitchens where it can be a tricky business. I vividly remember my husband helping lower me behind ours to clean (big-eyed toddler wondering what on earth we were doing). A more minor item but still potentially useful is that the oven can go anywhere there is a spot for it, including under the stove, of course. Or even your daughter's bedroom. :) This is what we have in our kitchen because we had a width issue, and it works wonderfully.

Also regardless of where stuff ends up, I'm thinking your work counter should be extra deep to convert some floor inches to great work surface. How tall are you guys?

Looking at the photos, I conclude someone once painted the wood floor a light gray. I see it under the range. Methinks the space was renovated once, partially, after that: partial floor sanding is the big clue. The sanders didn't move the range. So it seems. If this is all true, then you cannot go with unfitted freestanding units unless you are willing to sand and varnish the floor, or to put up with the visual discontinuity. The only way to cover the unsanded part of the floor is with typical "fitted" kitchen units, keeping the exact same L shape layout, or enlarging their footprint. Have you been to Ikea? At Ikea you will see both fitted and unfitted units at a great price. On the Ikea site, search for Varde and for Akurum to see both types.

The next fridge: in Montreal there are small + tall fridge options, more than in the US ( e.g. as shown on ajmadison.com ) because Montrealers in small apartments buy a lot of small + tall fridges. LG has two small + tall fridge models in Montreal, but only one in the US. The small + tall GE fridge got discontinued in the US but is available in Montreal. You can see it in the appliance store on Laurier Street East.

The space is small because you have one run of counter. The three doors in three corners prevent most plans from coming to fruition. The comparatively massive floor area is unused, but it is not big enough for a cart island. The window is too large (low), so you cannot put a kitchen counter there EVEN if the dd bedroom door could be moved.

Maybe this will help: in front of the window, put a 35.5" high and 14.5" deep Ikea VARDE Shelving unit (Article Number : 801.584.16 at http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/catalog/products/80158416/) and install it without the back panel, to let the sunlight shine through. A metal cross brace can ensure its rigidity instead of a panel of cheap white luan. Ikea sells metal cross braces too. And one can make them easily too.

I think you'll come up with something really cute, actually. What a charming little kitchen!

I second the idea of the cooktop and oven separate. And your idea of a counter-depth fridge is a must. Have you seen the dishwasher drawers? Maybe you could get one tall DWD and still have a drawer or two underneath it?

Davidrols idea of the shelves left open in front of the window is a good one. I'd do that. Be some dusting there, though.

Ikea might be your best bet. The have a nice 24" apron front sink, too.

When are you planning to start?

I'm planning to start soon, this summer.
Ikea is less expensive but how easy is it to customize ?

For example my ceilings are short 92-93" which means I can't fit their tall 39" cabs. The 30" ones would not reach the ceiling which is what I want...
Is there any way around that?

Here is one of the small kitchens I love. I will keep looking though. I think this kitchen had three doors also.

Here is a link that might be useful: FKB: Beeswax kitchen

Here is the one I was thinking about, but her kitchen is GIGANTIC compared to yours! LOL just kiddin.

Here is a link that might be useful: hest's kitchen

Geomeg, I would consider getting the larger upper cabinets and dropping them closer to the counter if it were me, just because you are so short on space. A lot of folks will rightfully tell you that this limits your choices for stuff you can put on the counter (shorter coffee pot, mixer, etc) if you were planning to do that. And I cannot comment on the flexibility/modifiabilty of IKEA except to suggest that you search through older IKEA posts because there were some really clever alterations made by a number of IKEA fans.

Are you willing to get:

-- A smaller DW, such as an 18"
-- A GE under-sink DW, which is 24"
-- A 24-inch wide fridge? You can walk to better food than I can cook! Although not if I went to Jean-Talon in the summer
-- Move the DR door at all??

You could actually get a 2x2 rolling cart in that kitchen--or maybe an island of the same size--if you installed this way, from DR door up the wall and over to your daughter's bedroom door:

- 27" of open or custom shelving over the chimney and pipe
- a 24" fridge
- a GE under-the-sink dishwasher (these sinks tend to be shallow and the DWs are not very quiet); also 24"
- A 36" corner cabinet, which extends 12" along each counter run on both walls
- Your range
- A 6" pullout

This would leave the window and lower wall completely open. You could now put storage against both--I mean only narrow thin stuff, but that could help--and put a 24" x 24" cart or island in the middle. Aisles would be narrow but bearable at 36".

More important than whether you like that particular plan is knowing which of these options you could never live with--small DW, small fridge, etc.

And moving the DR door just a bit lets you do a LOT more with that sink wall.

With marcolo's plan, wouldn't she actually have 16" on the side of the range?

82" - 36" corner cab - 30" range = 16" That's room for a whole drawer stack! :)

Also, are you able to access the space between the studs at all? I don't know if that is remotely possible in homes of that age? B/C if so, and you followed marcolo's plan of moving the fridge to the other wall, you could recess some 9" deep cabinets into that wall and end up with only 6" of covered floor space. But it would give you way more pantry storage than the corner upper. And you could use that corner upper in a hinged front for spices and oils and such maybe?

I'm definitely getting a smaller fridge. When you say 24 " is that width or depth?
Also which is the DR door?
I'm also willing to get an 18" DW. I don't know alot about DW drawers, I have to look onto these.

Thank you for all the suggestions.

It really would help, both you and us, to draw the kitchen to scale. And show all dimensions. Ruled graph paper (quadrille) is useful for this.

thanks again, everyone

I'll try and draw it out properly on ruled graph paper.

"I'll try and draw it out properly on ruled graph paper."

that'd really help - otherwise, we're just guessing.

check out the dish drawer. and the smaller fridge. mine is 28" wide and is plenty big enough for 2 (probably even 3). They do make 'em even smaller.

I think the idea of a cooktop (they make them with just 2 burners - glass top or coil type) and small oven is a good idea. Do you bake a lot? I've used a hot plate and small counter top oven for the past 14 yrs. has worked fine. I do use my mw a lot.

you could put in something like this pull out board for the mw or a small oven extra space.

as for an ugly, tiny kitchen - yours isn't near as bad as the one I'm moving from... I'd have loved your kitchen in here!

Your nice old kitchen is a nice problem, Geomeg. It'll be interesting to see what everyone comes up with putting those those actual dimensions to work.

Just musing, though, 30" and 32" drawer slides (and deeper) are readily available, and it occurs to me that creating an extra-depth counter along your current sink wall would not only create a great deal of extra, easily accessed storage and (wonderful!) work space but also allow you to set a dishwasher or sink in front of that 6" pipe as if it weren't there.

Also with a deep counter, if you wished, you could run closed storage at its back right down to the counter, with sliding doors on the bottom level (side to side or up and down) for access without disturbing work in progress in front of it. This one isn't used nearly enough, but it's perfect for tiny square kitchens big enough to do jumping jacks and lunges in the middle but not to hold a toaster AND make a pie on the counter.

Other upper cabinets would have to be deeper also to reach the fronts of some of the shelves as usual, of course, but the extra depth would provide valuable storage for seldom-used items.

A drop-in cooktop also only takes up a handful of inches of vertical depth, so drawers and doors below can be configured almost independent of it (nonstandard, but extremely doable and lots of people have done, like us). For instance, those great pullout units that go in corners under the counter require extra inches for a door that small kitchens often don't have, but a drop-in unit could overlap. For example, a 30" cooktop with part of a corner door and a 24" oven below.

Rosie:
That deep counter with uppers right down to the counter is a great idea with sliding doors being the perfect answer to the accessibility problem of standard doors when using the counter top. I hope the OP sees the great solution that provides for her kitchen.

I may borrow that for my kitchen, too!

The extra deep counters are a great idea.
Would doing extra deep uppers be a good idea? right now the few uppers I do have are 14" deep.

yeah, musing too, in the kitchen space that geomeg has, imagine selling the range and having only one humungous counter. Her one counter could increase in size after one enters the room. The back wall could be a humungous appliance garage (rolltop front) where the Breville Smart Oven lives permanently. One can cook a lot in a small toaster oven, and even more in a large toaster oven. When closed, the appliance garage is a wall of clean. In front of the mega garage, a $999 Ikea induction cooktop can be right there, unobtrusive and ready to be either like countertop or a spot to cook on.

Other appliances: mixer, blender, coffee mill, pepper mill, sliced bagel toaster, coffee machine, folding dish rack, you name it.

The "floor" of the appliance garage could be sloped, or made with Runnels, and (of course!) the slope leads to a separate drain. This drain could be plumbed to the sink drain in the same easy way as double sinks get plumbed (one P trap is shared between them).

Wall cabinets, "uppers", can be built so they project forward more than the garage rolltop wall, and this makes the closed garage wall look a lot more like a continuation of the wall when you enter the kitchen.

Under this extra deep counter, the volume (unused space) behind the drawers can be used for long-term storage. Accessing it involves removing some drawers, a 2 second operation with most drawers.

Since the range wall is almost 7 feet long, the huge counter would have to wrap around in an L shape, to make efficient use of the available space. It is also possible to imagine a big appliance garage on THAT wall too (the range wall). With a huge corner cabinet, super susan or ...

Inside one of the appliance garages, a silent concealed fan exhausts odors and steam, and a slide-out glass captures smokey effluent rising from the induction cooktop ....

But, this is mere musing as long as we have inexact dimensions.

Muse away, Davidrol, always a big part of the fun here. Let's not forget KitchenKelly's morgue drawer, tho--a true inspiration. She always has a place for yet another guest. For those who haven't seen it, it pulls out lengthwise from under a banquette seat. (I said those full-extension drawer slides come in longer sizes.)

Geomeg, that's why I wondered how tall you guys are. I'm 5'2" and I'd have to climb onto the counter to get to the front of a standard-depth upper over a deep lower. No matter, though, you could make them any depth that worked for you. Think just where you want the shelves in front of you to be. If you used Ikea, you could buy lower cabinet boxes and cut them back to what you wanted. In any case, the front 12" or so of the bottom 2 or 3 shelves, regardless of how far they projected and what sat behind them or didn't, would hold items you need often. If you had extra depth, behind dinner plates used daily might sit the rimmed soup bowls/plates only used on special occasions.

The only problem I see with extra upper depth in a place with limited storage space would be the encouragement to accumulate. I really, truly never felt any need to have special dishes, linens, etc., just for Thanksgiving until I had room for them; now, holy cow! Mercifully, Christmas is always at our son and DIL's.

It's only musing at this point, though. Accurate measurements will de-luster some ideas, or shut them down entirely, while opening up wonderful new possibilities.

Deedles, I wish I remembered the name of the person who recently posted a like to a kitchen with this type of storage. She reminded us. With most spaces discussed here quite large (whether their owners think so or not), we tend to forget special fixes for more complex situations, ones that are more about fitting together a 3D puzzle than lining up boxes.

Doea anyone remember that galley kitchen thing that someone posted last summer? It had these sliding modules over the counter and sink, so every inch of horizontal space could serve multiple purposes. It was the coolest thing, but I can't find the post now. I think it was something that was actually designed for boats, or maybe it was for a commercial application. I mention it only because I wonder if it would provide some interesting ideas for maximizing functionality in this space.

I haven't read every post, but has anyone mentioned that if you get an induction cooktop, you can use it, gently, like counter space. Also, lap-board type pull-outs provide extra temporary surface area, and you only lose about one vertical inch of space from your lower cab.

My goodness, the vendors must monitor this forum very closely, because today there was a spam posting of exactly what I was talking about. It's the Galley Sink. I don't know what it costs or if it would work in your space, but when I first saw it last year (after I'd already started my remodel) I thought it was pretty slick. I would have considered it for my little kitchen if I'd known. It's at www.thegalleysink.com.