I would recommend the short soapstone backsplash all around, a soapstone sill, and painted wall otherwise. That is because I'm guessing (without more information from you re wall color, cabinet color, design aesthetic in the room etc) that the soapstone up the walls would make for a very dark look regardless of cabinet color. If you google "soapstone backsplash" you will quickly see what I mean, and see if that is the look you are going for or not what you want. If you decide to go with the full height soapstone backsplash, anticipate needing to amp up your lighting plan to compensate.

I ahve no idea the pics you posted mean nothing . Post pics of the actual space and IMO a pot rack is not ideal in most kitchens and at least needs to be close to where you use the pots . As for drip drying without see the space the whole thing sounds off to me. So real help comes for real pictures so post here in a comment DO NOT start another post .

how are you planning on trimming the window?

Thank you @jenny. The full height soapstone backsplashes I've seen have been beautiful, especially around the range, but I agree that for it to look really god it needs quite a bit of light. We'll be ramping up our lighting for the remodel, but our cabinets are a medium-tone wood, and the effect in our small kitchen may be too dark even with the lighting. You're right that we are planning to do a neutral white paint.

Patricia, sorry that my post didnt' provide the information you needed to answer. The mockups seemed more useful to show than the current photos because at the moment our kitchen is down to the studs with our old countertop and sink hooked up as a temporary wash station. For what it's worth, here is the current actual photo.

Additionally, I appreciate your feedback on the potrack. We weren't sure about this either, so we prototyped it using scrap material before gutting our kitchen and lived with it for a couple months and really liked the convenience. Here's the very crudly constructed prototype of that if you're curious.

@lalagirl what we had before was just a sheetrock wrap with wood sill. We're still leaning toward sheetrock wrap since all the other windows in the house finished that way. Just swapping out the sill for soapstone.

Thanks, all

My vote is for a short soapstone backsplash. I think soapstone is great, but one can also have too much of a good thing. I think a soapstone windowsill with a short backsplash is fine.

Whatever you decide about the backsplash, I recommend that you do not put a pot rack above the sink. You are concerned about the backsplash looking too busy, but that would be minor to how busy, if not overwhelming, a pot rack will look.

If you are sold on soapstone backsplash I think 18" nehind the cabinets is mandatory. You don't want two heights around the windows, so I would either stone the whole wall which you said you don't want or do from cabinet to cabinet at sill height/ 12"