threebees - Your set up looks a lot like what I imagined for mine. Thank you so much for posting the pictures - they really help - how deep is your base cabinet? Is your refrigerator a normal 30-33" depth? It looks more like 24". Mine is deep so I'm making the base 30" and the uppers 18" deep. Each door will be 18" wide (yours are only 12) but maybe it will be all proportional?? beaglesdoitbetter - thank you for asking your cabinet maker. I want my beverage/micro area to look a little like threebees and sit right on the counter. Difference is my cabinet would be 18" high, 36" wide and 18" deep. If I can make it work I'd like to do the pocket doors that glide back into the cabinet. I know that they'll still stick out a few inches but I think that may be better for my situation. The left side will be next to the refrig and not in anyone's way but the right side is next to a passageway and people may bump into the open door. BTW - I lived in Pennsylvania many years ago and much of my family is in Florida; now I guess I'm a Jersey girl.. but NO WAY a Jersey shore girl like Snookie - clarygrace - I love your lift up door and the glass on the front of it. Would I still be able to open the cabinet above? I wanted to put the coffee cups and dishes above and it looks like the flip-up door may stop the upper cabinets from opening.

I agree with some of the others about "hiding" but also add that there are some issues about the doors. If you have a pair of side opening doors, then one hits the wall and the other hits you? the wall? and how do you reach around the open door to get anything. If is a lift door(non-tambour), It can prevent using the upper cabinet while open. And it shares another problem with a pair of doors. The counter in front of the doors for some distance (one foot to 18 inches), must be perfectly clear every time you want to open the appliance garage. I like the slightly mad staging in the photo (I have an island for prep and the cookbook is beside the range - because why?). And I like the bravery of using a strong color.

Standard tambour appliance garages are 18" high, as that's the standard space between upper cabinets and base cabinets. Countertop MWs are pretty deep (around 18" or deeper) unless you're talking a teensy one like you'd find in a dorm room, and those are at least 15" deep. There's only so much that can be done with stock cabinetry, and if the cabinet line doesn't even have slide out shelves, it's unlikely that they carry tambour appliance garages or extra depth cabinets. You can find the hardware for the pocket door cabinet, but you'd need a very good and experienced cabinet installer to be able to create what you want when so little pieces are available from your cabinet line. Really, you seem to want so much more than your cabinet line can offer that you might benefit from just accepting the stock builder's grade cabinetry and laminate counters (get a credit for the granite) and then ordering new cabinets from a line that offers exactly what you want from the beginning. Retrofitting cabinetry to the degree you're talking costs a LOT more than getting it the way you want from the beginning.

CORRECTION: I'm sorry to confuse anyone by posting my not-most-current layout in pictures 1 and 2 (still has my old idea of my gorgeous copper hood). --> I have 5 windows and my sink is centered on the middle window. In the 3rd picture (of me at the sink), you can barely see the left sconce between my most left window and the 2nd window. I think I didn't have the current layouts saved in Shutterfly to grab/post here. -- In case anyone wants to the right side of my layout: scroll to 2nd picture. Amanda's not finished pix of hood wall Had to go w/ 42" Kobe hood instead of my gorgeous copper (blowers, etc just didn't work/fit). Amanda