You don't have enough room to add seating without doing some alterations to the kitchen. Really, I would NOT put granite on that layout as it exists. It's wasting your money. The kitchen could be made to be SO much more functional with some tweaking instead of setting what's there into stone. Like turning the island instead of the angle. Like moving the cooktop off of the island. Like adding proper ventilation to keep the odors and grease out of your soft furnishings and off of your walls.

Keep what you have and leave it alone until you can address the bigger issues. Then, you can get some seating at that island after you take the cooktop off of it.

I agree with turning the island if possible--then you would have ample room for seating. I have almost grown kids now, and we have a large kitchen with a couple of loveseats, a large island (10ft long) and a rectangular kitchen table. My kids literally grew up sitting at the island. It's where they did their homework, ate snacks, and mostly ate dinner. We have a very casual :-) approach to meals, and standing around or sitting at the island worked for us.

Thanks for the input!

Hollysprings-I really appreciate your suggestions. Unfortunately, there's really not a lot of options of where to move the cooktop unless we did a major overhaul. The layout works for us. I've actually been a happy cook in our kitchen and didn't even realize that having a cooktop in the island is not ideal until I started reading posts here.

I like the idea of turning the island, but I've always enjoyed looking into the hearth room/breakfast nook area while cooking. Also, since I don't want to get into refinishing floors, etc, we didn't pursue it.

Anne2326-Sounds like your island was a great gathering place!

Hi again RKB. I remember your other post and what you hope to accomplish. I think this is the first we've seen beyond the kitchen. Your dining area and hearth room are so pretty. Love the windows and the view. I remember from the other pics the angled island looked a little odd, but honestly more so in this picture. Wonder why the builder positioned it as such?

It might makes sense if the angle of the island paralleled the angle of the window where the bench is, but according to your layout drawing it doesn't. Is that correct? Would look better if it paralleled the hearth room and maybe had the sink instead of the cooktop, but I get what you're saying about not being able to change that.

Anyway, back to your question. I say no to seating at the island. Doesn't look like you have the room now and certainly wouldn't if you expanded it. I think it would just accentuate the negative, which is the angle of the island. Not pleasant to sit across from a cooktop either.

I'm curious to see what it looks like from another angle. Can you please take another pic from the corner of the kitchen toward the window with the bench, including the island in the shot?

Have you ever tried angling the table to more parallel the angled window? Looks like that would give you more room between the seating and island, but don't know how it would look if those angles don't line up or if it would look strange from the hearth room. I can't quite picture it in my head.

Is there a 3rd window there to the left of the bench? Is one of them a sliding door to your deck? That looks like a great outdoor space BTW.

I have an angled nook area that bumps out beyond the family room wall with 2 non descript windows and a sliding door to the patio, smaller scale than yours, but always interested to see how others work with that space.

I love your kitchen!!! I love how the island is angled. Since changing it isn't an option I would use it and love it with the beautiful angle. Enjoy your new granite, it is always fun to make changes.

I do think that seating at the island would be redundant as there is a beautiful dining table near by and not in another room. I think your room is so light and beautiful and I am sure it feels good just to spend time in your lovely space.

I absolutely love how your lighting fixture is centered with the door. When I had one of my previous homes built I was adamant about centering the light to the door and was so glad that I did.

I think centering the chandelier would be the least of your worries if you added seating to the cooktop area. Can you articulate the reasons that you would like to have seating there?

Well, I am really glad I posted this :)

It prompted me to put some poster board around the island to mock up the overhang. I probably should have done that a long time ago. Anyway, I think it's another case of "this is a great idea" but not in my space.

I've decided against the overhang.
Thanks to all of you who took time to respond. It helped a lot.