Exciting! I love your tile. However, I too wonder about the pennisula. While iyou have a place to sit and talk to the cook, the peninsula may impede good flow for a party. Anyway, the kitchen layout seems functional. I'l be following your progress in the new year.

LL - I love your drawings ... they are super cute!!!

I'm thinking for circulation that I am going to widen the door into the kitchen to four feet wide. I'm hearing your concerns about circulation and totally get it. I may just be trying to justify my peninsula here, but I do think this house will never be that super-modern open plan that I totally want (but it has lots of other great points!) -- what I mean is, everywhere else people have to go through doorways to get to every room (living room arch being the largest "doorway") so it's not incongruous to have a "doorway" to the kitchen.

Thanks! I'm having too much fun with my paint program! LOL

The doorway to the kitchen makes sense! It will look great with your style of home...and if you have a really big party, you can dine in the family room :)

Would a new window in your utility room across from the DR door bring more light to your DR? If W/D can be moved somewhere else in the utility and the walls on the sides can be removed a big window can be helpful.

I think a lot of light will come into DR from new kitchen, which has two skylights and will soon have a patio door letting light in to dining room. There's also a glass door at the bottom of the stairs right next to dining room, and big bright windows in the living. So I'm really not so worried about it. I think I'll paint it a darker color and go for "cozy." But I like the mirrors idea.

Going for cozy sounds perfect. I'm a windows person too, but allowing a space here or there to inward for a change can do wonderful things for the moods of all. IMO a dining room is a perfect candidate since that encourages focus on those around the table.

I love your choices, especially that "starburst" of tile going behind the stove, and am really looking forward to seeing it.What have you chosen for your background tile?

Hi rosie! I haven't made a choice yet.

The starburst is glossy tile.

I have these cheap 4x12 plain white tiles I used in my shower surround (unfortunately the only pic I have is of when my cat figured out how to open the shower door).

{{gwi:1696103}}

HOWEVER, they're matte. So I don't think they'll go.
Honestly I was thinking of going with a 4x4 or 8x8 gloss white ceram in an offset pattern.

Also I need to decide if I want pencil liner...around the stove? 2/3 of the way up the backsplash?

I think it's great and you will love it. Personally, I like U-shaped kitchen whout an island, but that's a minority opinion here!

For tile, are there any large-format glossy whites? Thinking of something almost monolithic that totally recedes into the background relative to the fabulous Moroccan tiles. Can't wait to see those installed.

I didn't see much lighting discussion after your initial post. I wasn't clear on the location of the chandelier, but it seems to me 4 pendants is already a lot of things hanging down. If you simplified the lighting over the sink (cans?) it would de-emphasize the asymmetry of the sink/window/skylight locations and let the other fixtures predominate.

I hope you're having fun-- I think it will be beautiful.

It's funny, my parents just moved into a kitchen with almost the same U dimensions. I liked working in it a lot - there was room for a crowd to pop in and out but the cook still had his corner between sink and stove to himself. Maybe I just like it better than my current "fridge in the hallway and post in center of room" situation.

I'm nervous about the pendants. My architect specced cans at first but I was reading lots of negatives about cans in exterior sloped ceilings. The chandy is actually the one you can see in the DR photo above -- very plain. I'm going to hang it almost semi-flush so it should be unobtrusive, in fact b/c the ceiling is peaked you won't see it from outside the kitchen.

So THEN I was going to go with sconces beside the sink, but actually there's no room for sconces unless I mount them on the cabs which is kind of the advanced class as far as I'm concerned. So now I ended up with pendants. Very plain pendants. That I may also hang up high. Or...not sure. I do now have two RH sconces sitting in the basement . Got a little too itchy with the trigger finger on ebay! Guess that means I'll just HAVE to remodel the other bathroom now.

5-foot or 6-foot wide patio sliding door? 6-foot will be a squeeze, like if I do a narrow trim it will come right up against the pantry on one side and a little cabinet on the other. 5-foot would give a little drywall strip of breathing space on either side.

Is the functionality of 6 feet way better?

Either way it's north facing so it won't let in a ton of sunlight.

Excited! Ordering the last bits before contractor starts end of January!

This post was edited by robotropolis on Mon, Dec 30, 13 at 11:17

So my contractor came over last week and was like "I'm starting next Monday or I'm starting in April" so we're starting next Monday! Super excited/terrified I'll forget everything.

Had 2nd last meeting with cabinet company on Weds and it was a little difficult and disappointing. It's hard to know if I'm the stubborn illogical person that will end up with a non-functional kitchen or a determined person who will the kitchen that best fits our needs. The die is cast either way.

Some decisions:

Glass fronts (two small cabs): 'fluted' - looks like this wide reed
{{gwi:1696105}}

Lowers: black, uppers white

Floors: natural maple select hdwd.

Faucet: delta trinsic

Pulls: contemporary, plain
{{gwi:1696106}}

Counter: birch butcherblock (IKEA), but we also got a smokin deal on an offcut of Caesarstone to go on either side of the sink - Alpine Mist. it's a light green-grey, which is awesome since my entire first floor was already being painted light green-grey.

Quartz is causing its own problems since the two surfaces aren't the same height (30 mm vs 1.5")...but c'est la vie.

The cabinet lady tried to tell me that outlets inside upper cabinets 'weren't to code' -- I think she thought I was trying to put my code accessible countertop outlets in the uppers?

Anyways, I was like "what about people with OTR microwaves?" and she was like "that's different" and I was like "could we pretend I have an OTR microwave in my vent cabinet so I can get an outlet up there?" but it was at the end of a very long meeting so that idea didn't get much traction. So at the end of the day I have to rethink my under cabinet lighting.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Thu, Jan 16, 14 at 12:58

I have an outlet, in addition to a transformer, for my UCL in an upper cabinets. I also have a set of outlets in a cabinet for charging. My electrician installed it; the city electrical inspector approved it. I think your cabinet lady is not an electrical expert.

I know! Ha! She was generally pretty good but that sounded ridiculous to me.

I think regardless, this cab company isn't exactly into accommodating electrical. So I'm going to talk to my contractor and his electrician for workarounds. I think I can get the vent cab with an open back for a junction box (that's how it was in my last condo kitchen) and do direct wire to the other side of the kitchen for the rest of the UCL.

Forgot to add, although I wanted to do 8" square plain tiles to match my fauxroccan behind-stove, husband strictly forbade square tiles, so we're going with 4x8" rectangular tiles instead:

Like this but glossy.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Thu, Jan 16, 14 at 12:57

How exciting!!! I just saw this and wanted to say...I'm so happy for you! I can't wait to see your kitchen progress :)

Thanks LL! Hard to believe my dining room wall will be gone on Monday!

I also have 30" in my prep corner and would recommend exploring whether you could push your stove down a little. I know it will change the perfect symmetry of your uppers and shorten your landing space for the fridge and stove. I think 15" is the minimum for landing space, and you'll still want balance on that wall. Can you steal a few inches from the pantry cabinet?

Either way, I'd switch your blind half-moon to the peninsula corner, giving you drawers to the left of the stove. I think the design always looks more upscale with cabinets on both sides of the stove, especially since you want to feature the Moroccan tiles. It won't look so good stuffed into a corner when you have acres of wall space to the right of the stove. Small appliances don't need to reside in primo cooking space, but I think you'll want your wraps and Tupperware by the stove for preparing leftovers, so you'll have an extra drawer stack for them, along with gadgets, pot holders, etc.

I don't see the need for a 9" tray cabinet (an expensive filler cab forced by the half-moon pull-out) since you're using the over-fridge cab for trays. With the half-moon near the peninsula, maybe you'll come up with a different idea.

The pantry--I see you have three drawers and the upper will just be a deep cabinet? I had a deep cabinet for a pantry in my old kitchen and did I hate it! Have you considered a pull-out pantry for the lower and a small cabinet for the upper? An 8-pack of paper towels fits very nicely in a deep overhead cabinet.

Good score on the Caesarstone! I have a similar pattern in a creamy color and I love it!

Mayflowers, thanks so much for your thoughts! What do you think of this plan but with 27" to right of stove and 21" cab to left? I could do 24" and 24" too, but that would shave 3" off the nkba recommendation for shared landing space, plus shave down my pots and pans drawers.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Sat, Jan 18, 14 at 10:59

I think 24" would be enough landing space to the right of the stove for cooking since you have plenty of room to the left. I always land in my prep area, but the DR is on that side. Is 24" enough for bags of groceries? Are you doing a French door fridge? If so, you won't put groceries there since the door is in the way. It's easier to load a FD from the front, so you might walk things over from the peninsula--for your pantry too. The other question is whether 24" drawers are wide enough for your pots and pans, but you'd have four deep drawers in two 24" drawer bases.

Otherwise, could you steal 6" from the pantry? I have a 12" pull-out and it's plenty for two people. There's so much more storage in the cabs that go to the ceiling. You'll be surprised if you haven't had them before. I have one 28" cabinet for baking and oils (top shelves are empty), one 18" deep drawer for bread and snacks, a spice drawer, and the pantry for cereal, pasta, and canned goods. You have a few cabinets more than me.

Are you doing the Morrocan tiles on the sink wall as you show in your mood board? I think I might do the window wall with the tiles instead of the stove. I think the window could be a more natural focal point for your layout, even though it's not seen from the dining room. You already plan on glass cabs, so I'd keep the focus in one area. Would like to see some renderings of the window with the tile to the ceiling.

With the stove sharing the refrigerator wall and in a corner, it's not a spectacular focal point. I usually like murals and fancy tile when the stove has its own wall and/or the stove and hood are worthy of calling attention to. I'm not sure it's effective with a 30" stove, but I don't see what you have planned for your stove--maybe it is spectacular! I particularly think it's wasted on a glass cooktop. I see you switched to a chimney hood, which is a better hood for featuring tile. I thought I'd bring this up now in case you do rethink who gets the tiles because you wouldn't have to use a chimney hood and would need over-the hood cabs. It is a nice way to break up a wall of cabinets though. In our remodel, we replaced a 3 year old hood with a chimney just for that reason.

Dreary dining??? I thought we fixed that :)

Not sure if you've thought about this yet, but here's more of my 2 cents:
1. consider doing a dead corner where your baking susan is.
So instead of the blind corner, use the 12" + 18" trays = 30 for a 3-drawer.
(what is that 3" next to the fridge"? can you use that next to this new 3-drawer base cab as filler so you can open the drawer)

Then on the other side, instead of the 12" trash (since you already have 18" trash under the sink), take that 12" + 12" from the baking susan = 24. But really 21" since you need space/filler to open it up.

I have 2 corners.
I am so glad that I dead-corner one of them so that I can put in a 3-drawer that is used daily/frequently.
The other corner, I did a blind corner and I RARELY use it. In fact, it's pretty empty because I do not like opening it.

Good luck!
Very exciting!
Amanda

This is what I mean by dead-corner:

My layout: I dead-corner the left one under the label "KA mixer":

Huango is suggesting what I suggested--switch the two corners so that you can have the full drawer stack near the stove. I have a blind corner between my stove and refrigerator walls so that I could have two full drawer bases at right angles. Someone here did the math once and found there is more usable storage in two drawer stacks with a blind corner vs. a lazy Susan and other types of corner pull-outs.

Hmm, how about something like this? This would solve a lot of problems in terms of aftermarket add ons (wouldn't need any) and countertop heights so I wouldn't mind bringing it to the table with cab designer when he gets here on Tuesday.

Husband is adamantly opposed to pull out pantry so this is as small as the pantry gets, I think. I now have it specced as (top to bottom) door matching height of over-fridge cab, open shallower shelves for cookbooks, then door concealing bank of roll out trays.

Trash under sink is ok but we have four different kinds of trash up here in NS so it's always a struggle finding places for it all.

My mom has a 'dead corner' with no lazy susan, but it can be reached through the lower cabinet next to it. She keeps her punch bowl and other items there, which she doesn't use very much. It's a nice compromise, since they would have to take up closet or pantry space otherwise...and she uses them about 4 times a year, so wants them handy for parties.

Wall is down, beam is up, and the cabinet company marked all the stuff. Pretty excited right now!

According to my contractor, the last homeowners neglected to put a header over their 64" french doors...the ones they punched into a two story load bearing wall...so, yeah.

Progress! It's nice to know once hidden problems are now being fixed. Good luck on the rest of the Reno. I look forward to seeing the evolution.

What did you decide for a layout?

thanks iheart!

may_flowers, thanks for asking! basically the one I posted above. I really liked the idea of having drawer stacks on both sides of the stove. Unfortunately could not sell DH on the pull out pantry much as I would have loved to shrink the pantry and add prep space. And -- he's the cook, so I really wanted to take his wishes into account, especially since I MAJORLY overruled him on the OTR microwave. That man loves OTR micros. His other dearest wish was the bar fridge. Something he always had growing up and wanted to have, so I gave him that one.

My contractor asked for detailed elevations before the cab company was able to provide them so I did these up (cab company is providing tomorrow, architect drawings were good for electrical/plumbing/code but not 100% specific on cabinetry sizes so gfi and stuff isn't marked on here).

This post was edited by robotropolis on Wed, Jan 22, 14 at 13:46

Nice! Don't you just love the drawings? I was amazed by how close they looked to my actual kitchen. Should be a beautiful kitchen!

I had a book shelf in my pantry just like yours in one of my renditions. Are they going to put a back on that opening so the books don't slide into the cavern?

Thanks! Yes a shallower panel is planned, although I'm pondering because I definitely have enough cookbooks that I could stack the uglier ones in behind and leave the prettier ones in front...a problem I tend to have with books as well...

I forgot to mention I also sacrificed the EZ reach to get bigger glass cabs and a little more space around the window. A triumph of form over function. Also their EZ reach cabs were a very strange shape, like 24" x 38" so they were taking up a LOT of real estate and messing up my stove wall. So bottom line even though I thought they were a must-have, they didn't end up working out.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Wed, Jan 22, 14 at 15:56

I have a kitchen door! This is the most exciting part of the whole process yet, except maybe the beam. I love the way you can see it as soon as you walk in my house.

(Old view)

{{gwi:1696118}}

Starting to look like a real kitchen!

Caesarstone Alpine Mist
{{gwi:1696119}}

It's lookin' GOOD! How exciting. Thanks for sharing your progress reports. : ) I'd love to be able to work under those skylights. The light your kitchen is going to have. Ahhhhh.

That really is shaping up nicely! Isn't it fun to see all your thoughts and choices coming together (and looking good)?

My friend gave me the ultimate compliment last night - she said it looks like a true Nova Scotian party kitchen.

You might be from Nova Scotia if...

Oh wow, how exciting! I love the cabinets, am partial to two tone myself, and that sink is fabulous!

I was wondering how things were going with you - it's really taking shape! Can't wait to see more "eye candy" (it's an industry term... ;))!

Thanks all! Planning out what goes where...and tile layout. I think my husband is becoming allergic to stickies. Thanks to whatever genius suggested photocopying backsplash tile for layout, yet another sanity saving idea from GW!

Everything in this kitchen is 1" higher than my other kitchen (37" counters, 56" bottom of uppers, 55" bottom light rail). I love it but it feels really different for only an inch! Almost intimidating. .

This post was edited by robotropolis on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 10:23

This looks amazing! I'm sorry but I'm late to the party, I was thinking why don't you put the recyclables in the big laundry/utility room you have now?

I live in Canada too and have the 4 types of garbage but I actually prefer to put my cans and paper recycle into the mud room. One of my pet peeves is when DH puts wet cans/yogurt containers into my small blue bin in the kitchen and mucks up the bottom of the bin. I usually keep the small bin on hand for scraps of dry paper stuff but the larger stuff goes into the big blue box in the mud room. Newspaper and flyers also go directly into the big bin.

It looks fantastic! I don't know if you ever noticed my post about your tile back on Jan. 18--I noticed the other day when you bumped your thread that you never responded. But don't you think the window wall would look gorgeous if you did the tile there instead of over the range? It's not a lot of tile and the window wall seems like more of a focal point to me. I'm not sure about that little bright pop behind the small range. What is the other tile?

More detailed explanation up there ^.

Hi may_flowers and jams, thanks for your suggestions!

jams, I think I'm with you. Although I might still keep small containers in the kitchen and larger ones in the mudroom.

may_flowers, thanks so much for your suggestion on the tile. The beauty of the photocopy is that I can try it both ways! I did try the tile on the sink wall but it looked somehow a little off to me, especially because I have a big switch and stuff there. And the Moroccan tile looks a little nicer next to the warmth of the wood. The rest of the BS is plain glossy white 4x8" 'subway.' Although I like the tile a lot, I don't want to run it throughout as it starts to have a wallpaper look that isn't what I'm going for.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 13:17

Did you see where oldbat2b covered her switchplate with the photocopied tile and then shellacked it? It looks just like tile.

So do you think that tile on both walls would be too much?

Okay, saw your edit.

This post was edited by may_flowers on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 13:21

I think oldbat2be was the genius who first used the idea of using color photocopies to mock up a tile wall. I love your tile, especially with the wood countertops.

I'm intrigued by may_flowers idea about tiling around the window. I'll be watching to see how this wonderful kitchen develops. I think it's looking so beautiful!

If you hate the tile around the little range now, wait until I get my high backed non-slide-in range in there...the type my husband said to "assume we will have until the end of time." Grrr!

Lol, my DH is already starting to sound like that, and we haven't even started. ;-)

High-backed range with that tile? Gulp.

You don't think this is getting a little busy with all the different tiles, counters, and cabinet colors?

Nope! I love it! But I'm not a OTK or restrained type of person.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 16:37

Caesarstone Alpine Mist and IKEA birch numerar. And Eddie. Really pleased with the Alpine Mist. The cobwebby 'veins' are long and the light grey appears slightly translucent so the material appears to have depth.

Double post.

This post was edited by robotropolis on Sun, Mar 2, 14 at 20:38