I'd hide the name, say nothing to the kd and see what people here come up with. The kd would invariably be miffed to hear you second guessing her/him.
This is for your kitchen specifically, with your doorways, windows, plumbing issues, etc... Unless they have designed something never seen before, cabs are cabs and appliances & fixtures are pretty standard.

I should have added that people will be more likely to copy the improved version after posting than the one you post at first ;)

Thanks dianolo - I'm going to bump this up and see if there are any more opinions about it.

I'm not telling you what to do, except to check your contract. The drawings are likely the intellectual property of your KD, and you may not be able to reproduce them without permission.

Perhaps you'd be able to re-draw the important parts to scale instead. Realistically, what you want to know is whether you've gotten the big picture right, with trash and sink and range in the right places, and enough drawers, and so on. We can see that from a simpler drawing than the one the KD provided.

Thank you marcolo.. That's a good suggestion!

We've been through this before and Marcolo is correct about intellectual property issues.

Yes, and Marcolo is also correct that if what the drawing shows is all standard stuff--cabinets, appliances, doors and windows, you can draw it yourself and post it with impunity. The drawings are demonstrably the intellectual property of the KD, but you can't copyright an idea, and you certainly can't claim ownership of a standard kitchen layout.

If her cabinets somehow fit together and formed the shape of a dragon, with the range belching fire in its mouth, then, perhaps, there might be an issue. For a bunch of rectangles, however, never fear.

Yeah, I remember (and followed) the threads about intellectual ownership, but had a hard time extrapolating from there a request for plan feedback. The discussions I recall were more directed towards shopping plans around from one professional to another for feedback and quotes, also intellectual ownership as related towards displaying rights in portfolios. So, thank you for the direct suggestions to redraw the plans before asking for feedback, as well as checking the contract first. That is exactly what I was looking for!

plllog - I really want to see that dragon kitchen! That circular kitchen someone posted the other day comes close, but pales in comparison to a fire-belching dragon! In such a kitchen one would, of course, have peons to work it, so no need to worry about practicality of layout and function.

It sounds like you have a good solution (and I very much agree about not reposting the KD's file).

I'm curious, though, about the "miffed" assumption above. Presumably you're bouncing the plan off people in your household, maybe friends -- I know I can't make good decisions without a lot of consulting. Surely a designer understands this. Could one not say to a designer, look, my decision-making process involves an online board, and at key moments I'd like to be able to post a sanitized version of your plan to that board for feedback?

Pllog, for years that has been one of my husband's and my favorite sayings. I think originally I heard it as "do not offend a dragon..."

To the topic at hand: This is an online community where people really want to see your stuff and are not just the neighbor you roped in the front door. You can choose not to mention GardenWeb, but should it come up: A KD with self confidence will realize this is the world we live in. She probably facebooks, right?

Colorfast, this is a good example of making something your own. There are lots of T-Shirts and bumper stickers with variations of this with different drawings (I only link in commercial things). T's and buttons are the probable origin, as well. It does usually start with "Do not meddle" because it's a take on Tolkiens formula: "Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they are subtle, and quick to anger." That, in turn, is a representation of a common formula among well educated englishmen that flippantly refers to the bad consequences of tempting gods, fates, and other such cranky beings encountered in classic literature. It is regularly attributed to Bored of the Rings, but isn't actually there, at least not in the original edition.

Yes, NC, I think you've got it now. Draw your own picture. Tell the KD what you're doing to keep the communication going. You'll be fine.

So now I'm beginning to wonder if I should be able to post the layout rendition from the sale of our home. Is that OK?

Also once I saw coast_modern_love's kitchen w/o the copyright and now it has the copyright plastered across it. Are we not suppose to use that in any way. It's confusing.

Copyright...if you're talking about the pictures with a copyright message such as "Copyright Buehl 2009" on them (like some of mine have), that's a personal addition. A couple of years ago (and a few times since then), there was an incident where a company stole someone's kitchen pictures and tried to pass if off as their work. It caused a stir here and we all, temporarily, started copyrighting our pictures by adding it to our pictures ourselves.

However, if someone really wants one of our pictures, it's not that difficult to remove the "copyright" text so some of us stopped bothering with it. Was that a good idea on our part (to stop)? I don't know; but I guess in the grand scheme of things it didn't seem like a big deal even if someone did "steal" our pictures. Let's face it, once you've posted a picture anywhere on the web, it's there forever, no matter what you try to do.

See, that's my concern. A posted image is there forever, so I would not like to take something with my KD's name on it and post it without their permission. OTOH, I don't want to seem "sneaky" by blacking out that area and looking like I'm preventing them from getting credit. However asking a highly esteemed professional if I can post it so an anonymous Internet group can rip it apart does not sound very... respectful. And please don't take offense to that, I KNOW the people here are INCREDIBLY talented, generous, and take great personal interest to vest so much effort in a stranger's kitchen - I am just saying that that's what it would sound like if I were to ask specific permission. I do NOT mean that's that how I see it, but, it could easily come across that way to somebody who is not familiar with GW.

Yeah, re-drawing really sounds like the best bet...

The best way to keep people from stealing your pictures for their portfolios is to take really crummy pictures. Do them at an angle, with a pair of muddy workboots on the counter, and other dirt and detritus. :) We can still see your beautiful kitchens, but no one sane is going to try to use it to sell something to someone else. :)

Pillog, that is a fantastic solution for the photo stealing drama! I love it!

I would hope that a "highly esteemed professional" would understand that there's no "right" way to design a kitchen and personal preferences differ. I'd hope they'd understand that the ultimate goal of posting a design on GW is not to "rip it apart" but to get feedback from a large and experienced community to help you decide what you do or don't want in your kitchen. Getting lots of feedback isn't going to hurt the KD as long as you continue to work with that designer. It's probably better for them than you shopping around for a KD with different (and perhaps better) perspectives. In the end, customer satisfaction is what counts and not how much the KD likes it.

It sounds like you want to be respectful which makes me feel the answer is to ask. Ask if you can upload it and ask if they want you to crop out identifying info. If you were to leave identification intact, depending on the feedback of the forum the KD might be thrilled -or mad- to see the free publicity.