I'm no layout guru, but can you swap the sink and stove? It seems like the sink and fridge would receive the highest volume of traffic and if that were my kitchen I wouldn't want people walking behind me constantly while I was cooking or trying to open the oven. Just a thought. Then you could have the narrower counters on the back wall near the range, and wider counters on the half wall where the sink will be. This may also help with the cleanup area and dish storage being closer together.
HTH!
Good luck!!

18" deep counters would be much too shallow for me to work at. You need room to work as well as room for prep & cooking tools, utensils, bowls, ingredients,etc. There's hardly any room on an 18" deep counter to work let alone have other things on the counter that you need.

Have you considered roll out tray shelves (ROTS). They can still be open, but you can pull them out to access everything. Even 18" deep shelves could use them.

BTW..."one deep" usually means 12" deep shelves, not 18". I had a pantry w/18" deep shelves and things got lost on those shelves all the time! I now have mostly 12" deep shelving in my pantry and they're perfect for the vast majority of things, including small appliances.

Just a couple of disconnected thoughts.

Can the office yield some space? The kitchen is kinda tight for what you want to have in it - the ref to island edge being of particular concern. Instead of 12 and 12 for widths, is it possible to go 10 and 14? Same statements for the depth of the seating/dining areas - both sets of doors in the side walls are unusable. I realize that some can be addressed with different furniture placement.

There are two kinds of people in the world - those that plate in the kitchen and carry the plates and those that transfer the food into service dishes that are carried to the table. On an everyday basis, which are you? The answer should help guide the placement of the dish storage and cleanup.

So, the thing about having multiple cooks is a lot about contention over water and workspace. The way its laid out the water is buried inside (but at least not in a corner) and the cherished workspace (facing those hills) is on the opposite end with fire and ref in the center. I'm puzzled by where dry food storage is.

If your spouse is a baker, he's gonna need a lotta flat area, dry storage type stuff, and fire. Occasional refrigeration and the mixer laying out. Depending on what he makes, he's also going to create volumes of big clunker dishes all at once.

You sound like the everyday chef. You don't need a lot of room and you want everything off the counters. When I overlay constant back and forth to the water, ref and the range AND your spouse taking the "nice" workspace and walking to/fro in the same area, I'm not seeing bliss. If he continually steals "the cherished workspace", are you going to be happy?

Excellent comments this far. Thanks.

noebee1313 - I am playing around with your idea of swapping the stove and sink. I am also reconsidering adding maybe 2nd sink to the peninsula.

Buehl - Will double check my work habits and will block off the counter at 18" debt and see how it feels like. I can make counter 20" and still make the shelves 18" below for those large items for which this debt is good fit. When I work, I usually spread sideways rather than keeping everything in front of me and reach.
I will have to look into ROTS. See their functionality and availability and cost here.
And BTW, "one deep" means any debt that items stored will take up LOL I will have 6" and 8" deep shelves in my kitchen as well.

Bmorepanic - I plan thinking of steeling 2 feet from front porch, or maybe getting rid of it completely, as there is not real everyday use for this area at the moment. I am less willing to give away from my office, but like I said, everything is open right now. The "unusable" doors are placeholders right now, I will have to have access to those sides, but I am not done with them yet.

I usually bring everything to the table and people serve themselves.

"I'm puzzled by where dry food storage is." = me too LOL. It will be somewhere on some shelves ;) The canned foods will have a 6" narrow shelve next to the fridge.

DH does not use mixer, probably never will. He is content with his hands. He makes our breads, every other day or so. That is all he bakes. Rest of the baking is done by me. He does cook occasionally and I see him cooking more, once the build is done. We used to have deal that he and I shared cooking equally.

So is swapping the sink and stove good move? I was thinking of making peninsula 36" wide rather than current 48". That will give more room between the peninsula and fridge. But if I add additional sink to peninsula or move the current one there, should I keep it 48" wide?

But don't you WANT TO face those hills? Given that I had that view, I'd try everything to face that way or have an edge that direction.

Does the seating area (couch, etc.) NEED to be there? Could it be cut or reduced to just a hang out sofa on the entrance porch?

Are you set on a range or would you consider a cooktop/oven instead?

Other questions - Does the piano need to be on the inside wall? Is there a bathroom nearby? I know zip about Central America - will this have air conditioning or heat? Will the windows open? Got bugs or (gulp) other living things that are a concern?

Sure I want to enjoy the view, why else would I build there and orient all the huts so that they have views :)

As for couch, it either is inside office or outside with better view. One or another. The entrance porch has no views, expect to the carport area, so I am more inclined to cut it smaller or out completely. No-one will voluntarily want to sit there.

I am stuck with my current range until it quits. It is less than a year old, so I have to wait for many years for that to happen. Also, all cooking is done using propane here.

Piano needs to stay on the inside wall. The bathroom is in the carport hut that we call community center, as that area will be used for larger entertainment.

There will be no windows, all openings are enclosed with screen. No heating or A/C either as the year round temp during the day is either 80s or 90s.

Just curious - What happens when it rains?

Its really hard for me to imagine as I sit here in the gloom part of sunset at 4:30 in the afternoon with the temp outside relatively warm at 6 Celsius (-4 overnight) and 48 kph winds.

My main counter is 18" deep (courtesy of the previous owners) and I hate it. That's part of the reason we're remodeling. It is a complete and total pain to work on. I have to clear things away every time I use a cutting board because I can't even fit a spice jar behind the cutting board. The microwave will not fit on the counter. Everything spreads out horizontally because the counter is too shallow. It's totally annoying.

If you want your cabinets to be one item deep, you're free to just put one item on the shelf with nothing in front of or behind it. There is no reason to make yourself deal with ridiculous counters just so that your cabinets can be so shallow that you are physically FORCED to put only one item on the shelf. You can simply DECIDE not to clutter up your cabinets, and still have normal-depth counters.

The counter beside the refrigerator looks especially annoying to me, because it's set back from the front of the fridge so you can't even easily use it to set things from the fridge on. And the counters beside the stove look UNBELIEVABLY annoying, and in fact dangerous--why should you have to reach so far when you're cooking? Why should you pick up a hot pot on the front of the stove and then reach a foot back before you can set it down on the counter? That's really, really useless. And what about drawers beside the stove? You will find them very useful for silverware, cooking utensils, pot-holders and so on--you probably won't want all that on the counter, because you don't have much counter space and it sounds like you like an uncluttered look. Don't let Alexander's personal theory get in the way of a functional kitchen. With two cooks and one of them an avid baker, you NEED more counter space and you NEED the counters beside the stove and refrigerator to be as deep as the stove and refrigerator.

It's also worth considering changing the footprint so the kitchen is a little larger and the office a little smaller. That's your desk on the north wall of the office, right? You could have the same amount of desk space in a smaller office (in fact you could have even MORE desk space) if you made the desk an L shape or a U shape rather than just straight. You can still have your main work area face north for the mountain view; just put your main thing there, whatever it is (presumably your computer), and other things on the part of the desk that runs along the west wall.

Also, the interior entry door to the office seems like it's in an inconvenient spot. I think that's partly because the kitchen is too small. So here's a thought: make the office about 2 feet narrower from east to west, and have an L-shaped desk running along the north and west walls. Your desk looks to be about 12 feet wide, so have six feet on one wall and six on the other. That leaves room for you to move the entry door up that wall (the east wall of the office) so it's right at the corner, which, combined with the fact the kitchen is now 2 feet wider, gives you plenty of room to get in and out of your office without feeling like you have to walk into the kitchen to get there. And more importantly, it will give you room for counter space on BOTH sides of the refrigerator.

Oh, just a PS: if the "one item per shelf" idea is because you're concerned about losing things in your cabinets or having "dead space," have you considered drawers on at least some of the lower cabinets instead of open shelves? More expensive, sure, but not horrifically so, and way more efficient in terms of their use of space. I doubt you will regret having more room to store pans, dry goods, etc.! :-)

What about a continuous shelf that runs along the back of the range (entire length of wall), like in the kitchen linked below (in range niche).

Also, check out his pantry, located behind pass-thru fridge. Could have squeezed in way more shelves.

Here is a link that might be useful: 18 Foot Island Kitchen

Jane has a lot of open storage in her country house kitchen. Not shown up close is her pantry (first photo, to left of wall oven). The last picture is one I wanted to show you:

Here is a link that might be useful: Yellow Eurosplash kitchen

Large pot rack over peninsula for all your pots/pans. This will free up a decent amount of lower storage.

Here is a link that might be useful: large pot rack

Bmorepanic - do you mean, does it rain in? We have lived close to 6 months in our rental and our favorite open area is no problem during the rain. We will have 4 foot overhang all four side of the huts.

ideagirl2 - thank you for your passionate and heartfelt contribution. I will carefully consider all you wrote.
The climate where we live and the fact we will not have A/C, will not allow us to have any drawers or closed cabinets. It is just not feasible. Also, it is not feasible or desirable to have A/C, so we have to make accommodations in our designs to take that into account.
Also, there will be full length shelves next to the fridge and the drop zone after shopping and before putting things away, is the peninsula.

allison0704 - Thanks for the links. I am really interested to see the first one as well, but it gives me an error, item not found, when I open it. I have been thinking about large pot rack but I am little worried about the noise it will make when we have the north wind coming straight at us :)

In general, I will be spending many more hours each day in my office than in the kitchen. So it all needs to balance out.

Sorry 'bout that. Site was recently moved and I didn't realize I posted a non-working link.

lol We get amazingly strong winds down our valley. If we didn't have windows, everything would blow out across the front veranda.

Here is a link that might be useful: 18 Foot Island Kitchen

After looking over allison0704 inspiration photos and mulling things overnight, I think that there will be some major changes coming, mainly, instead of the front porch, it will be closed in to make a walk-in pantry. So I need a door from kitchen and right now thinking door from outside, so this will be walk through straight to the kitchen from outside. In this case I will have two L's and right now no good idea how to make it work.
Any comments, inspiration photos highly appreciated.

Are you going to have any front porch at all, all of it pantry, expand the office or half pantry/half porch?

Glad I was able to help with new ideas.

Good questions. Nothing is decided, like I said, I was just thinking of it over night. Talking to DH, he said the more storage the better, as we always seem to fill up more.
Plus I have not mentioned before, but we make our own wine, we need to store the bottles, the equipment, the large buckets. The juice making is going to be in the kitchen, once we start the wine, it will be in the pantry and raking and stuff will happen in the pantry as well. So most likely we should have the whole length 24 ' minus the door for pantry.
Need another locations for entry door to office, which is OK and maybe even better, giving me two full walls in office.

{{gwi:1991128}}

Much, much better. This orients everything towards the views.

punamytsike, it never occurred to me that climate and lack of A/C could affect the drawers/cabinets decision, but I see what you mean. That makes sense.

Of course, that doesn't mean you should go with 18" counters... :-)

With all the activity and movement you're planning to have in the kitchen, and the fact there are two of you, it really seems like you would regret not making it larger. Do you really need so much room in the office? I don't even see an armchair in there--it looks like all it is used for is desk work and piano playing. Which is lovely and fine, but surely doesn't require so much room, especially not at the expense of room in the kitchen.

Here is my current new re-do

Thank you bmorepanic for your effort, I hope you will look my version over and comment :)

As you can see, I did trim the office a little. All the doors should be usable, plenty of storage room. There will be one narrow shelve running on the stove wall, like Allison's photo. There will be full wall of shelves on the sink side, many on the wall will be wrought iron mesh, so they also work well for drying cups, glasses and there is good air flow. Again, one square is one feet, to give the scale some meaning.
So any big problems with this layout? I do not want to move the kitchen part out as was done by bmorepanic. The mountain view wall will be mostly full screen, so anything as high as 36" is just blocking too much. The whole back is the living/dining area.
Please let me know what you think. Thanks

Looks much better, Punamytsike. Not sure what "raking" means with the wine making, but if some of that takes place in the pantry do you need a water source there?

Will the floors be stained concrete (easy to hose down)?

Back to the pantry, I did fixed wooden shelves. Hold a lot of weight. Just be sure to measure different things to know the various heights. Store heavier items on the floor below the lowest bottom shelf (such as distilled water containers).

Maybe have a small flat place in pantry to sit grocery bags, etc down to unload. I know you've seen my pantry - I had the trim carpenter build a table that looks like a garden potting bench. Has toaster and microwave on it, but it's also nice to have when unloading.

Any large, bulky storage items? Dog food container?

With floor to ceiling storage, you'll be in good shape.

I know someone will point out you're not facing the view when you're at the kitchen sink, but mine doesn't face ours and I can tell you that it can still be seen while washing the dishes and/or cooking.

I wouldn't do it for myself, if that's what you mean.

What follows isn't to be funny or to make fun of you. I think we all fall in love with an idea or an interior visualization that sometimes doesn't work the way it looks. I'm hoping that nothing of this is news to you - what follows is the way it looks to me.

The water is now completely on the other side of the room from the workspace. So, lotta hauling full pots and wet veg from one side to the other - dripping all over the floor.

The easy way to see this is simple pasta. Start at the sink. Get big pot from (allison is suggesting a pot rack over the peninsula so let's use that) the peninsula, walk over to water (around 14 feet). Walk the filled pot to the range (about 8 feet). Go get pasta from the pantry (about 36 feet to midpoint of room and back to range). Get colander from pot rack and take to sink and return to range (about 20 feet). Walk full pot back to colander and dump (8 feet), let drain a while and take somewhere, dripping all the way or place it inside the pot and take both or dump into a piece of service ware (8 to 14 feet).

So, pasta in about a hundred feet of walking, crossing the floor twice with a full pot of water, twice with hot stuff. Altho I'm ok with the cleanup sink in a traffic aisle, I'm not sure I'd like it here because of the hot pots crossing.

The relationship of the ref, range and that corner between them doesn't work well - there is The ref and range are so close together that you'll probably need to move out of the way of another person who wants to use the other device. This can get annoying fast because one of the players is the refrigerator - the exact thing that spouse and guests need to access.

Also, if you actually have a side by side or a french door ref, the best landing space is behind you - pivot and sit down. Because the doors probably don't open wide enough to use the counter to the side, you'll need to walk items to the other side of the range or the sink - one or two things at a time.

The sitting and eating areas are very small. Your office now feels cramped - you can't even just walk in and sit without threading a careful path.

I have this thing for proportional space - so I look at the huge pantry and sigh. It's one thing to have it when the other rooms are functional, or if you store food for a year or if you need to have service for 150 on occasion...

The pantry is 80% of the size of the kitchen, 95% of the size of your office, and 60% of the size of the seating and dining areas.

allison0704 � "raking" is moving wine from one container to another to get rid of sediment and junk that has collected on the bottom. So the container have to be clean but other than that no water needed.
The floors will be stained concrete :) The counters I am currently dreaming of being concrete as well :) Very easy clean up and no worries about spills anywhere ;)
Will measure and make sure large things will fit.
And as for the view from the sink, I do not like to do dishes, so I do them as fast as possible, so no lingering and admiring view necessary.

Bmorepanic � first of, thank you so much for taking an interest. I will not move the kitchen part to the NW corner of the building (some explanation why, below, some I already gave). Do you think with this in mind there are any additional improvements possible in the current foot print?
I will responds to your concerns with how we actually live:
Like I mentioned above, spills are not a problem. In reality, looking at the current plan, I see myself making salads and prepping veggies for cooking on the counter next to the sink. Then carrying them over to be cooked. I tried to fit them all on the same wall U shaped, but there just was not enough room.
My DH hates pasta LOL I cook it only for myself and maybe once or twice a year for large group. I do make large pots of soup but I would need to carry that from sink to stove and then to the dining area. Or I can ask my DH to do that. And majority of the time, more than 90% it will be just him and I.
Again, there are no cabinets or drawers. All are open shelves. I envision all the pots and pans and other stuff used for cooking to be stored on the lower shelves next to the stove.
We have regular refrigerator, door opens toward the sink in current layout.
I was playing around, moving the entrance through office, so I can close in the back wall and then can arrange the water, fire, fridge maybe better for pasta cooking, but then the wine making will become real pain to move the full 6 gallon buckets from kitchen to pantry and back. And pantry is just a code name, in reality it is storage that will keep the many bottles of wine, the equipment for making wine, paperwork in boxes that need to be kept but not used and so on. So it is not just pantry.
I was also playing with the idea of putting a 2nd sink into the peninsula, but I really would hate to see it while sitting behind my desk. Same applies to kitchen being moved out, that�s all I would see when sitting behind my computer and not something I want. I can put the sink to peninsula if I move the door that enters the office closer to the pantry, so that while sitting behind my desk, I will not have a view to the kitchen part at all, instead I will look at the view or a wall that will have my favorite paintings and tapestries hanging.
Still lot to ponder :)

I don't think I can be of any assistance - you know what you want and are convinced its ok.

Good luck with your project.

bmorepanic - again, thank you so much for your contributions, you were a great help :)

Based on the continued discussion, I made some more modifications and below you will see 2 versions with slightly different entrances and office layout. Please comment and let me know which one YOU like better.

Main change, I removed the half wall completely between office and open area, the desk will be the divider. That will allow much more flexibility to move furniture around based on need and desire. This also allowed to get rid of the doorway between the office and kitchen, allowing to move sink up closer to peninsula prep area and cleanup area closer to peninsula dish storage area.

Just want to throw something out. I'm looking at this and, considering the climate, I'm wondering why there are any interior fixed walls at all? All these are awake rooms. Would it be possible to use sliding "barn door" type partitions (apart from pantry) on that interior wall that can move to open or close up the space as needed? Fridge could go on back wall.

As drawn, the seating area is is oriented away from the view. Anyone on the sofa will be looking at the desk, not the mountains. As much as I like the circular flow of the most recent plan, the half wall between the living room and office was useful for having something to place the sofa against (in which case I'd move the west wall's door northward so you have a lane to it.)

Add in a prep sink on the peninsula if you want to radically improve the space. It still leaves a hike between the fridge and prep, but not as badly as before.

If you add a prep sink, either in the peninsula or at the corner between the peninsula and stove run, you'll have much improved functionality. With the new wall, you won't see it from your desk, so that's no longer an issue.

Oops, LWO posted the same thing as I was typing! I also meant to say what mnerg posted about the half wall. I think it serves an important enough function to leave it in the plan. So, no fresh ideas here--just agreement with the posts of others!

With those two changes (the prep sink and half wall), I think you have a very workable plan that accomplishes all you want it to. I do think having two entrances to the storage space could be a good idea, especially if you'll be keeping much office-type stuff in there. Not having to haul such items back and forth through the kitchen would be big plus.

I hope you'll post your "finished" pics here when you have this built. It's so different from most of the kitchens we see here, and I think the final product will be fascinating!

Rococogurl - The wall in the middle has two purposes: To reduce airflow/wind and provide space to hang shelves where wall cabinets would be and office side to hang my paintings and tapestry.

Mnerg - I had a long discussion about the sofa with my DH. In reality, we sit on it only when we watch movies on the computer. And since my monitor will be on the desk, I only flip it over for us to be able to watch movies comfortably. If we later get a projector, we could just move sofa over and place it against the desk. Or we could move the desk out to open area, move the sofa more in. With out the half wall, all that will be possible.

live_wire_oak, holligator - my problem with the current last versions is still the following - instead of prep sink, I would actually like to have the clean-up area in the peninsula, but at the same time do not want to break up this fabulous large flat working surface. I also would love to have the other sink closer to pantry for wine making purposes :-/ But I am not sure flipping the fridge and sink will work.
I also like the idea of having access to storage from the office, but do not like how this doorway changes the back wall symmetrical placement of bookshelves both side of the piano. Why can't girl have it all LOL

I'm glad you're thinking hard about how you'll actually use the spaces. You know your habits better than we do. If you do decide to turn the sofa around (which might, I still think, change that space from seldom-used to very welcoming and pleasant) the sofa against the desk will block the exterior door, or pinch the walkway into the office, or both. If you recess the sofa into the office space your desk area might become cramped. Draw them out and see what you think.

I hope you also give equal thought to the clearances. The seating and dining areas look very tight. (The person in the north spot at the table, for example, can't push the chair back to get in or out.) Can you mock up such an arrangement and see how it works?

Am I missing something or are there no longer any windows in the kitchen or office in the latest drawing?

Could you add a prep sink in the back right corner of the kitchen in that last floor plan?? Against the pantry wall or in that corner?? That would give you a sink closer to the cooking zone, and near the pantry for your wine making. Then you could use the other sink solely as a clean-up sink since its closer to the penninsula and you said you plan on doing clean up at the penninsula.

One question, if you have guests over, will they have to walk into the kitchen/office hut through the pantry, or will they be able to access it through one of the side doors? Just a thought if you're entertaining and the only way in is through a utility space.

I really like your new layout. The top one is my preference since the piano flanked by the bookshelves would look so nice. And you get more flexibility for furniture placement, plus more storage, without the extra doors from layout #2.

Can you do without the doorway on the left by the couch as well? That would also give you more options if you decide you want to reorient the couch and chairs sometime in future (e.g., you might decide to rotate the couch and chairs 90 degrees so you could still see the monitor for movies while still benefiting from the mountain view to the side).

I think you should swap the sink and fridge. That way the sink would be closer to your wine making / storage area, and the fridge would be more easily accessible from the dining area and rest of the hut. Then your short (18") storage would be at the end of the run where you're most in need of the extra space to clear the penisula. And I would really think about bring the side run at the stove out to 24", for a more balanced look. Keeping the 18" cabs on the south wall and at the open end by the fridge would look nice and also be functional re. allowing more working room and clearance.

Finally, and I know many have mentioned it before, but it would be the shame of the world to forgo a small sink at the edge of the peninsula. Would make it so much easier to have both you and DH working in the kitchen together, and would cost so little to add it in up front.

Good luck whatever you decide. Those gorgeous vistas will make your space so special no matter what you do. :-)

Nothing wrong with having multiple sinks. Have a cleanup sink one one run, a prep sink in the peninsula, and a pantry/winemaking sink. In the planning stage, it adds very little $$---just the cost of a bit of pipe and a sink. Adding it after the fact is when it gets to be more spendy.

Mnerg - I am using several different programs to get to the final version that I originally posted. Got tired making all those changes, so used some short cuts. Sure I have the half walls. Added them differently to the latest version to lessen confusion.

The eating and sitting is little tight in the screened area. Will making pantry storage 5' rather than 6' work? Then I can add that foot to the screened area? When we will clear the building area, I will see if I can squeeze another foot or two to the length of the building to add some more room to the open area.

noebee1313 - The new version has two sinks. I hope to get some comments if this would work? As for quests - for large gatherings, which I expect couple of times a year, we will have a different open area for that. Just regular small dinner parties are not common with locals. Where we live, we have not met any gringos yet, so currently I do not see too many dinner parties in the future. But most likely they will be able to come through side doors as well, especially if I can squeeze another 2 feet to that area, to make is more roomy.

Taggie - I agree with you. Once I looked more into the two versions, I realized that the two-door version had again very unappealing views. So although little more practical, not esthetically pleasing at all.

live_wire_oak - added the 2nd sink.

Do you all think I have enough counter around the stove with the new addition of sink? Will stealing a foot from storage work to add to the screen room ( this is not done on the current version yet, just got that idea while typing)? How does the fridge area look?

And here is yet another version :

I like your new layout a lot!

I wouldn't take extra space from the pantry -- you've only got 3 1/2 foot aisles in there and any less that that wouldn't allow you to do your racking. You have enough room in the dining area in my opinion. 10 1/2 x 11 feet is plenty of room for a table for 4.