Looks like a very exciting project!

It certainly looks like you have space for a bigger island and if you love to entertain then it's a good idea to go for as large an island as your space can afford. Plus, nowadays there are a number of different appliance options you can have installed on an island - hobs, downdraft extractors, wine coolers etc.

We love the sleek look of the kitchen and are big fans of handle-less designs - in fact, it's worth checking out our Dolce Still Novo collection, which has a retractable handle that 'pops' out when in use!

Good luck with your project!

I’m confused about the plan.
Where is the door in?
Is the extra room to the top your Pantry? If so it’s oversized. Do you have a laundry room elsewhere?
Could you post some pictures of the room please?

Yes, I am wondering where the door into the room is, is it in through the bit that says sliding door?

The size of the room, excluding the pantry, is almost identical to mine. Similar with the layout too, except we have island rotated 90 degrees, we have sliding doors along your bottom wall. On the right we ran our units right down the full length of the room.

The way your island is in the pic, if you were to have stools, I am guessing you would sit on a stool and face the wall of units with glazing/views behind you - not ideal.

Hi Klairi,

Sorry I hate being frank but please get a new kitchen designer. Those drawings are awful.

Jonathan, I ‘ll upload the architects’ floor plan, I hope it will help you to further understand the whole layout. Please note it will be an “upside down” house when finished, but you are right, the sliding doors are the entrance to the kitchen and the room in the top is the intended pantry (marked as “utility” on the floorplan). There is a separate laundry room which will be located near the future bedrooms on the ground floor.

Arc3d, I appreciate your honesty, my husband also suggested we should get another designer when he first saw the kitchen design :-). We are both novices in this journey but try to minimize any significant errors before we actually start the reno.

Thanks all for your input so far.

Ellie, my thoughts for the ideal kitchen seem to be close to yours... We have decided to move the dining table from the kitchen ( as shown to the architect drawings) to the 2nd living area ( the one with the l-shape sofa on the attached plan) and would like to get an L shape kitchen and a bigger island with a breakfast bar.

Hi Klairi,

That's a lot clearer. Thanks.

If the dining table is being moved to the 2nd living area, do you intend to use the whole area as a kitchen? Is that a balcony on the front side of the house?

Hi arc3d,

We are thinking of using the whole space as a kitchen with some form of informal seating, either a breakfast bar or maybe a low level table, integrated to the island... we are still indecisive re the chimney breast, I ‘d like to keep it and create a focal point around it but my husband believes its off-center position will negatively affect the layout of the kitchen cabinets.

There is no balcony at the front of the house, what you see on the plans are just the projections of the bay windows on the ground floor.

How long is your island going to be? Ours is 180cm long with 3 stools. At that size we have plenty room for our dining table along by the sliding doors.

As I mentioned our dimensions are almost the same. We have the L shape and island rotated 90 degrees to your original pic.

Hi Ellie,

The proposed island is 90x200cm with an overhung breakfast area... is your island in line with the kitchen cabinets? I ‘d prefer the island rotated as well but, as it is, the space feels out of symmetry. Maybe a longer island and extending the kitchen cabinets over the chimney could help to restore the balance?

Island 180 X 90 including overhang. Distance from end of Island to sliding doors 270 and we feel that's plenty room. Table 200 long. Entrance into room is on bottom left of the pic. I've taken pic from hallway too as I don't think your doorway in is same position.

Thank you both for your suggestions, they give me a lot of food for thought... Jonathan, I really like what you have created in the space, I guess we just need to decide if we remove the breast or opt for shallower cabinets over it.
Thanks again all!

Hi Klairi,

Did the architect plans have a compass on them showing which direction the house faces?

The small window is labelled as "in gable", is this a double height space?

You mentioned it being an upside down house, but the stairs are labelled as going up from this floor, is this a mistake or are there other stairs?

Has the open plan area already been created i.e. have the walls been removed?

I don't really understand what the small section of glazed wall is for. Did your architect say why he/she added it?

Did the architect produce renderings of the plans?

Hi there,

Removing a redundant chimney breast is always a good idea in any case, especially in a major refurbishment. In your case it seems that these take a significant amount of space, especially in the smaller rooms.

Of course there could be structural implications, commonly if the chimney is still in place, also needless to mention the party wall agreements etc. and the cost for demo works.

I can't tell from the comments above if you have an architect on board, but if you do, they're usually the ones who work our the space for you, so you wouldn't have to hire a kitchen designer separately.

Hope you find the above helpful.

Andrei

Kay Moden

Hi arc3d,

The front of the house faces the north and this small “in gable” window faces west. It was originally created to bring light to a dressing area (the now proposed kitchen/pantry area was initially designed as master bedroom/dressing/en-suite, with living spaces on ground floor) but probably has little use now. Ceiling height of the space is 284cm; staircase leads up to loft where we plan to have our master bedroom and another living space with large glazed dormers at the back of the house.
We are still in the pre-planning phase and no work has been carried out yet, i.e. all old walls remain (shown with black and interrupted lines in the floor plan), but the architect sent us some 3D images to better understand the end result. I believe they will produce full 3D plans after we receive pre-planning advice and we are in a position to finalize plans.

Andrei,

Thanks for your reply. We have an architect for the whole project who are happy to give us general ideas about the kitchen layout but they advised us to hire a kitchen designer if we wanted to get the most out of the space.
Can you please explain why it is always better to remove redundant chimney breasts? I am keen to do any work needed to get a good end result but I am afraid of biting off more than we can chew by removing all chimney breasts.

Hi Klairi,

Purely my opinion, but these usually take valuable living space, especially in small rooms, forcing you to compromise on the design.

Again, the cost & implication of these need to be carefully assessed.

If this is a structural element, which it usually is, you might need an engineer & a party wall agreement to say the least. Obviously beside demolition works, consider the cost of the structural implications to replace the breast.

A skilled contractor should be able to tell upon a site visit, what the implications & the approximate cost will be.

If you have a contractor on board already, talk to them to asses the works - that should ease your decision making. If not, feel free to message me directly - We can advice some skilled people we work with, they have done this on many occasions.

Andrei