Love all the unique ideas and pictures! Unique things to my kitchen for this area, but commonplace to GW would be my soapstone counters and cork floors.

Truly unique items to my kitchen would be my magnetic knife drawer pullout, designed by me & built by DH,

my end of the cabinet run DIY cookbook shelves, designed by me & built by DH,

and my backsplash, designed and created by me after falling in love with the ridiculously expensive barcode tiles.

I bought various porcelain, marble, and ceramic tiles, and cut them into 2"x various length tiles, then mixed them until I liked how they looked. I did the install, too.

Omgiod -- ding dong so much fab eye candy I've never before seen! famgirlinky, sochi, cotehele, honorbiltkit, zelmar, I am swooning ....

Earlier today I caught a bit of a Harry Potter movie, the second one, I believe. I fell in love with his ginger haired friend's kitchen -- it looked so *real* (save the magic, natch).

I've also loved the kitchen in "The Seven Silly Eaters," a sweet children's story: it's actually illustrator Marla Frazee's vision of the kitchen which I adore. Of course, my kitchen in no way, shape or form resembles any of those, and now I'm not sure why. I suspect I was in too great a rush to do it (the remodel) and I didn't have the maturity to bide my time and really figure out what would make me happiest, what would fit our lifestyle best. But what would best fit our lifestyle would break my heart (aesthetically), so there's a silver lining. There's no pleasing some people!

Very cool table cat mom!

You can see my DR from the peninsula in my kitchen, so can I post something from my DR? I've been meaning to post this for a few months now. I finally added a living wall to my DR. I love it! Pretty unique I think. If I could, I would have done something similar right in the kitchen.

I may post a separate thread with the pics for the plant lovers here on GW.

My kitchen isn't done yet, but what's left isn't terribly unique. I went without traditional uppers and just have one over my stove for the vent hood. I had a cabinet made to look like an old random cabinet I found and hung on the wall. My pullout pantry units are a little different, since they open into a small area, I wanted them accessible from one side only.

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Thanks sochi! And may I be the first to say how amazingly cool and awesome your living wall is? Beyond unique!!!!

Our unique item is the Eye-Vac under the sink. Through a cut out in the toe kick we can sweep the floors to this automatic vacuum and the sensor sucks the debris inside. Fantastic in a space with hardwood floors and pets.

Kiffgirl, that is such a cool feature!

Oops, I forgot to add my own unique bit!

While we're at the very beginning of the remodel road, I can say with confidence that we'll have a unique feature in our 5 1/2' Galley Sink. It's sitting in the garage right now, and it's killing me that it'll be several weeks before I get to use it! Check out the link, they're so very cool (although be warned that the link has sound, so mute if you're at the office).

Here is a link that might be useful: The Galley Sink

I forgot about that. We did a similar thing to Kiffgirl, except going to our central vac unit. They also have a drawer version:

Ooo, Beagles, that is a cool feature. I'd like that one, too!

Kiffgirl -- that looks awesome. We've been slightly concerned about keeping the new hardwood floors in the kitchen clean, especially with a dog that sheds like crazy. Does this really work?!?

What a great thread - wish I'd seen some of these before completing our kitchen!

Anyway, we have a Vroom, similar to the Eye-Vac a few posts up - also goes straight to central vac. Handy but the only downside is the rigid hose that wants to retract so it really needs two hands to use.

Possibly somewhat more unique, and also practical, are our "sweeping corners" - blocks of the same material of which are cabinets are made, installed at 45 degrees in the corners of the cabinet toekicks, to make sweeping them out easy.

Amazing kitchens!!!

kiffgirl--That eye vac is so cool. Is there a hole in the bottom of the cabinet that it sits in? Can it be a bit above the floor and still detect the dirt etc. to suck it up? I think if I ask my contractor to to one more "teeny little thing" he may kill me, but that would be very handy to have.

Sochi, I love that living wall - I have plans for one in my powder room if I live long enough to finish it!

My unique things are in an 1850's house where the outside kitchen had been demolished & we re-purposed one of the formal rooms. Don't know how useful these will be for those with newer homes, but here goes:

Cabinets are oversized to maintain the scale of the room & the existing architectural elements. Upper cabs are not stacked & reach a height of approximately 10 ft, making them about 65".

Pantry cabinets flanking the fireplace are stacked & go from the floor to the 11' ceiling. Interiors on all are streaky milk paint & eventually, the pantry cabs will be painted white.

The Glass door china cabinet is incorporated into the fireplace mantel.

Inset drawer fronts are recessed 1/4"(?) instead of being flush, providing a closer resemblance to the doors without the awkwardness of 5 panel fronts on small drawers.

The backsplash area isn't particularly unique but it's covered with recycled old-stock copper sheeting with a band of salvaged slate at the base.

The shiny black exterior of the U/C lights are covered with adhesive backed copper foil (from a stained glass supply) after I forgot to add a light rail to the cabinets. I also covered the electrical switchplate covers with the same. Ordinarily I would've bought copper covers but I already had the foil so ............

Outlets above the counter are matte black/graphite (rather than shiny black) to better coordinate with the flat finishes of the milk paint & slate.

Toe kick is a piece of heartpine flooring to visually minimize the wicked slope of the old floor.

The trash can is made by RubberMaid (called a 'Slim Line, I think) & came from an office supply store. It fits under the counter (a necessity for dog proofing at my house!) at the end of a cabinet run, holds 33 gallons, takes up less than 12" (w) of floor space, & fits under a standard height countertop although I doubt if it would work inside a cabinet.

I forgot the photo of the trash can so here's a link. It also says it holds 23 gallons but it uses a 33 gal liner.

Here is a link that might be useful: Slim Jim trash can

antiquesilver - what a beautiful kitchen! I don't think I've seen it before - unique and wonderful.

I agree with those who are loving these kitchens! They are beautiful all! Many of them have long been on my list of precious GW kitchens, but I'm with Sochi in noting Antiquesilver's for the first time. That is a gorgeous kitchen, indeed!

And thanks for the kind words on my own kitchen. Yes, Farmgirlinky it is a happy place! And, Allison, I smiled at your noticing of that Greek Key border on my oak parquet flooring. One of the endearing features to be found all over this old house are the border trims on the parquet floors which often vary in design from room to room. Yay!

kiffgirl, farmgirlinky and all of you, really -- AMAZING beautiful work
Thanks for sharing
:)

shimmerstorm, your 45-degree angled corners are a wonderful idea. Wish I'd heard about it sooner--would gladly have copied it since I have 3 cupboard corners and dog hair + garden dirt are my constant companions!

Thanks, ladies for the kind words of praise. The majority of the kitchen was finished in 2003 so I don't post much anymore on this forum.

The ideas posted on this thread are amazing & outweigh any 'how-to' article by far - not to mention the magazine worthy designs!

NYSteve - Yes, it really does a great job. It has enough power to get what I throw at it and even grabs the pet hair out of the broom if I leave it there a second at close range.

reston1 - Our cabinet maker cut out a square in the base of our sink cabinet so the vac sits on the floor. They also cut the toe kick so the sensor and opening could be reached. The unit itself is portable and can be placed anywhere as an 'electric dustpan', I just chose to hide it behind closed doors.

antiquesilver - what a beautiful space to work in everyday day. Such a lovely kitchen.

I built compact plumbing under my sink so as to enable a full drawer under the sink.

It appears to be so unique that nobody can imagine it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Full drawer under sink

Good grief, y'all -- such creativity on display!

cat mom -- loving the table...very PNW of you : ) (even though iirc you're not from the PNW, are you?)

sochi, your DR made me *gasp*. I cannot believe it. Who designed it with that wood and chartreuse juxtaposition? I'm in AWE.

Our unique things are my Sicis tile backsplash -- 18 sf of 5/8" tile, all personally designed and set by moi in a remarkably restrained version of an Amish Quilt pattern I found in a book (I think the person who came up with the pattern was probably drummed out of the community LOL--it looks almost random, but has its own OCD-ish logic)...I call it my first 10 mosaics : )

And because I wanted something local and handmade to go in an otherwise Ikea Hallarum kitchen, I had a local carpenter make vintage-looking curved sink-side shelves and some big doors for what had been a strange alcove in the kitchen, to make it into a spice cabinet -- out of reclaimed VCG fir. Nothing jaw-dropping, but I couldn't see doing a kitchen in the land of lumber (the PNW) without including some local salvage greatness : )

kiffgirl - I love that eyevac! I am gonna have to look into that! Also, if this were a thread for unique houses, you would win hands down!! You should do tours, because yours is amazing!!

Probably the most unique thing in my kit is my husbands presence "cooking". He really loves having a gas range.

Nope, we're in the NE (born, raised, stayed!) flyleft.

I'm glad you like the table! The guy that made the grapevine table base lived in Virginia (maybe the vines came from the west coast!). He died shortly after we received the base (we had the glass cut locally, using a template DH made following the contours of a table that "goes" with the couch). We think we might have gotten one of, if not the last table bases he made.

I love this and seeing all the photos. Such unique and wonderful ideas and kitchens, and it's great to see them all in one spot. This is such a fun thread, Gary. With DD #2's wedding in 5 days, I haven't had time to take or find photos, but I'm going to take a moment to play.

Some of these things in our DIY kitchen are more unique than others, but here goes:

Framed in corner, creating an inset shelf, which I love, and an easier way to deal with another unique thing in my kitchen, different counter heights and materials:

Plenty of color, 3 countertops, and 3 backsplashes:

Hand done mosaics...This is my 'crazy' thing, although not as detailed and perfect as those wonderful outlet plates! I picked out certain tiles from sheets and replaced them with others to get the designs I wanted. I mounted them flat on thin door skins and applied them to the wall after so I wouldn't have to deal with the scootching around that would happen if they were applied on the horizontal surface. (I marked on the skins where the studs would be and left out tiles here and there so we could screw it to the wall)

The pantry isn't anything unique, but this photo shows the trim we used throughout the house, which was milled from trees we took down on our property. This is the reason we decided on Douglas fir cabinets, too.

We have 2 fridges...split to serve different areas. One close to the cooking and baking areas and next to a freezer. One is handy to the eating areas. We raised both off the floor to prevent the dust bunny collection underneath. We have cookbook shelves over one, thanks to Trailrunner's example. Because the fridges are smaller than the standard 36", we planned trim or small cabinets around them, so if they ever needed to be replaced, we didn't have to rip out all the cabinets to put in a 36".

We have separate baking and breakfast/snack areas. We also had 4 ovens in less than 3 years, but that's certainly not a 'unique feature' I'd recommend! Those come in all different sizes, and the drawer underneath hasn't caught up with the changes yet.

Not sure I have a lot of unique items in the room, except maybe my waffle irons...just in amounts...

and my bowls, handmade by a friend, who is glad to make bowls in exchange for bread. :-)

Well this should certainly be handy for anyone planning a kitchen remodel, lotsa great ideas here. I love that red stove and the hood over it---(I lost that "battle") Wife didn't want hood, but had she , It would have been like Marthavilla's, cept copper.

Thanks to all for the posts and pictures.

Sorry You were so busy Rhome, Yesterday was my 69th birthday and I was gonna have ya bakes me a cake, after all, You are are "Reknown Baker" in these here parts (posts).

Again thanks to everybody, I'm off to another car show!

Later.

Gary

Like everyone else has said, I never tire of looking at these kitchens.

antiquesilver, yours has long been one of my favorites.

Zelmar, Sochi, Cotele, farmgirl, catmom, marthav, and Rhome, even though all of your kitchens are extremely individual, I love so much about each of them.

Ziff, I am so glad to learn of that vaccuum. I always thought you had to have central vac for that. I will definately remember that. Your entire house I think wins most rightous!

lax, those tiles are sooo unique. I love them.

daviddro, is your kitchen finished? You always pose such interesting questions and responses to threads. I can't wait to see your kitchen if it hasn't already been posted?

Great thread dodge. Your curved corners are so unique. They remind me of kitchens on world class yachts. By the way, yesterday was my DS1's bday as well. The big one-six! Happy Belated Birthday.

What would be a unique feature of my kitchen would be a finished kitchen....even a started kitchen for that matter.

Gary, there is always time to bake a special birthday boy a cake! Hope you had a good one!

So many times, I've said things like "If it ever do another kitchen, it'll be a lot like this," but since I've said it about Cotehele's, ZelMar's, Farmgirlinky's, and many more of very different styles, it'd be impossible! But the great thing is when we all help each other out and cheer each other on here, it's like we share in having all these kitchens.

Rhome, that transition corner cabinet is genius!

rhome...every time I see your kitchen I sigh...it's still my favorite! I think one reason is because I used to cook/bake a lot like you still do (I raised 4 kids & a husband...only the hubby remains ;) )

I know you told me your light cupboards are Dove Gray? Did you order them that way? What are the other 2 finishes? I love the reddish brown color - I'm so torn with my cupboard colors - I like light & I like darker. My kitchen won't be as big as yours so I'll have to be careful.

I'm going to go look at your kitchen some more... :)

Thanks!

After drooling over Martha's red Aga, Doonie's ceiling, Sochi's counters and cabinets, Rhome's fridges, Kiffgirl's whole cool house, and everything else here... well, I'm feeling quite dull.

But what is a bit unique in our kitchen is also what makes our kitchen really work for us: all the counters are about 39 1/2" tall (and the raised eating counter a bit higher.) Ahhh... so much better for my tall family. (All the bathroom counters are also 39.5" and we love them.)

Thanks, everyone. :-) We have custom height counters throughout our kitchen, too...But shorter. 2 sections (sink and bfast counter) are standard height, and the island, baking center, and stove run are 34" +/-.

Melaska, DH made our cabinets, ordered the doors and drawer fronts, and we painted them. The gray ones are actually BM Sabre Gray, but may be changing, because they've always been a little 'off' of what I wanted. When DH described them as 'blue' one day, I told him he'd now guaranteed himself a repainting job! I wanted them to be a creamy dove gray...Light gray, but with a little cream/tan to it. I am considering SW Dorian Gray or Fawn Brindle, but I'd have it color matched in BM Satin Impervo.

I had a specific burgundy (not too bright and not purple, but a bit toward brown) in mind for the darker cabs, and the first color I brought home was too ruby red. So I mixed in black until it was the shade I'd envisioned, then noticed it was the color of one of the Ralph Lauren paint chips from Home Depot I had in my pile of samples...Picture Gallery Red. So I had that sample color matched in the BM Satin Impervo.

The island is a couple of colors right now, because I thought I wanted it a little golder, but don't and it will all return to BM Lancaster White. Oh...I see I used an older photo above, so it shows Lancaster White there. The wood cabs are Douglas Fir, clear finished with Satin Waterlox.

I think you can go with stronger color, even in a smaller kitchen, if you have enough light.

Rhome, that is a kitchen "con brillo" -- bold colors and clearly designed for a real cook. I love to see it!
Lynn

I guess we have a "mutual admiration society," Lynn, because I can gaze and gaze at photos of your kitchen. It takes my breath away. I have previously printed the pics so I could show DH and point out all the wonderful details. :-D

On another thread I finally posted my compost tray system. Here it is.

Here is a link that might be useful: Look for photos here on compost thread

Laxsupermom, can I please see your cork floors!?

Kiffgirl, i am so in love with your kitchen. Thank you for install info on the eye vac. Sending that to our builder today!

Beagles, what is your undercounter catcher thing called? Do you have a link?

Shimmerstorm, do you have a picture of your sweeping corners?

Would be nice to see your plumbing job davidro. I've been hearing about it for sooooo long. Going to be doing my sink plumbing in the next couple weeks. Hopefully I come up with something nice.

Any pictures available? :)

I love that square utility sink up there, so cool! The most unique thing in my kitchen is leaving the origianl brick wall so we have a brick wall in the kitchen with a built in window at first i wanted it to come down but my husband wanted it so i had to oblige since every other thing was going my way and I must admit i now love the brick wall, it really gives my kithcen a lot more character than your run of the mill white kitchen.

ICFgreen it is a drawer vac. It is part of a central vac system, not a stand-alone like the eye-vac.

http://www.drawervac.com/

Since you are doing a new build, I'd highly recommend putting in a central vac system if you can. Both the drawer vac and a baseboard outlet like the eye vac could work with it, plus you'd get the benefit of the whole house system.

Here's an idea to all who wonder about my sink plumbing. In this thread, or in a new thread, please add a link to the Franke and/or Blanco undersink drain thingie that gives you a button to turn on the countertop to open and close your drain. The web images from these companies will shed a lot of light on the subject. Everyone will see the horizontal drain pipe. ((Reminder: Horizontal = flat, going sideways. Vertical = pipe goes through the middle of the drawer. ))

A week or so ago someone found other images to link to. I had been asked about pics of my plumbing. That was sharp. He/She posted other images that were close, in a sorta kinda way.

Please accept my inability to do things asked of me; accept my inability to do some of the things asked of me. Maybe one day, eventually, but not at this time. No promises are hereby made or implicit.

I saw this very same "Remote Pop-Up" drain button today when I went faucet exploring. It was in a showroom. It was hiding in plain sight. I'm sure I cannot be the only one in the world who sees it when he sees it. But why has nobody ever written about it? Are you all for real? Is this an imaginary universe with phony profiles of people who just try to create buzz? I don't get it. Am I the only one who....

Gary, thanks for this fun thread. I've bookmarked it so that when I've a moment here or there, I can read through it bit by bit. It's really kind of the kernel of this site.

I'm posting one of several favorite things, but I've chosen this in particular because someone elsewhere called this cabinet a "problem" cabinet -- and yet I designed it this way deliberately and it's even more successful than I could have hoped! I don't know if the moral is just "Different strokes" or rather that I haven't adequately explained why it's neat.

This is a cabinet on the edge of my kitchen overlooking the next part of my wide open space that is the family room. That is, the kitchen and family room are one big room, and substantially open to the rest of the shared room in the downstairs as well, the dining room and living room. I wanted to transition the edge between kitchen and family room. I had thought since we mostly just read in a family room, maybe crafts too (we've never before had one so I don't rightly know exactly how it will be used), I thought I'd want a set of bookshelves that could hold family-room-type books or games or something. For now at least these bookshelves are holding cookbooks and I really like it. I don't know whether this will change in the future.

But in order to set the bookshelves into the cabinet, right-angles to the cabinet itself, a bite had to come out of the cabinet to house the book shelf. And then for there to be a door on the cabinet, the bite had to be recessed a bit to make room for the hinges.

What I hadn't anticipated was how useful this little minishelf would be given the plan to house spices in this cabinet. My most-used spices edge out onto the mini shelf on the right where they are just one-deep; no rooting for lost spices amongst the most popular. Then there is a deeper cavity on the left for the workhorse job of storing the bounty.

I bought an additional shelf from the cabinet guys which has helped contain almost all of my spices. Still there is overflow above the hood. But with time I may balance out the spacing, say, be moving baking-type flavorings out of the cooking-type spice cabinet. Don't know; all's working great for now though. I'm constantly amazed at how functional and pretty (IMO) this is. Very exciting.

Here's the view from the family room looking down the range-run:

Here's a photo of the interior of the spice-part of the cabinet:

I love that, Aliris. Love the cookbooks so handy, but around the end where, if a little messy, they don't show, and, mostly, where they won't get greasy. I like the functional spice storage, too.

Beagles,
Thanks! We just met with our GC today. We are doing a central vac and I showed him kiff girls eye vac adaptation. He said they do the toe kick thing standard. And now I will pass on your info, too. Thank you!

By the way, I am always seeing cool ideas with your name attached. Do you have a picture of your kitchen I could see?

ICF I'm so glad you are doing the central vac!

My kitchen is not yet installed but here's the CAD and photoshop (sorry to those who have seen it a million times!) It is about the opposite end of the scale of the aesthetic look I think you are going for though so I'm not sure how much use it will be to you :)

Oooh! Lots to love there, even if the style is different. Are you building or renovating?

I love all the drawers, the walk in pantry, and all the fun drawers. We're doing the bread drawer, too. I had one growing up. When I was single, I kept bread in the frig because it took so long to go through a loaf. My Dutch husband will eat 3 loaves a week!

Are you doing a pull out trash at the end of your island? (I love the curves! So pretty!)

And what is the bottom right pull out (#16?)

We are building new. To be done in October/November (maybe!) I keep loaves of bread in the fridge because we don't go through much of that but I eat a lot of baguette and brie/pesto for lunches since I'm incapable of doing much more in the kitchen than toasting and reheating!

I am doing a trash pull-out on one end of the island and a recycling pull out on the other end (recycling pull-out is next to the beverage/ice cream refrigerator/freezer drawers and closest to the gathering/great rooms off the kitchen so people can come and quickly access drinks and then recycle their cans) Both trash and recycling will have a hafele foot pedal on the main island side (the side opposite the cook top) so that you don't have to touch the cabinet with dirty hands.

However, you will also be able to just access the trash from the side cabinets- thanks to an idea I shamelessly stole from GW (major apologies for not giving credit to the person whose kitchen I took this from- I REALLY need to keep better track of who to credit with these things):

The bottom right pull - out contains a holder for plastic grocery bags at the bottom and the top provides a place for sponge storage.

l love this thread even if a lot of the photos are not available. There must be a lot of new ones to add.