r/kitchenremodel

My wife and I bought a house about four years ago with an open plan first floor but a galley style kitchen. It worked when we bought the house until allergies got worse in our middle age. We now cook almost every meal at home and we are exploring options on a partial kitchen remodel with the following criteria

The primary goal is to offset the sink and the cooktop so two people can work side by side (sautéing and dishes, for example). Our primary problem with the kitchen is the sink and stove are directly across from each other.

Second, I want to convert from our table made of ikea scraps to a dual height kitchen island. The sink and dishwasher section will be at a standard 36". My section will be at 42-45" to help with back issues. We aren't concerned about sitting at the island.

I have attached pictures of our current kitchen, a rough diagram with dimensions, and an idea of how to move the island about and reconfigure to move the sink about three geet. My goal is minimal changes with some extra usability. Does the achieve my goal of two people working side by side? Is there anything obvious I have missed? I have never attempted to design a kitchen before.

Do I need to make a built-in refrigerator?

Keen to get people’s input on kitchen layout. Ideally I would’ve loved a walk-in pantry (there’s a pantry on the other side of the kitchen wall) but I’ve been recommended to skip it due to the size. I’ve also seen a lot of recommendations to keep the island free of everything and just use as counter top, but again the interior designer i spoke to said it wouldn’t work for this kitchen as it’s too small. I don’t like the idea of a stove there as the frying splatter will be a pain to clean and I dont trust the worktop extractor fans, at the same time if that would enable me to do a walk-in pantry I would rather prefer that.

For reference, the kitchen wall length: 3200 cm is 10.5 ft.

I had my granite cut six years ago to put in a farmhouse sink. I have two minor issues that have surface recently and I’m wondering if I can fix them on my own or if I have to call in the granite company. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

We are remodeling a kitchen and having a hard time finalizing our plans. We've more or less narrowed things down to two competing ideas (#1 and #2 above). Generally, we strongly prefer the look of #1, but are worried that it may be annoying to actually use.

Layout #1 (Top):

• PRO: We really, really like how clean the look is and that the only visible appliance is "hidden" below the countertop. (We really hate the look of kitchen appliances)
• PRO: The wider upper cabinets mean that the two cabinets that hide the stove vent will actually have functional room on the sides of the vent, which we could use for storing baking sheets and cutting boards.
• PRO: A little bit more useable countertop space (the countertop on the short-side is 6" longer in this arrangement than in the other).
• PRO: More storage space with the tall pantry cabinet on the side (a bigger pro than it may at first seem, as the rest of our pantry space in the house is relatively far from the kitchen work areas).
• CON: Only one oven. We do have a second kitchen in the basement, but trying to cook between two different floors would obviously be very inconvenient. On the other hand, we only really host larger dinners ~6-7 times a year.
• CON: Microwave is hidden inside the pantry. This feels like by far the biggest problem, as the microwave is such a high-use appliance.

Layout #2 (Bottom):

• PRO: Two ovens in the main kitchen at a more ergonomic height. As mentioned before, we don't host large gatherings all that often. However, it does seem like double wall-ovens are an expectation in the neighborhood (every listing I've seen in the area has them).
• PRO: Don't need to open a cabinet to use the microwave.
• PRO: "Skinnier" cabinets may help the kitchen look taller (by far the biggest downside of the kitchen is that it only has 8' ceilings).
• PRO: Both sets of "useable" upper cabinets would open together, making for lots of interior room in them.
• CON: The middle set of upper cabinets that hide the stove vent become entirely unusable and would be decorative only.
• CON: The wall-ovens would be right next to the passage into the dining room. That opening is only 4' wide, which makes us worried about having the ovens so close to an area that people would be walking past regularly.
• CON: A little less countertop space along the short-wall than in the other layout.

Other Notes:

• Not shown is the kitchen island, which is quite large (14'x4') and will house the sink/dishwasher/etc. The walkways between the cabinet walls and the island are 4' wide.
• Before you warn us: yes, we are aware that we need a special microwave if we're going to put it inside the pantry cabinet to avoid fire hazards. :)

Questions:

• Are we crazy to consider layout #1?
• The biggest problem with layout #1 (the microwave in the pantry), could be addressed by putting a drawer microwave in the island. We hate drawer microwaves, but do you think we'd find one more convenient than an in-pantry microwave?
• We could get more countertop space along the short-side by narrowing the entrance into the dining room. However, that entrance is currently 4' wide, and we're very worried about going any narrower. Would you prioritize countertop space, or a wider entry into the dining room?

NOTE: The "design inspiration" pic is AI-generated (and also not a particularly good representation of the layout).

I'm currently renovating my house from end to end! I've designed my entire floor plan and I feel like I've put together a pretty good layout for my kitchen and new pantry... but I'm struggling with a few aspects. My previous kitchen was bright yellow, with light cabinets, dark countertops, a busy backsplash-- and I actually loved it, except for the dark countertops. I had a bright teal accent wall in the living room. I'm not afraid of bold and color, but I do want it to feel cohesive.

Some notes about my design:

• I'm reusing all my current kitchen cabinets in the pantry and laundry room, hence the random numbering.
• I want an "appliance garage" concept, but it's actually going to be an access door(s) to a 54" wide shelf in the pantry-- this way I don't take away from the kitchen counter space with a typical appliance garage.
• I currently have white appliances, but I'd really like to transition to black stainless.
• I'm going with Icicle kitchen wall color, a very white/light quartz countertop, and a light colored backsplash.
• Unfortunately, my kitchen has no windows. There is an exterior door near the dining room table that I plan to install a French door. But since I had to stay within my existing house footprint, there was just no way to make it open concept while also moving the kitchen to an exterior wall.

Where I'm struggling with my decisions:

• I really want colored cabinets. I'm leaning towards Smart Cabinetry Nautical Blue. I'm not doing a full wall of uppers across the stove side, so I feel like that would offset the "too much blue" worry. I'm also going with the Icicle color for the kitchen walls.
• I want a fun, light/neutral colored kitchen backsplash, but also primarily something that has vertical straight lines-- because I want the appliance garage door to be as hidden as possible and not stand out like a sore thumb in my backsplash.
• I'm leaning towards mostly drawer base cabinets instead of door. The narrow cabinets next to my stove are where I question myself-- spice or cookie sheet?
• I want the range hood to be sort of a statement piece on that wall, since when you walk in the front door that's what you'll see across the living room. Do I take away from that concept by adding some floating shelves?

If you've read this far, thank you! I've been designing and redesigning this floor plan for over a year now, and now that the house has been demoed, I keep going back and forth on these small things. 

Fabricator sent me the layout he said ignore the coloring. He also said this was the only way to get the flows to work.

I am concerned about the area over the stove not being one full piece. The countertop will also be the backsplash. The layout matches the picture of the kitchen. The top left of the layout is to the left of the stove. The first seam is to the right of the stove.

any thoughts ?

any questions I should ask ?

We’re moving into a new place that has an island in the kitchen. The island has a sink in it but the previous owner took out all the plumbing and lines to it for some reason. Since we’re renting, putting lines back in or removing the sink is not an option. I’d like to cover the whole area with a cutting board but I’m not finding something large enough.

It’ll need to be 22” x 37” (max).

Any ideas? (Everything was getting painted so I wasn’t able to get an uncovered photo)

Hello! Hoping to hear some opinions on the direction you would take with this very 90s kitchen. I hated the honey oak cabinets at first - and maybe someday will have them stained darker - but for now we are ready to redo countertops, backsplash, and hardware.

I’m interested in hearing what you think would go best with the honey oak. Even better would be if you have a modern kitchen that you made work with honey oak cabinets so I could see some ideas!

Edit: I now realize these are maple cabinets. I do respect wood! But I know nothing about it 😅

Okay, so I got some feedback about my idea to add 30cm/12" behind the cooktop, and a lot of great comments that gave me some new perspective. Someone pointed out that my original plan (regardless of counter depth) didn't give me a lot of work space at the cooktop or the kitchen sink, and to be fair, it would have been a lot more than I have today.

Someone else also suggested that I should put the sink under the window, which I didn't think would be possible because the foundation walls are 1.5m thick and it's not easy to move the plumbing, but we got really lucky with the setup of the water central in the basement and it shouldn't be too much work.

There is still the problem of putting anything in front of the windows because the sills are gonna sit 10cm/4" lower than the countertops, but we know a surprising amount of people who have done this and it seems okay. For reference, the window sills are roughly 15cm/6" deep. This is an old log house, so moving or resizing the windows is out of the question.

Other than that, I also got some flack about proper ventilation in my previous plan, so I asked around and it seems the general consensus is that duct-out ventilation is a must. My new plan features a ceiling hood, hence the box drawn in over the cooktop as we have nothing extra to work with in neither the floor or ceiling.

The door in the corner is meant to represent a built-in corner fridge.

So, what do we think? Does it look too empty without any uppers? What can I do with the awkward corner behind the door? Should I squeeze in some bar stools between the counter and dining table?

Link to original post

I need help figuring out how to make my kitchen flow. The place we're contracting to do the kitchen turned our original design upsidedown and proposed this. The peninsula would offer seating for up to 5 in a line. The induction plate is on the left wall, with the extractor hood above it on the wall. The sink on the peninsula is nice, but I worry about all the large hand washed items that will pile up next to the sink. Switching the stovetop and the sink sounds nice in theory, but if the sink is up against the wall, where can I put the dishwasher without trapping myself into the corner. Putting the stovetop on the peninsula also sounds nice in theory, but getting a ceiling extractor will cost way more than just a wall mounted one and I'm worried about the people sitting on the other side of the peninsula that could be splashed by whatever I'm cooking.
I've tried so many different ways of configuring this kitchen and my brain is blocked.. How can I optimise the design of this kitchen?