If I am understanding your post, the designer wants to put the refrigerator at the front of the house and the eating area away from the windows. I would not do this. The original arrangement seems much more pleasant to me. Can you elaborate on why the changes were made?

Sorry, I should have clarified that the eat-in kitchen is not currently used as such. We have a dining room that is on the other side of the kitchen at the back of the house. The eat in part of the current kitchen isn't really used. This design would incorporate it into the rest of the kitchen. The dilemma is whether the fridge looks ok on that wall between the two windows.

The whole plan is wacky. Its still obviousjy 2 non kitchen rooms, and not at all ”a kitchen”. Not a usable one anyway. Start over. What does the original layout look like? In the context of the original hime? Without the 130K redo?

We're knocking down all but 48" of the wall between the family room and kitchen. The 48" will house the pantry. The remodel will be $75k.

@verbo can you clarify what you think is wacky?

You went the wrong direction. The eating area should be at the front, and the kitchen should extend into the living room. But not by as much as its extending into the dining room.

No way is that is 75K in 2021, unless you’re doing every bit of the work yourself. Or there’s only import and fall apart builder grade materials being used. Which makes no sense to do do.

Thanks, Verbo. There is a screen room adjacent to the living room that made it difficult to move in that direction, especially with our budget. Yes, we are using Ikea cabinets with Kitch fronts. Our budget is pretty fixed, so it's not an option to move the entire footprint, although that's a nice idea and something others in our neighborhood have done. We're actually fairly happy with the design, except that one wall-- any thoughts on that?

I don’t like the refrigerator there at all. I’d want that side of the room for mudroom/drop zone space. And the island is too long and skinny. If the kitchen is 11’ wide, and island with perimeter cabinets on both sides does not fit. You probably need to stick with a peninsula. (Am I correct that the room labeled “living room” will be the dining room?)

This is the entire detailed plan. There are 44 and 38 inches on either side of the island. Does anyone have a suggestion for where the refrigerator could go if not there?

The whole thing violates a ton of Design Rules. Here’s just the major 2. Start over.

Fridge where the pantry cabinets are, peninsula where it was.

If generally you want to do this then clear the windows and get the fridge away from there. i grew up in a split level they are not the most sought after home design. dont make things more difficult and awkward or eyebrow raising. Attach the fridge to the island and turn it to face garage door. you will encase it and build an enclosure for it . no big deal . It will sit next to cab 14 . island may need a skooch over. you want aisle between side of fridge and windows.

​You all are making good points.

We paid $1,100 for this design by a kitchen designer highly reviewed on Houzz. Feeling a little bummed.

Herbflavor, are you suggesting that we free float the fridge in the middle of the kitchen attached the the island? I hear you about the split level.

Did the fee allow for another re-do? But if not, you’ll eat the $1100 but make up the difference by not paying $$$$ for the miles of countertop in that design…

Yes w fridge next to # 14 the kitchen essentially becomes a galley. win win . Window wall is cleared and kitchen becomes efficient .

The design agreement allowed for 2 minor, and 1 major set of changes. It was an odd experience. The designer was not receptive to our concerns and played the "I've been doing this for 15 years, do you know who you're talking to" card when we tried discussing them with her. Given the constraints of our budget, the space, and how very disfunctional the current kitchen is, I'm still thinking some version of this design is what we'll have to do (there are things we like), but it clearly needs some tweaks. The designer was up front about the fact that it violated some of the kitchen rules but said she wasn't concerned given that it's primarily used by one person.

Herb flavor, I do like a gally kitchen-- they are very efficient. Does the top of the fridge get built up to the ceiling?

If you make the sink off-center to the window, it looks as if you can maintain at least 36" between the sink and range. The faucet can be centered on the window to help disguise the asymmetry. Move the fridge to the right of the DW, and keep dishes in drawers across the aisle. Use a 12" trash pull-out. (I have that size and it's fine.)

Can the stub wall be shortened (red circle) and the final 48" of the wall dividing the kitchen and FR be removed? Island can then be moved back for a more comfortable work aisle. Open shelves on the cabinet by the window can then become pantry, and the small cabinet by the door can rotate to become a tall pantry cabinet. If you need more pantry space, use a shallow cabinet between the windows. No seats under the windows.

If you can make those changes, I'd suggest making the island seating area deeper and wider, to put two seats on the bottom side. Omit the narrow cabinet in the middle.

BTW, I'd make the island all the same height. In addition to being long and skinny, having the center area shorter is going to look odd and make prep less convenient. I bake a lot, so my island top is at 34" high (8" below my elbow). Given a choice between 36" and 31.5", I'd choose 36". Or put the lower level on the end opposite the range and move the MW to the middle.

you can have a partition wall built any way you wish. You have space here. You can even install a pantry cab 12 in deep on to the side enclosure for fridge [ facing window walll....and maybe something on backside ] so you can free up the stuff up in the corner near the left window......have you been thorough about storage need evaluation??? I 'd get someone to quote you the wall you think would work... not to ceiling... you'd get a ballpark....work off that and keep on with your planning...then you can come back to exact dimension/inches.

Mama goose: Thank you so much for the thorough recommendations. I was worried about that 31" baking zone in the middle of the island being inconvenient. The only benefit was that because of the dropped height, the island gets a little 5" wall, which means I can keep my mixer on the island without worrying about it falling on someone's foot. Otherwise, I agree that the drop will be annoying to have in the middle. I think I'll skip it altogether.

I really like the idea of moving the fridge to the wall across from the island. I had originally wanted to do it this way, but rather than putting it on the right side by the sliding glass door, I thought we could put it all the way to the left and move the garage door down all the way to the left. That would make it so that we're not having to state at the fridge from our living room. Either way, I think the off center sink/centered faucet trick would work well to achieve that.

I also really like the idea of removing that pantry wall and expanding the sitting area at the island. We have three kids and I'd really like all three to be able to sit at the same time.

Heather, the fridge in the pantry space only works if there is NO island.
It sounds good if you can move the garage door all the way down. But if you have all of your appliances in a row, the order should be fridge, dishwasher, sink, stove. And the fridge should be closest to the living/dining areas, so you don’t have people coming through the kitchen work area to get something.

Because I'm short, I can't live without a lower counter somewhere in the kitchen, not just for baking. In our beach house, the island is 6 x 3.5' and with 18" on one end 32" high. What if you put the fridge where MamaGoose put it and put the lower counter between the two windows sort of like a hutch. We did this (not between windows though) in our previous house.

I love that idea, Cheri, thank you! I am 5'3, so definitely on the shorter side. Having a lower counter for rolling out dough would be great.

Thanks to everyone who commented here we scrapped our original kitchen design and hired an online designer to do a new design that we are happier with. Special thanks to the pro who suggested that we switch the footprint and put the kitchen in the current dining room. The contractor is coming to give us a quote this week. Hoping it is still in budget. Because all of our focus has been on getting the design right (again) we have neglected picking finishes. We are trying to put the order in this week and could use some help with that decision. I don't want to spend all this money and hate the way it looks. The new design has the kitchen in a significantly darker location because the only window is adjacent to a screen room. We want to do like a white oak island and off white cabinets or maybe all off-white but have read that it can look dingy in a dark area. Should we go dark? Or light? And what does everyone think about "wood look" doors like the ones from semi handmade. They are laminate or melamine but are textured to look like wood. Too industrial and/or tacky? Can't decide how I feel about them. They look nice from a distance and I know they will be very durable but they feel very fake under hand. Thanks again.