Alright you guys, I know this one has been discussed too much. But I'm curious. I've been living outside the United States in a country where there is typically no airconditioning (even though the country gets quite hot). As such, kitchens are often either totally separate, or at least somewhat separate, with very high ceilings, to try to manage the heat of cooking (which actually does make a huge difference when you have no air conditioning). We've been here less than a year, but I now find myself looking at all these open kitchen plans and thinking they all seem so ridiculous (where as before they seemed very normal and beautiful to me). To have all the mess of the kitchen together in your living space? When you live in an unsealed house you also deal alot more with bug control, etc, in your cooking space. I bleach things down every night and then vinegar clean in the morning just in case. Having all these concerns so close to your nice, comfy furniture now seems dangerous (for the furniture).

On top of that, I also find myself noticing more separate kitchens featured than I used to. And I'm wondering if I've come to love closed kitchens simply from living here, or if the general trend is changing even in the United States (and other places??) so that I'm just following trend. It's not really that important I guess. I just am planning to build at some point when we get back and I wonder if I would be crazy to do a separate kitchen in the US? I like the idea of a room large enough for cooking and a large dining table, with a boxed opening to the living area adjacent.