When you say "doable", how much clearance will you have between the dining chairs and the island seats when people are seated at both? Only one (table or island) will get used if you don't have the space for people to sit and walk...

Use one almost every day - it’s great while waiting for a timer to go off. We also like perching there for coffee, or lunch.

Sammie- about 5 feet (1500 mm) between edge of island and edge of dining table.

I agree that "doable" is questionable. We had 4' between our island & dining table and it was too tight. You need at least 5'.

That being said, we still used our island at that house all the time - it was especially valuable when our baby was in the Inglesina chair, which made meal times so much easier at that age. DH and I would also eat breakfast & lunch there most days despite having the table right behind us. We just couldn't have people sit at both simultaneously, so it didn't work well for larger gatherings.

In our current house we have plenty of room for island seating and use it for breakfast & lunch most days. We use our dining table for dinner most nights.

anj_p that is helpful. We will have 5 foot, so will just slide in under doable! I have a kitchen appt tomorrow so hopefully that will help me visualise it better, too!

jinx- oh my gosh! Two dining rooms! Amazing! I do want an island so the kids could help with cooking easier. It's the seating at it I'm toying with. Thanks for your input!

I've had an island or peninsula in four different homes, and rarely used any of them for seating. This was true when I was childless, raising small kids, then teenagers and beyond. Of course, I always had a kitchen or dining table immediately adjacent. I will always choose a table over a counter -- more comfortable, more social, more homey.

Bar or island seats are not comfortable. They are too high and cut off the circulation. I use one of mine occasionally to shell shrimp. My husband uses it to plop bags on before he goes to the gym.

I’m another person who would always choose a table over an island or a peninsula.

I'm another one who never uses my island seating. It was one of "those things" I thought I had to have...but it turns out like a few others above, I prefer table height seating. It just seems more stable to me. I realize that's probably not technically true, but all I know is I found out I'm way more comfortable at a table.

We have an island with only 3 seats (there are only 2 of us most of the time). Nearby, about 6-7 feet away, we have a breakfast nook with banquette seating and 2 chairs. We also have a formal dining room that we only use once or twice a year. My husband has his laptop on the island, so he sits there ALL the time. Son-in-law likes to sit there when he's here, otherwise we sit at the breakfast table.

We have an island with four seats and a table in the eat-in area of the kitchen. The kids almost always eat breakfast and lunch at the island. We all eat dinner at the table. When we have the neighbors for dinner we use both. A lot of times when we entertain the guests will sit at the island and chat while we prep food. We use ours a lot!

We eat breakfast and lunch at the island everyday. We might also have drinks and appetizers at the island on occasion, but dinner is always at the table.

We were in our old house 20 years, and we had a nice-sized peninsula with 3 cute-and-comfortable swivel bar stools. The bar overhang could have been a little deeper, but the stools had ample elbow room. In those 20 years, my kids sat in the bar stools and did homework or chatted with me while I cooked -- oh, I think I can be exact here: Zero times. Yes, zero.

2-3 times over the course of 20 years someone ate at the peninsula because we needed more seats than the dining room and the breakfast table.

When my kids had college apartments, both of them had peninsula seating instead of kitchen tables ... they took the bar stools away literally for years, and I never missed them.

One positive: After my mom had her hip replacement, she found the bar stools exactly the right height, and she sat on one when she visited.

WHY were my bar stools such a miss? Spacing.

- They were 5' from the kitchen table, which was too close for comfort. Everyone chose to sit at the table rather than pull out the bar stools.

- The stools, when pulled out, blocked access to the covered back porch.

Our son eats breakfast at the island every morning. When its just my husband and I for dinner we usually sit at the island since it saves us having to set the table, candles, etc. We have high backed stools at our island that are actually comfortable, if they were backless I doubt anyone would want to sit there.

We did the kitchen in our house about a dozen years ago, adding a good sized peninsula with seating on one long side and the short end.

My husband and I ate dinner there every day. Lots of weekend breakfasts as well. Also plenty of casual dinners with friends and family were enjoyed there. It was used for seating during big parties, seating and standing for prep and visiting, and served as a great location for buffet spreads for plenty of holiday dinners eaten in the dining room. We used the heck out of that peninsula, much of the time spent sitting.

So yes, we enjoyed our island seating even more than we could have ever imagined.

I'm a little sad to say that I've just eliminated the entire island from my new kitchen reno in our currently-gutted future forever house. Our situation is different, our living circumstances are different, and the kitchen itself is different, so I'll probably be getting either a worktable or a free-standing island without seating. This new kitchen will have a big table however, which our original kitchen with the peninsula did not have.

It's just the 2 of us. Closed kitchen. I use my island a lot. if I had a kitchen table I would probable sit at that instead. Hubby likes to watch TV while he eats so he eats in the living room and I am at the island . Saturday and Sundays we always have family over and we eat in the dinning room.

You need 36-42" between the table top and any obstruction, baseboard or furniture. That gives you adequate room for chair scooting and sitting. Get a smaller, round extension or drop leaf table that can collapse somewhat if you find you prefer sitting at the bar for daily meals. You can always open the table for guests and remove the seating from the bar for a party, using it instead for serving a buffet style meal.

Susan- I love a work table, though! That look is just beautiful to me. Would have gone that route, actually, if we could have fit the applicants on just the kitchen run!

Decoenthusiaste- def going to look into that. Thanks!

Functionthenlook- thank you!

Caroline Hamilton- that is 100% true and I’m so glad you said that! I would have forgotten how you are always scouting for a better chair when at an uncomfortable bar stool. Going to up my budget there 👍🏽👍🏽👍🏽

Mrs Pete- I have a lot to think about here. That’s exactly the space I have here. 5’ 😬

Marilyncb- I feel like this is how we’d use the space too

Angela zuill- yes! I always feel cut out of the conversation at the moment and to be able to prep AND chat would be amazing.

We have island seating but the plan was never to eat meals there. We have an adjacent table where we take our meals. There are times we eat appetizers there but move to the table for the main meal. We drink our coffee there on weekends or sit and chat while one of us is prepping.

I thought about my family and how we socialize. My mom was always in the kitchen (6 kids and tons of extended family, baked her own bread and made pastries and desserts, canned vegetables, made homemade jelly . . .)

The kitchen was open to the family room. It was the central gathering place - the hub of the home.

When I go to my sister's or brother's homes or my nieces homes, we gather in the kitchen. Counter seating is always used when available. When there isn't counter seating we stand in the kitchen. It is our gathering space and counter seating makes it a better gathering space. If there is a table that is not separated from the kitchen by an island or peninsula it is used, but if it is separated we don't sit at it for social gathering.

We only go into the living room areas if we have been there for a couple of hours and decide to relax and watch a bit of TV or a movie. We use the dining table for a meal when there are more people than the number of counter seats.

If that isn't the dynamic of your home and you are more likely to gather around the TV or computer than the stove it may not get utilized enough to make it worthwhile.

I have a tiny kitchen (10x11) and don't have any counter seating. I really miss having that counter seating. My friends and family still end up gathering in the kitchen until it becomes too congested and we are forced to move into the living room. Working on a reno that will allow 2 seats at a small peninsula.

We use ours constantly . We have a TV in our kitchen for morning news we eat a different times for breakfast so always at the counter we have internetional students they always use the counter for many things like homework if they do not want to be in their rooms. I think you need to decide what you need . My kitchen always gathers everyone there no matter what I plan in my designs so the stools are the first spot that fills .

Our island is adjacent to an early in area, and the table gets more use. This id our 2nd home with an island; what I’ve found is the use of island seating seems to depend on orientation. We currently have 3 seats with their back to the family room/tv space and 2 seats perpendicular - everyone gravitates toward the perpendicular seats both to see the tv and converse with people in the family room. The other seats are occasionally used by the kids, but mostly just a landing zone.

My young children like sitting at the island but the adults, especially the older and pregnant ones, prefer the table. (My tall husband will actually kneel on the floor to eat at the island instead of using a stool!) They are just over 6' apart, counter edge to table edge, and it's plenty of space to pass through. I think 5' apart would be doable.

I've been under the weather and/or deadlines pretty consistently over the past month, so the island has stayed pretty messy with papers etc. We've been using the dining table instead and haven't missed the island much at all as a seating space.

Edit: since you have the space, you might as well get the seating overhang, especially for resale value I think buyers would expect stools. I do like having both, especially for parties.

I’ve had them in the past 2 homes - never used. The current home is completely open concept (hate) and the kitchen is ridiculously small for this space. There’s a dining area nearby with a table and chairs where we go. We have stools at the island to finish the look, but it’s just crammed in and looks uninviting. The other home had a large breakfast room which was where we gravitated, as well as a formal dining room. So, no, never used it in any.

Obviously this is about 90% dependent on personal preferences and 10% dependent on island seating layout. Bottom line, what you should do really depends on you.

I added space for 2 stools on the short end of my island, because people expect some counter seating in a kitchen and not because we will use them. Since it is only 2 stools, I got to splurge on comfortable stools with custom fabric/leather.

When I remodeled my previous kitchen I eliminated some counter seating, going from space for 8 stools down to 4 stools. Never missed the ones I eliminated and I filled the space with larger drawers that were a lot more useful.

My island was not built for seating as I wanted the largest surface space. I have a nearby peninsula with seating that I definitely do use however.

The absolutely last, repeat last, thing I want in my kitchen is a TV.. I really want a kitchen with doors that I can shut and lock, so no one is in my kitchen while I am cooking.

I have an island with no seating as I figured we'd never use the stools. We are both shorter preople and are much more comfortable at a table.