How a bout no cabinets on the wall with the hood as for moving up the cabinets I need to know how high your ceiling is and IMO angled anything is bad design unless the exterior wall is angled. I see a deep fridge where a counter depth one should go and all lower cabinets should be drawers . This is hard to tell the size of the space but usually in a smaller space a range is a better choice that a cooktop and wall ovens. When you say designer is that an actul kitchen designer, a cabinet salesperson or an interior designer that works from a builders company. There are big differences . BTW the fridge door might not open in that space .

Stacked cabinets with a bigger budget. Or shorter cabinets with a bigger gap. But your not dealing with a kitchen designer. Too many design errors. Way too many errors.

How tall are you?

If you want cabinets to go to a 9’ ceiling, you will need to stack them and you will need the budget for that. You didn’t mention whether you’re willing to spend significantly more to have your cabinets meet the ceiling. For all we know, your designer knows your budget constraints, and she abided by them, and designed your kitchen with 42” upper cabinets, which BTW is a nice look. Unfair to criticize the designer if she was working within the budget you gave her.

If you are willing to spend significanrly more to achieve your goal of cabinets that meet the ceiling, I like 36” + 15” stack with 3“ crown, or 33” + 18” stack with 3” crown. I am not fond of bigger crowns, so one of those combinations would be what I would do.

“I've asked if we can just move the cabinets up higher.”

That doesn’t make sense. How high are you going to raise your upper cabinets to meet the ceiling? 12“? 9”? And how are you then going to reach them? The standard distance between the counter and bottom of the uppers is 18”. You could increase that by a couple inches, but more than that makes the shelves almost unreachable. Your designer suggested 36“ stack instead. I am starting to feel the designer more.

Your hood ideally should be 6“ wider than your cooktop. I’d do that, and then just eliminate the flanking upper cabinets.

A fridge next to a wall is a difficult location. The fridge door won’t open fully unless there is a good deal of filler against the wall, which is a waste of space.

The ceiling is supposed to be 9'. The kitchen is 11'x13'8. She's supposed to be an interior designer from a local bath and kitchen company they subcontracted to do their interiors, but I've had so many problems with colors being changed from original selections and wrong items in places I'm not confident in the work or opinion any longer.

Well, the designer made 2 sensible suggestions: 42” cabinets, or stacked 36” cabinets. Both good choices. You have not mentioned whether you are willing to pay the significant increase that stacked cabinets will be. Your idea to raise the 42“ cabinets so they meet the 9’ ceiling is bad.

Are the stacked cabinets the only option? Can you trim it out and close the gap? I’m open to suggestions. While I’m okay with increasing the budget more, I need to see value in the upgrade. If the cabinets are unusable, then I don’t want them.

Mark I’m 5’10

On your overhead, your refrigerator is not counter depth, but yet your designer butted full overlay cabinets right up to the refrigerator on the lowers and uppers with no filler. That is also a no-no. You'll be banging handles on the upper and not even able to open 90º, and whacking your cabinet on the refrigerator on the bottom.

There are a bunch of other little pokey errors like this in your design. They aren't massive but that is WHY you have a designer to begin with: to catch all the details.

Get someone who knows how to design kitchens to start over from scratch.

for the hood area consider an under cabinet hood which would join up your cabibetry so that cabinet isn’t floating by itself

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in your shoes id want a full depth cabinet above the fridge too

your rendering shows the hood vent oddly low too. it shouldn’t be that low. I don’t recommend raising the cabinets. You could soffit like the image above

You have 54” to work with to get to the ceiling. Here are 48” doors (which lower cost manufacturers won’t make) interspersed with different size stacks. Assuming 6” of molding at the top for all. The 36“+12” is first, and too squat up top. The 30”+18” is next, which gives the best glass proportion. The last is 33”+15”. which is OK if you don’t do glass, but the glass can look a bit squat depending on the cabinet width you end up with.

A 5’4 person and a 5’10 person are shown, and both will need step stools to fully reach the back of any shelf in even a 30” high cabinet. I’m almost 6’, and can reach the front edge of the top shelf in a 30“ cabinet. Anything taller than that requires that step stool.

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The corner cabinets here are 48”, but that’s inset, so the doors are 3” shorter than the box.

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This is 9’, with 30”+18” transom cabinets+6” of crown.

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These are 36”+21”, but the ceilings are taller than 9’ here. Just showing it for proportion.

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Yes, there are several design issues in what they show. Some are architectural issues though. Like the angled peninsula that won’t allow you to stand at the sink with the DW open. I’m assuming that you’re dealing with a tract builder who discourages changes? Otherwise, that’s one of the first things to try to rework.

A bigger space between lower and upper cabinets means you won't be able to reach for as much stuff and you might not be able to see more than the bottom shelf. It depends how tall you are.

To figure this out, go to a kitchen store, reach and look in the cabinets, and find the distance between top and bottom you like.

I have 15" because I can see and reach into all of the bottom 2 shelves.

I wouldn't be happy with that little space around the stove. Those areas tend to be busy for me. Also, I like to have my pots and pans near the stove. It doesn't look like you have much cabinet space right there. There's lids and pots and casseroles and cupcake tins and angel food cake pans and mixing bowls and soup pots and lasagne pans.... And where are the herbs and spices going?

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What was the goal of the diagonal? Is that just empty space behind it?

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How are you venting the stove? There's a bathroom behind it?

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It doesn't look as though the fridge door will open all the way, which means you won't be able to pull out fridge drawers.

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I'd recommend a wider entrance door. This will allow you to enter with a grocery sack in each hand, or a child on a hip, space for a grab bar, etc.

We have 48” uppers and 9’ ceilings. With the crown they reach to the ceiling. I would not have a gap nor those cabinets on either side of the hood - it looks odd.

Consider what raising your cabinets to meet the ceiling will do to your resale potential and maybe even price. I’m 5’ tall and would quickly eliminate your home for a potential new home for me because of the cabinet height. Growing children can’t reach the lowest shelf for even more years. IMO, stacking or learning to live with the gap between the ceiling and top of the cabinets are the only options to consider.

Raising the cabinets will make the top shelf hard to reach without a step stool, which is annoying.

The upper cabinets by the range would look better if they were symmetrica, but it’s ok as is. However, the range hood should be 6” wider than the cooktop to optimize efficiency.

If you don't want space above your cabs and you also don't want stacked cabs, have them install a soffit. You can trim a soffit any way you like or leave it plain. It's by far the least expensive option for filling in that space.

Also, that kitchen design has a number of important deficiencies that you should consider:

• traffic is routed directly through your kitchen and you really don't have space for that
• walk-in pantry is very inefficient use of limited space
• fridge is deep in the kitchen instead of at the edge where it can be accessed for drinks/snacks without disturbing the cook
• stove is on an inside wall

Post up the whole main floor plan and let us see if we can do better for you.

I think I’m pretty much out of luck the dishwasher being in front of the sink. They already laid plumbing. I can’t believe I missed the dishwasher door opening out in front of the sink area. Making adjustments to move the fridge and fill in the area above cabinets with the fascia and crown molding as mentioned above. What a mess.

Did you ask how much it would be to redo the dishwasher plumbing? It might be worth the extra cost to move it now....

Why the awful dog leg angled peninsula with the sink and the DW that will bang into your leg when you're at the sink? Sorry but that's a very poor layout.

Now is the time to fix this kitchen. Yes, it will cost money. But it will be less money than if you try to do it later. Here's a sketch that gives a reasonably workable kitchen. I've used the dimensions that you provided. It doesn't have a bar... but honestly, tables are quite comfortable to sit at so I don't really understand what makes these kitchen bars so popular. It does have straight cabinetry runs which are less expensive than angled ones. And the pantry is a reach-in closet, which is much more usable than a walk-in corner.

But couldn’t you present that to them as a mistake? Where in the world would you be expected to stand to load from sink to dishwasher?

I’m trying. Unfortunately, i signed off on it. Lesson learned. We‘re adding cabinets next to the fridge to give it room to open and pushing the others down. I’m not sure I prefer a small counter area for a coffee pot or the long cabinets more, but it should help with the fridge issue. They added the fascia and crown to the top of the ceiling as well. After I pointed things out, it seems like they’re wanting to fix as much as they can on the plan. Not wanting to budge on the Dishwasher issue so far because of the plumbing already being done though. Maybe I can change the island without altering the plumbing lines? Going to keep pushing.

We just moved from a house that had the DW coming out at an angle next to the sink. It really was not that bad. DH could be washing dishes, and I stood either in front of the door, or toward the isle and loaded. The dog was even in there helping! It worked, but I am glad that we will not have the same set-up with the new house. My biggest grievance was that there was not much counter space to work on over there. Had plenty around the kitchen, but not where I needed it.

Here's a photo of my old kitchen. PS - I never once banged my leg or tripped over the DW door.

Changing that plumbing is less than a day's work for a plumber. If they won't do it, offer to hire someone to do it for them.

Like @nhb22, (but I don't have a photo of it) I used to have a dishwasher by my sink on an angle similar to that and never once had any issues either. I can't tell if the angle is exactly the same but it looks very similar. Angled bars use to be quite popular but I don't see them being built as often around our area anymore but have seen them in a few new builds still.

We are renting a home with an angled sink and dishwasher. I find it pretty awkward and it’s difficult to have more than 1 person helping with cleanup if the dishwasher is down. The extra money to fix the layout would be well worth it, IMHO.