Thanks for all the good feedback! I think you're all correct about the corner kitchen not being a good idea, for all the reasons you've stated. I hadn't thought about the dishwasher issue, but you're right. Space there with the door open would be very tight or non-existent. I just finished changing my SketchUp model to put the fridge over on the bottom wall, and it looks much better that way. Here's a screen shot of the new drawing. The big diagonal line near the lower right is a beam that will be holding up the roof. That's pretty close to a design I could live with, I think. (At least in the broad outlines -- I was sloppy with dimensions and took various other shortcuts, so don't laugh. :-) It has well-separated prep and cleanup areas, and the oven is close to the end of the island so that could be a nice baking area. The big, tall oven on the wall by the dining area is still slightly annoying, both because it looks odd from the dining area (though hollysprings's hutch idea might allleviate that) and because it makes the kitchen area feel a bit boxed in with big appliances on each end. I left some room in the drawing for a hutch or shelves or some such. I haven't thought of a good way to get both big appliances on the other wall. I could eliminate the problem by going with a range instead of a wall oven, but I really don't like ranges because you have to bend over to get at the oven. I much prefer having the oven up at a good working height. If anyone has ideas on what, if anything, to do here, let me know. @maries120: Having a counter next to the fridge is definitely a good idea. I'd been thinking of using the island behind the fridge as its "landing zone", but that's awkward. In my latest drawing with the fridge at the left end of that 'bottom' wall, there's about 30 inches of counter to the left of the fridge. (That's with a 36" cooktop centered on that counter.) @buehl: I think you're right about my architect not being so good at kitchen design, especially from a functional point of view. I'm not sure he actually cooks. :-) And it's definitely after a "work of art" with all the funny angles and corner windows. Fortunately our tastes coincide on that part. Even if I can't get rid of the whole wall of tall, moving the fridge away from that wall (and keeping the oven) lets me slide the window a couple of feet to the left. That should make it feel like a more central part of that wall and light up the kitchen better, rather than having it half hidden in the corner. And the window could conceivably be expanded by a foot or so in either / both directions. If it got any larger than that wall wouldn't quality as a shear wall, which is important since I'm ~30 miles from the San Andreas fault. The segment that looks like a window on the bottom wall of the plan...

deev78- the default sides are standard with that lip/ ridge down the side. if you do flush finished ends, it will look flat like a dresser or you can do a decorative door panel on the sides that show. flush finished and deco ends are more money. not sure how much more though. my lancaster cabs were just installed but they are a dark maple so i can't comment on the painted cabs. also i noticed you have no light rail molding listed. i did not get that for mine and you can see the unfinished bottom of the wall cabs when sitting at our kitchen table. it is only noticeable when sitting down but thought you might want to know.

If you are looking for pivot close, unless you are taller than me (5'6") 42in is not pivot-worthy. My current (needs to be remodeled) kitchen has 42in aisles in a "L" shaped kitchen. it's 39in countertop to countertop. it feels tight when people are helping... it's barely passable when the dishwasher is open... but it does work. But I cannot "pivot" back and forth between counters. It's more like pivot-step. if you are SERIOUS about having a traffic-free prep area and want to pivot back and forth, I think 39" between would probably be good (so 36-37in between counters). But think long and hard to see if you really want that. Mock it up. Live with the mocked up size a bit. Some people end up loving it. Others feel cramped. (I think for my remodel, I'm probably going to have to live with the 42in aisle for clean up side, I might shrink an inch or 2 for my prep side, but my prep side is the short side, so it's not quite the same situation as a long wall being "tight.")

Thanks everyone - sharing your experiences is most helpful for me. When you suggest shopping around, are you referring to stoneyards or fabricators? Things could get quite busy if I'm going to try different stoneyards and fabricators. We had originally been interested in the 5cm slabs as we were going to use it on our island. We really like to look of a thick heavy island top. We revised our original plan to use marble on the island and we've decided upon a 2" thick top made of mahogany. We were thinking the marble on the perimeter should be a similar thickness. After doing some research, it seems that many people use countertops with varying thicknesses in the kitchen. From the limited number of images I've seen, this looks nice. Does anyone have any thoughts about pairing a 2" thick wood island with 1.25" thick perimeter counters? Is this ok? Assuming this isn't an issue, we are going to consider more 3cm slabs - which are not only less expensive, but are far more available. Like many of you, I was really struck by the Calacatta Manahattan. However, I'm not sure we're ready to spend over $11k on the perimeter counters. At the same time, the Calacatta Reggine was the warmest and seemed to compliment our cabinets the best. Also, this stone has a slight translucency which really adds to the beauty - you can slightly see it in the pictures, but it is much more prevalent in person. At this point, I think we're leaning towards the Calacatta Reggine - but I'd love to hear more thoughts! It is pretty humorous that many folks go with Calacatta "gold" and we're considering a stone that translates to Calacatta "rust"! You would think rust would be much cheaper than gold... =) Roseofblue - our cabinets will be BM Ivory. The island will be topped with 2" thick mahogany and we were planning on marble for the perimeter. In a seperate adjoining pantry area, we intend to use soapstone - but we haven't gotten to that section yet. Thanks for the inquiry.