I'm offering the following as a devil's advocate. Both positions for your kitchen are viable choices with nice reasons to go each way. That's why you need to draw up all possibilities to consider. If the middle is right for you guys, this will end up reinforcing that decision. Versatility and size? That 15x30 room is looking very, very nice as it is, but the far end is prize square footage with all those exterior walls (light/views in up to 3 directions), and right now you plan to actually dine there very little--pretty but underused. If you put the kitchen down there, that addition would be used as intensively as it deserves to be. The living area for furniture placement would be the same, but it would be more strongly defined. Nevertheless the whole should still appear very spacious because it would still be part of a 15x30 room with kitchen on end and still be open to the north, which would extend additional living activities that direction, instead of east. The dining room might well end up used more for various activities in the middle of the house. In considering this alternative layout, how about a pretty door to the outside from a middle/dining room, French perhaps? And for that matter, are you sure you wouldn't have a door directly out from the kitchen? You have an entry in that end that looks as if it would need some reconfiguring too. Would it enter the middle/dining room? Last night I also thought of one other -- possible -- advantage to switching the kitchen and dining room: the step down. This could be a design asset for a dining room, setting it off as special as viewed from the living room. Since you don't plan to eat there a lot, even with young children you could have a nice rug under the table if you wanted it. You'd take that step mostly on the way back to the children's rooms--longer journeys. For the kitchen, you guys'd be making all the many, many little daily journeys between the living room and kitchen on a level floor. Morning sun in kids' hallway? Have sunshine everywhere and you eliminate the pleasure of entering a sunny room. A dim hallway is often a design asset because it makes the rooms opening off it all the more inviting. I can't see what that cabinet in the hall is, but with a little attention to attractiveness and interest, the hall looks pretty good to me. The only way I could imagine to improve it would be to extend it to come back around on itself -- children love to run in circles. :) As it is now, though, the hall enters a sunny middle room in the mornings, setting that room off really nicely, however it's used.

Here's my layout - very, very similar to Sena's. It provides three separate Prep Zones, all with approximately 60" of workspace and access to water. The primary Prep Zone is in the island with the Prep Sink and across from the cooktop. The two secondary Prep Zones are on either side of the cleanup sink. If someone is also cleaning up, then the secondary Prep Zone on the DW side will not be available until cleanup or unloading the DW is complete - but the one on the non-DW side is still available for use. Dish storage is on the Pantry side of the kitchen with 15" deep uppers as well as base cabinets. This location puts the dishes close to the DW for ease of unloading as well as on the side of the kitchen opposite the Cooking Zone and two of the Prep Zones, including the primary Prep Zone. This will keep those setting the table out of these zones and out from under foot of those working in the kitchen. The refrigerator is on the periphery for the same reason - it is easily accessible from the kitchen and the Dining Room and the rest of the house. Snackers and someone setting the table will not get in the way. There is a 6' long built-in pantry with 12" deep shelves on three sides. 12-inch deep shelves ares deep enough for the majority of items but not so deep that things get lost. 12" seems to be the ideal depth. You can get away with 15", but any deeper and things start to get lost! There are several advantages of a built-in pantry over a pantry cabinet: Much less expensive More storage space - no lost space due to cabinet walls & roll out tray shelf (ROTS) hardware and you can utilize the entire space - floor to ceiling More useful storage - no deep shelves over your shoulders that are almost impossible to see b/c even w/ROTS you still cannot see the middle of the shelves. You can see everything at one glance - no opening ROTS after ROTS looking for something Tray storage (cooking racks, cookie sheets, roasting pans, long platters, etc.) is above the MW oven in the oven stack. The trash pullout is in the island in the primary Prep Zone and near the Cooking Zone - both zones in which you generate the most trash & recyclables. It's also near the Cleanup Zone and the secondary Prep Zones. Note that the trash pullout is needed more in the primary Prep Zone & Cooking Zone than in the Cleanup Zone - but ideally it should also be near the Cleanup Zone. The island has seating for 5 - with one seat on the short end of the island. Having seats on two sides is more conducive to conversation. The cabinets on the sink run are 3" deeper than standard. This gives you more storage space as well as 3" more workspace depth. The base cabinets are 27" deep - if you can get them and they're in your budget. If not, then pull the base cabinets out 3" from the wall when they're installed. I did put in upper cabinets on the two side walls to give you more dish/prep tool/cooking tool storage space. The uppers on the Pantry side are 15" deep so even 12" wide dinner plates will fit. The uppers on the cooktop wall are 12" deep. They could be 15" deep as well, if desired. If you do not put upper cabinets on the walls, then you will need to create dish storage elsewhere. I don't recommend open shelves for anything other than items you use every single day. It only takes a couple of days for dust to start settling on items - requiring you to wash the items b/f using them and to frequently dust just to keep items looking clean. On the cooktop side, dishes on the open shelves will not only collect dust, but any stray grease, etc., will also settle on them. The hood is 6" wider than the cooktop - this is the minimum recommended. In addition, it should be 24" deep and the fan should be at least 600cfms. If you do plan to grill inside, then I recommend going even wider and a getting a more powerful fan (at least 900cfms). If all you do is boil water - then you can make do with a hood the width of the cooktop as long as you have upper cabinets flanking the hood. (If you do only boil water, then I question the need for a 48" cooktop.) The window is 10' wide to give you a lot of natural light and to open up the space. Normally, I would recommend a window to the counter, however, in this case I think it should be raised a few inches above the counter. It appears your kitchen is in the front of the house, so you don't want to make it easy for people to look in and see your dirty dishes or Prep Zones or Cooking Zone. Raising the window and putting in window treatments that can be partially closed when needed will help keep your kitchen condition private. (This is one of the reasons you don't normally put a kitchen in the front of the house.) Finally, I put in a 30" wide x 15" deep utility cabinet for a broom, dustpan, Swifter, etc. Here it is! Layout #1 . Layout #1 Zone Map .

Thank you for your candor, I appreciate it. I had maple in the kitchen when I made the decision and I am disappointed that the floor didn't come up in discussions with the designer. I wanted a wood stain v paint and was wearing horseblinders to that bc it looked fine on the maple. But, they are here and pretty and I'm hoping for the best. The cabinet picture is in the original post and the floors can be any color I want. We are down to the subfloor in the kitchen. We will do rift/quarter sawn to calm them down and I do think they look ok. (Agree with you, though, not ideal.) The pic in the post right above yours is just in a showroom where I brought my cabinet sample. So do you rec we just do a 2 1/4 red oak like the rest of the house (and color as we want). Do you have experience with a medium brown and grey that gets most of the red tone out? I really would like it not to be too dark. But ok with something like jacobean with a grey?

If you don't have seating on the long side of the island, I think it could work. I have a 3'x 5' island in my kitchen, which is ap 13.5' x 13.5'. Aisles are narrower than NKBA recommends, but it works well due to placement of appliances. I do my baking prep (rolling dough, kneading bread) on the short side of the island, facing the DR, as your island is oriented. You would just need to step to the right to wash your hands, and you could use the oven side of the island to line up baking sheets. I think the scale of the drawing is off, relative to the measurements. If you could extend the wall on the right side of the drawing, you would have more space for a wall oven.