My compromises:

We were essentially limited to one choice of oven because of the cabinet configuration (concrete floor condominium building - couldn't relocate appliances). The oven is okay, but I understood it had a telescoping rack, which it does not, and they are not available, anywhere, for this particular oven. I really wanted that feature.

Most of my compromises were with my husband, not because of the kitchen layout!

I don't think I'm going to be able to fit a kegorator in my kitchen, although I haven't ruled out trashing the base microwave cabinet and going with a GE Spacesaver. Which I might do, anyway.

Other than that? No compromises, other than holding out for what I want. :)

ROFL, a keggerater (how is that spelled anyways?)

Er, were you serious CE?

I had to compromise on my food pantry size due to pure aesthetics in a tiny house. Also had to downgrade the vent hood power because the roof slope didn't leave us enough room for a round pipe-thingee. And I had to give up inline LED lights as learning about them stressed my DH way too much. Not too bothered by any of that but I do kinda wish the pantry didn't have to shrink as much as it did.

Moving the kitchen from a small (10x10) room with laundry in it to a slightly bigger (11x15) room with no laundry, I thought I wouldn't have to make any compromises! Boy was I wrong.

1) No corner super susan b/c sink run is too tight, so have two blind lower corners in the kitchen.

2) No EZ reach uppers, which I thought were on my must-have list. That's compromising the function of the EZ reach to have the form of bigger glass front cabs flanking the sink (and a little more breathing room around the sink).

3) Fairly small pantry (but more pantry space in old kitchen).

4) No prep sink.

5) No island, peninsula instead. This isn't a huge compromise for me but an island would have been nice.

6) Initial electric quote had my eyes popping, so got rid of over-cabinet and can lighting (but should still have adequate task and ambient lighting) so form followed budget there.

7) Two years ago an appliance sales guy convinced my husband the no-back slide in ranges were impractical and overpriced, and he is now 1000% firmly convinced on that fact, so we're stuck forever with this kind which is really messing up my backsplash plans. If I could go back in time and strangle that sales guy, or at least keep him from getting to work that day, I would.

8) Gave up a bar sink and drawer stack so husband could have a bar fridge. Everyone in his family is fridge crazy.

I'll have to get back to you in a few months on living with the compromises....

This post was edited by robotropolis on Thu, Jan 30, 14 at 8:27

Off the top of my head:

Ideally, we would have been able to bump out the side wall by two feet...but instead, we will have a "cozy" kitchen...otherwise known as "tight aisles" because I felt that an island was pretty important to the overall function of the kitchen.

We are having an island that is narrower that what we would have preferred...again, those pesky aisles!

We wound up with an 18" LeMans unit instead of a 21" (anyone need a 21" unit? I've got one!) due to space constraints.

Our sink will be slightly off-center of the window...due to NOT going down to the 15" LeMans unit.

We are still in the remodeling process and have made a couple compromises so far. Most of those compromises are between my husband and I...the first one was a layout issue and it's really not a big deal.

1. We wanted and did completely tear down the walls between the living room/dining room and kitchen. We ended up rebuilding about 20" of that wall to accommodate our range hood. It was the best spot for the range and I didn't want the back of the hood just hanging out in space.

2. I wanted 14" deep uppers, hubby wanted 13"...he is much taller than me so he won.

3. I wanted to continue the hardwood floors throughout the rest of the house into the kitchen. Husband is so dead set against hardwood in the kitchen he was ready to forget the whole remodel if I wouldn't compromise on that point. We compromised!

4. We are getting Corian countertops and my husband really, really wanted the 4" backsplash with just painted drywall above. I want a stacked stone/slate look taken down to the counter. We are doing a 2" Corian backsplash and then the stacked slate up to the cabinets.

All of these compromises are minor and it's keeping both of us happy so they are well worth it.

I should add we also had to compromise on the budget a little bit. Our electrical work is costing us almost twice what we originally thought it would. It's one of those things that has to be done so we might as well be ok with it.

Being from Wisconsin, I think a kegerater is a perfectly reasonable kitchen appliance. You can barely throw a stone here without hitting a homebrewer and if there's one thing a Wisconsinite can get downright snobby about, its beer. CE, if you can fit a kegerater, props to you!

My kitchen got a facelift so no changes in layout. Since I have a G-shaped kitchen, I may win the prize of having FIVE blind cabinets, although two open into one another so they're not totally blind.

I wanted a handle on my new DW but I have an adjacent drawer at 90 degrees so I still have to hang my dishtowel on my stove handle.

I planned and plotted my kitchen remodel for about 15 years. After all that time - and a LOT of scrapped plans - I think I came up with the best possible solution - no compromises. After 5 months, there are only tiny things we would have done differently - and these weren't compromises, they are simply things we didn't think of in time.

OH my. Many compromises.

Robo, I've got the same kind of stove. Silly me, I shopped HHGregg, HD, & Lowe's; I kept saying I want the controls in front. Had I gone to just 1 high end appliance shop, I would have gotten a slide-in, something like an Electrolux.

Electrician here now, doing final touches. When he and KD first getting together I asked that outlets be placed horizontal. KD said wouldn't be worth all the extra cost. Looking back, they only re-used 2 outlets, so what is the big deal? Undercab lights just installed but without a dimmer. I had mentioned this, but it did not get written into plans. I also noticed that only one outlet, with 2 prongs, where I keep coffee pot, Nespresso, toaster oven. Had I brought it up sooner, they could have made that one with 4 prongs.

I have my first ever OTR microwave. I've been using a small MV that sits on counter. Way back, the KD said it would cost 2,000 to put in a vent to outside, plus cost of hood. He felt there was no place for the MV drawer. Fortunately, Samsung was just coming out with a MV with controls on the bottom, all the better for us vertically challenged people. My s/o, at 6'2", doesn't see why I was upset.

S, electrician just left, without saying goodbey to me. He forgot to fix outlet on the penisula.

I chose a slide range for my kitchen, but decided on the Frigidaire Professional because I liked the look of the solid black without the silver trim like on the Electrolux. My husband wasn't too keen on the idea ay first, he was worried that having the controls in the front would be a bad idea for young kids in a family neighborhood. But our range has a lockout feature, so that solved that problem. Plus, the range is ADA compliant. I did have to givenup the double wall ovens, but I was ok with that.

A double oven range instead of wall ovens, inspired by cost and logistics.

I regret it every time I get something out of the bottom oven BUT right now I'm 9m pregnant so it'll get a lot easier soon!

I ended up with only two toe-kick drawers. Wish I had more! I could add them at a later date but I don't' think any of the other cabinets are ideal for them.

Most of my compromises were budget related, which I think we all face, where a different appliance or material is selected because of the budget.

One major budget item: I did forgo enlarging an opening between the EIK and FR, because to do so would have added $7K to the budget (would have required us to re-reroute the entire HVAC system and add a new footing in the foundation). I do not miss the openness and in some respects, the original character of the home is better preserved.

I think my layout does not conform to the ideal standard because of the desire to keep the original sink placement and architecture. It's a corner sink, so there is a small jog around the island to get the range and pretty long distance to the fridge. It's not a barrier island, but a small detour around the island of a half a step. It's been a non issue. I have a prep sink on the island and everything gets unloaded and worked there.

I don't have a second oven because there is no room in the layout. I have not missed it -- I was able to fit an 19 lb turkey and half a ham on T-day in the 36" range, side by side, with no issues. I also have a WD to put the other stuff in.

I originally was going to put an ogee or dupont edge on my counters. However, the island was laid out too large, meaning my aisleways shrunk. I had to go to a mitered flat edge, because it has the smallest overhang for a 2 cm laminated countertop. It gains me back an inch to inch and a half in the aisleway. This is function over form, ever so slightly.

I did forgo enlarging an opening between the EIK and FR, because to do so would have added $7K to the budget (would have required us to re-reroute the entire HVAC system and add a new footing in the foundation).

I totally forgot about this one - and it relates to the bathroom, not the kitchen. We had wanted to enlarge the bathroom and relocate the toilet, but we have concrete floors in a condominium, and the stack was located such that doing so was not possible. We just lived with it (the price of urban industrial loft living) - it gave us room for a new linen closet instead.

I compromised on my hood. I really wanted there to be functioning doors on the hood so that I could use any and every inch of space that was not being taken up by the exhaust/fan unit. Shiloh would not do this for me despite several requests. They did accommodate my request to have three panels instead of two, which was a modification on the particular hood I chose. After several attempts at reconfiguring the hood to get everything I wanted, I gave up and really didn't care what the darn thing looked like!

This was definitely not the only compromise I made as I felt that I was constantly making compromises the whole way through. But this is the only one I can think of off hand.