Hi gogo, here is the new kitchen layout floor plan (excuse annotations); a second one with the lighting and power annotations that seems to have distorted a bit - and a third showing the original layout of the whole ground floor. you can see the vast chimney breast that came out. plus our cellar access (and a drain) were in the old utility room, where we needed units and the island to go. The cheaper solution to all our work would have been to knock through the kitchen and dining room and combine... but I wanted to retain 2 separate lounges. Our kitchen is space isn't vast - but it's actually perfectly proportioned now with our other rooms and apart from those giveaway pillars, almost looks like it was always like that. We lowered our ceilings so no beams showing - took a while to get use to the 2400 height but again, definitely the right decision. I've loaded more pics in my ideabook - (called 'last attempt' in reference to the loading onto houzz debacle, not the kitchen itself....). Good luck with your project.

Dulux Rock Salt is a grey but off-white which reflects a lot of light but dries darker than a white. It joins warmer colours like blush or grape well and the Laura Ashley Garrat side table in honey you can see sits well too. It easily matches your marble but would join your tiles, accent wall and floor up I'm positive. This is in our westerly facing landing and stairs which doesn't get a massive amount of light; painted this week (so not quite finished). In my view, yellowy greys look more of a beige too and would look sickly with your other colours (the dust sheets you can see are creamy beige for context). Rock salt looks very clean without out being cold.

Wow, thank you so much for going through the effort of illustrating this for me! Really kind of you! Good point about gold chair and the different finish on the lamp- did say I was clueless didnt i🙈 Kids are 10,4 and 0 so bench could work, but tbh I dont want one, because as much as I like the way it looks, I dont think it would ne that comfortable and we will be using table a lot- meals, family games, working from home, arts and crafts, so I want everyone to be comfortable🙂 So you think the heavy table would go OK with the rest of the decor like the examples above? Swoon supposed to be super unreliable with deliveries and table not available till march so im tempted by 3 week delivery promise from. John lewis... 🙈

I'm good on ideas, but haven't got a clue about structurals or costs! I've found daydreaming doesn't cost a lot, except time.....    tab's idea to incorporate pillars into the kitchen would create the open kitchen diner and the pocket doors could be the way to keep the living seperate but together with the function area. Would be interested if it increases your cupboard space or if just opening a section provides more storage capacity.  Although the play area is part of the way of living presently, that time will pass so I would hesitate to put in a wall you may only want to remove later. An open divider, like an open shelf unit would allow you to keep the play area out of the visuals, then the space could move into a second 'gaming' area or study area as little ones get bigger