i also had an inspiration pic with a vaulted family room and the a flat ceiling. not sure why so i hope someone chimes in but here are a few guesses. i think the kitchen would get really loud with a vaulted ceiling. especially when you are entertaining. also, maybe keeping the climate cool/hot in the kitchen might be a concern????????

anyway, we ended up vaulting ours only to about 11ft. with a flat area in the middle. one issue i thought about was that i didn't think i would like the hood to go all the way to the vault.....here's how our's ended up.....don't see much of the ceiling but it's the only pic i have. good luck and i hope you get some more responses.....

I have vaulted ceilings in both my LR and kitchen, so I would go for it. But, your inspiration picture shows a cabinet hanging from the ceiling, something you can't do with a vaulted ceiling. That's the only downfall IMO. Your uppers can't go to the very top in any part of the room. I don't consider that a big deal, I just put my collection of kitchen antiques and DH's bottles up there.

My kitchen is a total of 22 ft long, and the last 10 ft of kitchen wall is LR on the other side. There is a 4 ft opening to the LR. Both rooms have separate vaulted ceilings, and it's one of the things we both loved about the house, it does open it all up. I could show you pictures, but they would be the "befores" as I haven't actually started on my kitchen redo. If youd like to see them anyway, let me know.

I thought of something else! Because my range is on an interior wall of a vaulted ceiling, my GC quoted us a price to vent into the attic only - it's too far to go through the roof as pitched as it all is.
DH decided no, he didn't want to see the foot of pipe that would be exposed above the upper cabinet where the hood vent attaches. We do have gable windows and a good powerful attic fan, but we decided to keep things the way they are. Just keep that in mind - you will see pipe, unless they can go through a wall or camoflauge the cabinetry in some way.
So even with my reno, I will still have to live with a ventless hood. I don't really mind it much - as I don't do heavy duty cooktop cooking anyway.

I would love love love to see them! If you want to e-mail me privately, that is OK too. Thanks!

I think I would prefer my inspiration pic with all vault, but I wondered if that is bad for some reason?

I am really interested in this, also, and especially pictures. We are building a house with a kitchen/great-room concept with vaulted ceiling which will be about 20 feet high. I am just a little concerned about lighting, finish of ceilings, etc. Any suggestions and pics would be greatly appreciated.

I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for. My ceiling is vaulted from one side of the house to the other side. This includes the fireplace in the FR on one end, straight through the kitchen, into the dining room on the other end. There is a large island parallel to the fireplace wall. The range is on one of the sides where the ceiling slopes down closer to the floor. My ceilings are about 15' at the highest point.

from the dining room:

Monkeyjac, thanks for posting such gorgeous pictures. What a lovely design. I see what you did to hide the vent pipe on your hood. I'm sure that is what my GC was thinking of doing, and it would work fine, except for the "venting to just the attic" part.

Here is my little kitchen BEFORE reno. Needless to say, I'm hoping the reno will make it much better! Not sure this will be much help, because most people don't have small galley kitchens anymore, but I want to retain my DR, so I'm not busting down walls to make it any bigger. It will stay mostly the same footprint, just a little rearranging of the appliances which you really can't see in these pics anyway. It works for us.

These are from my files; a couple were copied off this site.

... we are moving our kitchen into our current family room, which is vaulted. Drawings look something like this (of course, they've changed a bit, but pretty close)

{{!gwi}}

Current room is this:

monkeyjac - a couple of questions on your kitchen (beautiful) = does your flooring come in vinyl? lol! it looks just like what I want / need for mine - but I need vinyl! or laminate...

what's the cab between DW and sink? and a trash compactor?

that's a cute little towel rack place to the right of your sink! I need a place like that! I need something up high I think - to keep from the dog...

My kitchen has a vaulted ceiling though it doesn't open into a keeping room like you have in mind. I like it - it's not loud. I have above cabinet lighting which I love. Here's a photo - since kitchen is a relatively small galley it's pretty hard to get much of a photo of the ceiling.

{{!gwi}}

I have vaulted ceilings in my kitchen and added beams, Not finished here. I like it and it is majestic!

{{!gwi}}

Here is a t{{!gwi}}aste of my cabinetry too.

Thank you everyone for the photos! It really helps me get an idea of what I have to look forward to. Peytonroad, can you please post some finished photos? Your kitchen looks amazing.

Thank you thank you everybody. These are so helpful. Our room will be about 21 feet wide by about 40 feet long. I was wondering how to handle lighting and fans in this set up as well and there are so many great pictures to "see it."

Peyton Road --- those windows and beams are unbelievable --- They are so gorgeous --- I can't wait to see more!

Gibby --- your mantel type hood is exactly what I want, your kitchen in beautiful. The above cabinet lighting is genius, I never would have thought of that, but once you go for the beams, etc, it is such a great idea.

Segbrown, Can't wait to see more, the plan will be really cool. I love your furniture like cabinet plans, all the way down to the counter. It will be great. Also, thanks for all of the inspiration pics.

gglks - your kitchen is great --- love how you tied it all together so beautifully. I love the cozy and inviting table area.

southern stitcher - Thanks for the venting heads up --- I don't know about that --- I have in mind a mantel look for over the hood, and I assumed I could run the vent pipe up the wall (without it being visible though) straight out the roof, but I don't really know?

Monkeyjac, that is a serious "wow" space, thanks so much for sharing.

Anybody not like it?

Mythreesons, here's ours - we love it!

Long view

Some up close shots

Eliz

Lesmis, I am speechless.... your ceiling is SO cool. I have admired your kitchen before as well, but the details of the ceiling are just AMAZING!! I bet every jaw drops when they enter your space... you have done a fantastic job. Do you have pics of the kitchen from the outside?

Thanks for posting these, it is really inspiring! Rachel

Rachel - did you mean me (not Lesmis?). I will assume yes and say thanks for the compliment! :-) I'll take a pic of the outside for you. We're especially pleased with how it came out; it really doesn't look that big and imposing from the outside (we live in a high density neighbourhood).

This is a great thread - many photos I haven't seen before and some really beautiful spaces.

Will be back to you...

Eliz

Elizpiz, yes, I did mean you... so sorry... guess I need to ramp up the caffeine! Thanks in advance for the outside pics, can't wait to see them. Rachel

Rachel - so sorry I am so long in getting back to you! I've been travelling and didn't have a chance to upload my pix.

The first one shows our house from the front so you can see the total roofline. The extension is to the right as you look at the house. You can *just*catch a glimpse of the new roof.

Here's the exstension rook peeking up. You can also see how close we are to our back neighbours!

You're right about people's reactions when they come over, especially friends and family who know our house well. Because you can't see the vaulted ceiling immediately when you enter, their jaws do drop as they catch that first glimpse!

HTH,
Eliz

Mythreesonsnc...I WISH that was my ceiling!!! Eliz thanks for posting the exterior pictures. We hope to one day add a "widows watch/walk" to our house and I'd love to do something like what you have!

All of these vaulted ceilings make me green with envy!

Kat :)

Thanks SO much for posting the pictures --- It is making me want to try to rearrange some rooflines to make such a great feature... think if DH hears one more "idea" he'll flip :-). It is really beautiful though and I am really enjoying looking at your house. Thanks for sharing.... Like Lesmis I too am green with envy.... so want to do something half as fabulous as your house! Rachel

Thanks so much for your compliments! We are so happy with our house, especially when I look back at the "before" pix and see what we lived with for 11 years... :-) What stage are you at, Rachel?

Eliz

A few from my idea files:
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff
{{!gwi}}From house stuff

We are still designing our house (new construction) --- trying to get started this summer...but that is rapidly approaching. Here is a cad rendering of the front elevation --- stone in the center.... we've made several changes to the front, but here's the idea....

As far as the interior goes, floorplans are more or less done...Kitchen does not have lots of cabinets, but it has "zones" around it --- clean up area (we call the dish pantry), range area, island area, butler's pantry, etc. The kitchen will be one longish room with the keeping room (like the picture at the very top). I'm going to try to post the plan that we have so far....

I of course can't figure out how to make this bigger... grr. So you likely can't even see it anyway....
Anyway, I think the vault will look good in that kitchen / keeping room --- all the way --- the high point will be over the range wall and the fireplace. Still working on details to make sure we have accounted for how we live. I have in mind a white (creamy color) cabinet with a wood top on the island - like a dark walnut. One reason I'm now thinking the wood is because the island is all one level and it is 10-11 feet long and the granite with a seam I worry about. Plus, think the wood is beautiful. I'll probably go back and forth about this many many times before we get there. The little dish pantry area has an opening to the eat-in area, so we can pass dishes through there (and I can watch TV while doing dishes (over the FP). We'll put "barn doors" on rails outside the dish pantry so I can close the door on the mess!

So far I am happy with it ---still so many details to work out, but it is very fun and exciting so far!

Thanks again for sharing... Also, I love this last set of inspiration pics --- so many really great ones! Rachel

Hi Mythreesonsnc,

I have a breakfast or keeping area off my kitchen. It is
not as lovely as any of the beautiful kitchens above.
It has a vaulted ceiling.

As you can see it is very small. The room off the ktichen
is about 12 by 12, Tiny.

My kitchen also opens up to a large family room with
a two story ceiling. The upper space makes everything
look larger. Anyway, I posted a couple pics maybe they
can help you.

I have a ceiling fan that will be changed to a different
ceiling fan. Speakers on the wall. The curtains are also
possibly changing along with the floor stain. A work in
progress.

my kitchen.. stil under the reno process excuse the mess.

Not mine but maybe they can give you ideas.

Hi, you mentioned that you didn't find a thread on this, but did you check the finished kitchen blog? They have lots of pictures of finished kitchens, and there is even a category of ceilings over 8'. Of course, you got lots of good ideas and examples here, and that beats just looking atg pictures, but just in case you want more inspiration.

Here is a link that might be useful: finished kitchens with 8'+ ceilings

Boxerpups --- what a great sunny space. I can totally picture my kids doing projects, or playing games in your space, it would be perfect! Thanks for sharing.

Livlilynne --- Thanks for all of the great inspiration pics --- my space will not be as grand, but a girl can dream, right?

I'm mainly a lurker--I usually find a lot of answers just by searching. But here's the problem with my vaulted ceiling:

Today, in our 6th month out of the house, the appliance installers appeared. 4 months ago, when the carpenter and electrician were asking me about stove placement (and we had the hood in the box in the garage), nobody seemed to think the vaulted ceiling was a problem. My husband kept saying, "won't the hood need a soffit?" but nobody ever answered.

Today, it is clear. The hood needs a soffit--because the stove was not placed precisely enough under the ceiling joists from the beginning.

So the textured and painted ceiling, above the almost-finished wood floors, will have to get modified.

It is a contemporary kitchen so I wanted the flue to show. I see pictures of them this way, but I find the joining of the flue to the ceiling is usually obscured in the photo!

If anybody has a better solution, please let me know!

Update on my soffit/vent hood problem above. The stainless cover that came with the hood is one inch too short on the higher side of the slope. So in order to avoid the soffit, or the expensive cover extension we are putting the hood at 32" above stove. That's an inch or so above recommended max, but it's a good hood. It'll just have to do.

Gosh! Another post I'm glad I "clicked" on! We will be having not just a vaulted ceiling, but open to second story over our kitchen. My range will be on an outside wall..hope there's no problem there?? Peytonroad....can you please tell me the color on your kitchen walls...I love it! Or can someone tell me how to ask peytonroad this question? Do I start a new topic or something? Thanks so much!
Dana

Dana, if you click on peytonroad's "My Page" and then "See My Journal", you will be able to send her an email. Or you could always start another thread, but if she's not checking into GW regularly, she may not see your q.

HTH!
Eliz

Thank you elizpiz!