I think a lot has to do with the layout. Is it open to another room or not? Will the seating area also be used as a transit walk way? If you post the proposed layout, you will get a lot of great input!

Good luck :)

A 24" DW + a 36" sink base, + an 18" trash + 15" of seating room, + side panel for DW etc= around 99" of room needed. With 2 48" aisles on each side, you're up to 195", with no cabinets on either of the perimeter runs. Add cabinets on one side +26" (L shaped and open to another room) and you're up to 18 feet of space needed, and that's without cabinets on another run. A 12' run is at least 6' too short to do what you're asking about doing. In a limited size kitchen, often a peninsula is the best solution to give you what you need, as it only need concern itself with a single walkway clearance.

Thanks you, the 31 kitchen design rules is a great resource!

Here is a copy of our purposed floor plan, it will be an open concept. I hope to have the island include a 24" sink base, 24" dishwasher and 12" cabinet. Debating over the final dimensions and if we can throw in a trash bin and how deep to make it and how much seating we can accommodate.

Won't work. Not enough room. Not to mention that a 24" sink base only fits a 21" sink, which is tiny for anything other than an apartment. 12" isn't enough room on the other side of the sink either. That's usually where you do your prep if you have enough room. 18" is the minimum needed for just safety, and if you want to do prep there, you want 36".

You can do an L shape and incorporate that unused bay for the sink location and then have a small island though.

How about an L with an island like so?

Thanks for the ideas and please keep them coming! I don't think I can put my sink into the bay window area, the windows are not at counter height, they go much closer to the floor. I was thinking of putting a small shallow window seat in the bay area. I am really going to have to rethink this, its very discouraging. What would be the SMALLEST island with a sink and dishwasher possible? As discouraging as this all is, I would rather be working out the kinks now, before I start ordering sink, cabinets, etc. Thanks for the responses.

This is the sink base with coordinating sink I was going to use, I thought it looked substantial but maybe I was wrong.
This sink base from ikea is 24" W by 25" D and it fits the single bowl DOMSJO farm sink.

This post was edited by nursecynthia on Tue, Nov 19, 13 at 21:11

How low are the bay windows? If you could get your social seating there with a little table, it would be really nice.

If you can get rid of the seating on the island, or at least on the end, I could sort of see it working (once you put some numbers on the paper of course!). I would perhaps make it deeper so that I could prep on the end if needed.

So I guess to answer the square or rectangular question, I'd say square until you run out of reasonable space that direction and rectangular until you impose on walkways the other.

Where will dishes go? I like them near the DW because it gets unloaded more often if they are.

My inlaws have a sink in an island that's around 6 ft wide. Dishwasher, double sink, then 24" drawer base. It's all encapsulated by a ledge on 3 sides to block spills. they always have a dish rack on the side with the DW and prep on the other side. Drives me bonkers. Huge kitchen, tiny island. But they don't HAVE to prep there. I don't prep next to a sink. (My floor does get wet though!)

So, what's surrounding the dining room? How nuts to try to put the kitchen in that area? A bay window is awkward in a small kitchen but perfect in any dining room...

That sink and sink cab are unusual in that they are custom made for each other and take advantage of the space perfectly, so if that sink is good enough for you, then yup, 24" is going to be fine!

Given the space constraints you're working with, I think it's clear that a bench seat is not the best use of that wall. Would you consider raising the bottom of the bay window to counter height? It's generally pretty easy to raise the bottom of a window. Of course you have to replace the windows, but the framing is easy because you don't have to modify the header(s).

Cynthia, what did you come up with? I am thinking of a similar floor plan/remodel