Please improve my tiny kitchen design!
We have a split-level home, and on the lower level is an office, a guestroom, and a rec room area with a dark and claustrophobic bar. We want to turn the bar into a bright, open, small-but-useful kitchenette for guests. The space is 96” along the back wall, 95” along the side/exterior wall. Ceiling height is only 84” in the kitchenette area, due to plumbing above.
A rendering below shows my tentative plan for the space. We’re doing this mostly ourselves, on a tight budget. Can you give me any advice, and especially about these 4 issues?
1) Sink placement: We'll have a TV where you see the framed picture in the rendering, and it will be mounted to swing toward the room; this is the only possible TV spot in the rec room. Having an overhanging, swiveling TV seems dangerous for banging one’s head if the sink is below it, so I've planned the sink closer to the window near the far corner. If we use a blind corner cabinet along the back wall, and a 24” sink base cabinet next to it under the window, a small sink would fit with a view out the window. (The window is located 12.5-49” along the exterior wall; so, adjacent to the blind corner cabinet, the 24” sink base cabinet will be underneath the right half of the window.) Is that OK, or is there a better spot for the sink?
2) Wall cabinets & awkward corner: The window molding is only 12.5” from the back wall, so if we had wall cabinets along the entire back wall, and if the wall cabinet was 12” deep with 1” for doors, then the cabinet would overlap the window molding. We’d need some sort of space at the corner. In order to avoid looking claustrophobic, I was thinking of stopping the cabinets about 12” away from the exterior wall, and having 12”x12” shelves in the corner (3 shelves shown in the rendering below). Any better thoughts of how to handle that awkward corner?
3) Cabinet depth over fridge: We need as much storage as possible, but I think a 24” deep over-fridge cabinet would look weird in such a small space, since it’ll be twice the depth of the 2 neighboring cabinets. Would using a 12”deep bridge cabinet over the fridge look better, because it would give us uniform depth with the other cabinets, even though it'd be harder to reach?
4) Cabinet height / crown molding: In this kitchenette nook, the ceiling is only 84” high. Should we plan to install the wall cabinets at the ceiling height, or down a few inches with a slim crown molding on top? 84” ceilings minus 30” wall cabinets minus 36” base cabinets/granite leaves 18”. Should we keep the full 18” space between base and wall cabinets, or take 2” for molding at the top?
Thank you so much for reading. Any advice is appreciated!
In case it helps to see the real space (in the beginning stages of renovation):
Comments (11)
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Please help me with my tiny kitchen layout!
Comments (27)Hi Rosie! Thanks! Using the front room for dining is a great idea, however we DO use our front room quite a bit as well, because when I'm cooking/cleaning or watching a movie with my daughter, my hubby can go up front and sit in the sofa with our dog and read, so it functions as a quiet "away" room (Sarah Susanka, anyone?) but he can still feel connected to us. And vice versa. That's also where our fireplace is, and we like to hang out there, especially when our families come out from the east coast to stay with us. I think we looked into it being a dining room, but the proportions didn't work. Ah, the joys of small urban living! Maybe I should post that plan too! However, I also love hearing about your lack of need for a prep sink. Does your husband or anyone else use the kitchen at the same time as you?...See Morecan you help with the layout of my tiny kitchen! please???
Comments (1)Sorry for the duplicate! It didn't seem that my initial post had been posted. Sorry!!!...See MorePlease help!! Need ideas to improve this kitchen design
Comments (22)I have posted to the other forum as well. I just recently found these forums and am so happy I did, I love all the input. The builder will be putting some sort of sound barrier to the master. The upper two bedrooms will be for my daughters, ages 8 and 14. We requested a bathroom not be in the middle of the rooms upstairs and that a jack and Jill style bathroom not be put there just so that if one girl Wales up to use the bathroom, it won't wake the other. As some have mentioned, I do think with two girls, the bathroom needs to have a bigger vanity area for sure. It's hard to see from these plans but there is a dotage area between the stairwell and the garage downstairs. I will utilize this area as our "school station" where we keep the book bags, extra school supplies, a tack board for school calendars, ect. There will also be a walk in storage built into the side of the stairwell. We originally were going to add a fairly large bonus area to the upstairs but recently decided to do away with that. We felt like if we did that the kids would tend to try to be up there all the time and we would not see them much. All the kids currently have their own tvs in their rooms but of course, they aren't allowed to watch tv for extended periods of time. The back patio will also be large. We will mount a tv out there also and we will spend a lot if time out there. It will function as an additional living area with deep seating our door furniture. I'm thinking that in about 4 years once my 14 year old is moving away to college, the 5 year old may want to move upstairs by then. Of course the downstairs bedroom would then be her room for when she comes home on weekends and holidays. The kitchen was my first primary concern as the concept in these plans is what I want but with a larger pantry. Then, once we felt like we would like to switch the kitchen and living room that became our next big concern. We did meet with two architects and builders before deciding to use the one we did. We have seen and been in multiple houses he has designed and built and we fell in love with them. We live in Louisiana so we told the builder that we didn't want a coat closet because we actually do not use the one we have now for that purpose. Ours is being used to store crafts which we plan to store elsewhere. The attic will be a walk in attic that can be accessed from the garage and from the second story....See MoreHow can I improve on my kitchen design?
Comments (15)If that's a major walkway from the garage/mudroom/laundry I'd keep the fridge as originally drawn. You can move the stub wall back 12", and the pantry's front wall back a few more, to gain aisle space, and make the island 102" rather than 106" to gain 4" more, then have seating on three sides. The art niche would be narrower, so if you already own a special piece for that space, this suggestion might not work: If the goal of moving the fridge to the top wall is so that you won't see it from the great room, then buehl's suggestion would work much better than that option. I like the extra storage she has under the island, but I forgot to include it in my drawing. If you want to keep the extra oven, I'd still suggest tucking it in the top corner, invisible from the great room. You'll probably just use it for the side dishes while the turkey is in the range oven (or vice versa), so I'd put in on the periphery. And BTW, I'd love to have an extra oven, so I vote to keep it. ETA, and unless you have a really unpleasant view from the window, I'd suggest making it larger. I missed the window and seating questions the first time. : /...See MoreRelated Professionals
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