Hey Andy! Spend a little money upfront and hire a kitchen designer for an hour or two of consultation in your kitchen. However, do *not* ask them to give you designs until you are ready to sign a project agreement and pay them for the work.

Kitchen designers do sooo much more than pick out cute cabinets. They are professional space planners, interior designers, appliance experts, needs/wants analysts, therapists, and all the other abilities you need to get the new kitchen of your dreams.

Yes, a floor plan with dimensions will help a lot!

Floor plan for sure but what you propose right now makes no sense.

Sorry here is a floor plan. We are thinking we will take down the central wall so the dining, kitchen and den are all open. So with the new fridge location the kitchen will be u-shaped with the island in middle.

The nook that will now be blocked off doesn’t bother me as we could put or piano there. I never loved the idea of the breakfast nook right outside the bathroom and it was redundant anyway w dining table and island.

Currently we don’t even have stools at the island as it’s the main hallway coming into house and space is too tight. But I hope by taking wall down we can use it for eating.

To Sophie’s point about light, I’m hoping taking down the wall will negate this by bringing light in from dining room. Also another option had been to place fridge where backdoor is which would’ve blocked more light.

I think the traffic would be ok once the wall is removed.

The issue is the powder room that someone forgot about and then stuck smack dab in the middle of everything just to check off a box on the listing. And you are not fixing all of those issues, and dealing with taking walls down, and redoing all of the house’s flooring, and all of the HVAC, electrical, and plumbing......and, and, and, without a substantial budget. Or without a day job as electrician for your profession and a carpenter as your night hobby.

Whats your budget? How long do you plan to live there? What are your DIY skills?

Agree with Sophie. Also, corners in kitchens are notoriously inefficient.

If all you need is better fridge space, remove the cabinet above the fridge and buy a tall, integrated, counterdepth fridge like a Sub-Zero. Yes, they are expensive, but less than what you are contemplating. And it will be a substantial upgrade.

Agree it is a big overall project and just to clarify we also want to take down the walls to improve the space for kids and ability to entertain etc... the question about fridge placement was just one part of the plan.
We heavily considered adding a new family room off the back of kitchen which to build and integrate w existing house would have been 100k Plus given we are in boston.
We are now leaning towards making a basement playroom and doing this main floor redo instead-so I do realize it’s a substantial investment - but I think it makes more sense to try to fix our existing footprint rather than add more space to heat etc...

So a 200K renovation rather than a 100K addition makes more sense? What does that get you if you were to move?

Gently, gently, Sophie. You're a pro and know to think about all these factors in the decision Andy's trying to make. He's not a pro, he's a civilian.

That said, Sophie is completely and irrevocably right, Andy. I would strongly suggest you get an architect in for a two-hour consultation. You'll pay good money for it, but it will be well worth it.

If you want to do some of the more dramatic changes in your first floor/basement, you're going to need city/county permits, so an architect is in your future anyway. Plus, she can tell you what can and can't be done.