1) Change every single base cabinet that you can to drawers.

2) Make your seating island counter height (36").

What are your walking spaces? The island looks too close to the stove - you really will want about 48" in that area. Did you consider a peninsula at all? It would give you the counter space but keep the floor space open... Do you need the table and the high bar top piece? I would extend the island and make it l- shaped into the bay area - you could do seating for more then.... I did a similar plan for a customer :

It sounds that you are getting more counterspace ( it looks pretty good here ) since you are moving the powder room out. Since you don't have seating on the island, the ref. will be fine in this position....You seem ready to go ordering your cabinets, but take that moment to be 100% sure you are getting everything out of this space; that all options have been explored.

Good luck!

Your island is between your sink and refrigerator: a barrier island. This will add a lot of extra steps.

DIY2Much2Do -- thanks. I have been considering changing another set of bottoms to drawers. At the moment, we have 3 bottoms and one set of drawers. I think I will definitely change the other set to drawers as well. If I do the set on the other side of the range, it will look more balanced anyway. I will bring it up with my husband and the contractor. Both think I have enough drawers as is though!

Debbi -- I will make sure there is room to stand with the oven open. Thanks!

Rantontoo -- I know we are creating a barrier island. We will have to get used to taking things out of the fridge and setting them on the island and then going around to work by the sink. We really didn't like the idea of either sink or range in the island though, and we need the extra counter and storage that the island provides. If anyone created a barrier island and hates it, I'd love to hear from you.

AnnKH - yes, it is an angled upper in the corner. I'm not a fan of those either, to be honest. Can you share what your easy reach uppers look like?

So, I think I will change the lowers on the right side of the range to be drawers too. This way, we have three sets of drawers along the wall counter. The one at the far end by the windows is the trash pullout. And then under the sink is a cabinet, obviously.

Unless I make the island drawers? I feel that space is too wide for drawers. That was where we were going to store our appliances: food processor, waffle maker, meat grinder, mixer.

I agree 1000% with AnnKH on the base cabinets. If you want to mix things up looks-wise, you can do some pullout shelves behind doors.

What do you have for base cabinets in the corner?

Sammy -- thanks! I think the one remaining base cabinet does have pull out drawers.

I'm thinking 1 set of drawers will have: 1) kids' plates/bowls 2) kids' cups and utensils 3) Containers for school lunches and snacks

The 2nd set of drawers will have 1) adult utensils 2) cooking utensils 3) Tupperware

Not quite sure what we would put in the 3rd set of drawers if we change that base cabinet. Right now that base cabinet would be used to store pots and pans with 2 pull out shelves.

AnnKH -- thank you for that picture!! I am definitely going to sit down with the kitchen designer/contractor and show them this. I want that! Right now, the base cabinet for the corner is a lazy susan. I know a lot of people don't like them but I haven't had any issues with mine and actually don't mind it. We will probably stick with the lazy susan or perhaps a super susan instead.

I put all my small appliances on a super susan - since my cabinets were locally built, I specified that the shelf be placed so my tallest appliances fit on one of the shelves. A super susan definitely supports more weight than a lazy susan (on a pole).

Drawers are great for pots and pans - far better than pullouts. My Mom had pullouts in her kitchen for 35 years - and I think they only got pulled out a handful of times. Even if we were digging for something in the back, we were more likely to crouch down and dig than to open the door far enough to pull out the shelf. Drawers are one simple step.

Depending on the brand of cabinet, lazy susans have come a long way!! The ones now a days are much better quality - of course there are other corner options... have your designer show you all of them.... Also - I do love drawers, however, make sure you can fit what you want in there.... I have a couple of taller pots and my pressure cooker that are just about 1" too tall to fit in the drawers - If I had rollouts instead then I could move the upper one to fit these pieces. I did a kitchen once for a customer who had a lot of cast iron cookware - Le Creuset and didn't want to stack it so we did a large cabinet 36" full height doors and 4 rollouts - they were thrilled! I also like to take a smaller cabinet say 15" wide and making it a tray divider cabinet - don't let the name fool you - you can put pyrex, muffin tins, cutting boards, frying pans, and of course trays in there! Great way to organize that stuff instead of stacking it in a drawer.

Have fun with it all!!

Do either your husband or your contractor do the cooking? If not, they have NO Idea what they are talking about when they say that the amount of drawers you have are "enough"! It's impossible to have too many lower drawers...

Change all of your base cabs to drawers.

I actually liked my corner cabinet but I am short and could reach the angled front better than I could have reached the easy reach.

Drawers! Just trust all of us who say drawers.

I would hate your barrier island. It will impede flow. It will always be where you want to walk.

Can I recommend you read the New to Kithchens posts, share your floor measurements including surrounding rooms and see if one of the experts here has a non-barrier island solution?

This kitchen is 14' wide. This would necessitate putting your refrigerator and pantries on the rear wall and adding a prep sink to your island. If your space permits you may be able to extend your island in front of the bay and have all seating at the island with an attached table. This also puts the refrigerator in easy reach of both sinks which would work well for multiple workers.

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A couple of other ideas.

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Both drawers and cabinets with pull out shelves work sufficiently for pot and pan storage. Keep in mind that adding more drawers will increase the cost of the cabinets.

Could you post a 2d floor plan of your space as it is now with room dimensions?

I had a barrier island and didn't hate it...I despised it.

If I were you, I would take a step back and let the layout gurus here design you a functional kitchen where you don't need to cross zones like you would in your design and where you won't have to take things out of the fridge, put them on the island, walk around the island and then pick up the food to bring to the sink.

Wait, I just read your opening thread again and you say your kitchen is 11' x 14'. You don't have room for an island! Not even a small one!

Your kitchen is 11' wide which is 132".

132" - 25" (for the pantry wall) = 107"

107" - 25.5" (for the sink wall) = 81.5"

A one cook kitchen needs aisles a minimum of 42", so how can you have an island?

Even if you go with the bare minimum of 36" aisles, that only leaves you with 9 1/2" so where do you intend to put an island? What am I missing?

I think the room is opposite of your thought - it is 14' wide and 11' up to the bay or at least that is what I was thinking!

Debbi that was my first thought too, but after looking closely at her stove wall, I realized that must be the 11' wall

I estimated the widths of the cabs on the sink wall, and came to the same conclusion as Debbi. ;)

What's in the space behind the fridge? If you can recess the fridge into the wall, or at least into the stud space, you'd have more room for an island. You have no landing space beside the fridge, so the island will be your landing space, and if you include a prep sink on the island, that plan would work much better. With a little more floor space you can have a 36" deep island.

I'd skip the bar seating, if you're keeping the table in the bay.

Looking again I do think I'm wrong.