sueb20: I love the names of paint, that sounds beautiful and, interestingly enough, it was the kind of color that I wanted to find for the siding of our home; we finally went vinyl to my husband's delight. I found the color on BM's virtual fan and I'll be pulling that color when I go to the store next week. It's overwhelming when I go there and to think that I'm going to need to find the right colors for five other rooms; OMG! Thank you for your suggestion.

thank you...Annette, why no for the dishwasher between the sink and the range? Kate, I have a bunch of inspiration pictures. Our house is a split level and was built in 1990, but it almost felt 70's to me when we moved in (3 years ago). We removed both walls dividing the kitchen from the rest of the space on the main floor. It is now one open squarish room. It has an 11-foot ceiling at its peak, with a beam running down the middle of the peak. White walls, white ceiling, dark grey-brown wood floors. This is our main common space room. I would say our vision is clean lines, warm Scandinavian, beach/industrial. Right now our room feels very cold to me. I would like to bring in some warmth (literally and figuratively). We live in a beach town, but not in a beach house. But the beach is part of my inspiration, I was hoping for a driftwood look to the cabinets, but I think the lighter grey is looking a bit washed out. As much as I love the darker grey, I am still thinking it might be too big of a contrast to the rest of the room. Right now, the cabinets are all that brown color, and the room definitely looks rather heavy in the kitchen corner. Then again, the dark grey could make a nice statement.

I'm attaching pictures of the kitchen plan. I apologize for the quality. I cannot figure out how to convert this file so that can upload the pictures. I tried to enlarge them as the printout was so small and as a result the measurements are blurry. The north wall is 25'. The first 10' are the dining room and the last 15' the kitchen. I was planning on going with cabinetry all the way down the wall. As I mentioned above, when I had separated the dining cabinet from the kitchen, it just felt like a waste of space and made the spaces on either side of the cabinet look awkward. The first drawing, with the stove between two windows is what I was initially going with. After comments above, I'm rethinking this plan. I thought that I would not mind the lack of space between the sink and the stove, as I will have 3 other large areas of counter space (all over 4 ft), plus an island. I emailed the planner, and I asked her about placing the fridge where the dishwasher was, the dishwasher where the stove was and the stove where the fridge was. She felt that the fridge would look too bulky next to the dining room cabinets and supplied the other option of putting the stove next to the dining room cabinets. I'm not really fond of this idea, as there would still only be about 15 inches to the left of the stove. Actually I think this makes the counter space more broken up and choppy than my original plan. The other thing I don't like about this plan is that it has shortened my dining room cabinets by about 15 inches. I will have a 9ft island and the side of the island was to line up with start of the dining room in option 1. I would like to hear thoughts on placing the fridge closer to the dining room and the stove on the wall where the fridge is.

We need more information from you. We have a "Layout Help" FAQ that will be helpful. I'll summarize the main points here and link to the FAQ for further reading. We also have a set of Kitchen Design Best Practices/Guidelines that will help you understand the comments/questions you will be getting. We need a fully-measured layout of the spaces under consideration (in your case, Kitchen & Dining Room) and a sketch of the entire floor the Kitchen is on. Layout...While you did include the KD's 2D view, what's missing is the information telling us where the doors lead. Sketch...The sketch of the entire floor lets us see how the Kitchen relates to the rest of the home. It doesn't have to be to-scale, but it should accurately show how the rooms all relate to each other and should include all interior & exterior doors (or how to get to them if they're on a separate floor). In addition, it will help us see how traffic flows in, around, and through the Kitchen. Include the front entry and family entry, if different. The family entry is usually a garage or side entry, but it might not be. It's helpful to know which door you use to bring in groceries. Other questions... Tell us about you and your family and how you plan to use your Kitchen. All-adults? Empty Nesters? Children (now or in the future)? What appliances (& their sizes) do you plan to have? Where are you flexible? Can walls/windows/doors/doorways change (move, change size, add, delete)? The above and more are discussed in the Layout Help FAQ. Layout Help FAQ: https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5500789/faq-how-do-i-ask-for-layout-help-what-information-should-i-include Ice.Water.Stone.Fire, a humorous discussion of Kitchen design: https://www.houzz.com/discussions/2699918/looking-for-layout-help-memorize-this-first Also see... Work Zones, What Are They?: https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5500762/faq-kitchen-work-zones-what-are-they Aisles Widths, Seating Overhangs, etc.: https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5500771/faq-aisle-widths-walkways-seating-overhangs-work-landing-space-etc Storage Planning: https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5500787/faq-how-do-i-plan-for-storage