My two cents would be to remove the soffit, and rethink the light locations. You seem to have a ton of cans in the center of the room, but none over the counter, where you actually need it.

And I'm always a fan of getting rid of popcorn ceilings :)

If you are opening the kitchen up to the family room, (which you are by removing the peninsula), I think it looks nice to remove physical lines that artificially to make the two rooms separate, like different floor and different ceilings. But that's just me. I'm doing this too, and it has meant no cork for me :( - I didn't want the line between the cork in the kitchen and the wood in the family room. So I'm going engineered h/w throughout.

I agree with Willis. I would open it up. Taking them out will make a HUGE difference in the feeling.

Good luck!

I agree. The soffits need to go. I came to the conclusion with my own remodel that if I was going to do it, I was going to do it right. It makes no sense to update the cabinets, yet keep the dated soffits.
I would also get rid of the popcorn. It is a huge mess to do it, but I think you will be happier with the end product if you can put up with some inconvenience now.
Good Luck! Please keep us all updated on your progress!

IMO get rid of the popcorn & soffit--you'll never regret it! We got rid of all popcorn several years ago--big mess to do but so worth it. The rooms look so much cleaner and ceilings look a little higher. GO FOR IT!!! I love your cabinets--can't wait to see your after pics!

Have you drilled some holes to check out whether the soffit is empty or not? Everybody agreeing that the soffit needs to be removed, means nothing if you've got pipes or wiring running through there that is going to add $$$ to your remodel requiring re-routing.

Although I agree with how much nicer it will look after removing the soffit and popcorn, I second jkom51's comment about checking on what is hiding in that space. We were doing a similar thing and our GC said "there is a reason the builders like to put in these soffits" - usually to run utilities. Fortunately ours wasn't a big deal and we are *so* happy we did.
My other concern would be the cabinets - you said you already ordered them so making them full height isn't possible. Will you do some crown to finish the top and have some space above or try to build up the crown to reach the ceiling (which would be a lot, IMO)? Another option would be to build a new soffit just above the cabinets if you don't want the space, which some consider a dust catcher. I have seen beautiful kitchens with soffits above the cabs as well as ones with the space. This is a personal preference choice to me. FWIW, I think I would go with a small crown molding at the top with the space above. If you are going to do that and you haven't already ordered the molding you should do that as soon as possible so it doesn't slow down finishing the kitchen too much (although it won't slow down getting it functional - they can always install the trim later)
Can't wait to see the results!

I have to chime in because my soffit was just torn out yesterday! YaY! Anyway, what was strange to me was that when I originally got bids for the remodel, one contractor told me to remove the soffit and the other one said leave it in. I hadn't even thought about it until then. But once I was given that idea, I thought that it was a good one. Fortunately for me, the contractor who was for removing it gave me a better bid and better ideas overall. The other contractor made it seem like a big deal. (I think he was being lazy!) Now, there were things in the soffit that need to be pushed up into the ceiling. But a good contractor wants the job to look nice and will go the extra mile!

I would defintely remove the soffit. It will make the room seem a little larger too.

We have recently removed a bunch of soffits in our 1938 house and I can't believe how much bigger the rooms feel. I think when your ceilings are uniform it will make the whole area work better together. I agree with re-thinking the light distribution. You want lights over the work areas and dimmable if possible.

Flwrs_n_co -- I am worried about what could be in the soffit, because the master bathroom is directly above.

Our task lighting (in the recessed part of the kithcen ceiling) is quite new, and works just fine, and is dimmable. We are planning to put in under-cabinet lighting, which I think could deal with any remaining task lighting concerns.

New idea (I think this would reduce costs?) Take out the two cams that focus on where the island is now but keep the other cams inside the recessed part of the kitchen ceiling.

Then, take the soffit down all the way over across to the sliding glass back door.

I'm concerned primarily about cost, but also about project creep... if we take down the popcorn in the family room, then we really need to take it down in the dining room too, and this project started out as "just" a kitchen remodel.

We are already more than 50% higher than our original ballpark assumption of how much we were willing to spend, which does not bother my husband, but definitely bothers me! (I'm the penny-pincher of the two of us.)

A soffit in the family room doesn't make send to me and the narrowness of the soffit is a little strange. Therefore, I think there must be a reason for it. In my own kitchen I had 3 soffits, only 2 of which could be removed because the 3rd was hiding a roof line. It is easy enough to explore - drill a nice size hole.

We're getting ready to embark on a very similar project. We have a living room, dining area, foyer and kitchen on our main level. All the popcorn on the ceiling in the entire space is coming down (starting this weekend!), the soffit (12") over the cabinets is coming down, all the flooring on the entire level (now a mix of vinyl and carpet) is being removed and replaced with solid cumaru. Our kitchen designer was just at the house this week for final measuring, and we are ordering our custom black walnut cabinets (41") to go all the way to the ceiling with at 1 1/4" shaker crown.

I think both the popcorn and the soffit date the house and I'm looking forward to having it all gone!