What’s the current layout?

I don’t like the stove under the window.

I think I would do:

Sink under the window.

And the stove next to the sink. Or near the fridge.
And possibly move the fridge over. To the wall opposit the window.

Thats where the fridge currently is! But then the room isn’t wide enough for an island, but feels awkwardly empty in the middle. Grr!

The current set up may not work. But I don’t think this one does either

Can you show us the current layout? Photos and floorplan

This is a mock up of the current layout. I can’t find any actual pictures from before we ripped it out. Its so awkwardly wide, but yet just not quite wide enough for an island.

What’s the room behind the kitchen?

Its the dining room. We were hoping to open it up to join them, but its turning out to be impossible, so we are sticking with the two separate rooms.

when you get beyond your main area of cabinets....patio door and furthur on...what is the width?

Id place island w sink in your kitchen ..... but look at various configurations. cant tell the width you have to work with. You can butt a table w seating up to the end of a run with sink.. You can make a T island. You can curve the end of your island at the non sink end and place stools similar to around a round table. You can perhaps make a double island situation with the 1st one holding the sink and 2nd one furthur down w most of the stools....[you want a lot of stools it seems] if you are washing a LOT of dishes for some reason and worried about it.....people still do install a two tier counter run if seating is the priority and trying to mask certain views. You have 8 stools as its shown. How many sizes/shapes have you taped off and actually tried to imagine in the space? Not knowing why but if you want that # of stools I'd look at double island w 1st one being task oriented w sink closer to stove and fridge maybe 2 stools ...then the 2nd one down w a few drawers and bulk of stools there.

if you can get 2 stools at smaller sink island up in task zone......can you work w island furthur down w 2 across/ 1 on the end ?? like this..... for your primary seating island. seems best to take advantage of wider part of your room. Your seating requirements are significant.

Hammond Kitchen 1 · More Info

I think you might be right. The tiny island is a possibilty if I make it skinnier. Thanks for the advice. I had originally wanted the island/table combo so that the dishes and crumbs could be pushed directly into the sink to make clean up a breeze. But it just wasn’t feeling quite right. So I went back to the traditional layout and its feeling better. Hopefully the skinny island doesn’t look dumb.

You need a scaled drawing, flat on paper with every single dimension in the kitchen

Walls, widows, doorways, and include adjacent areas and their dimensions.

Sky view plans as above are useless.

Post it as a jpeg, bold, and legible. Below and every single inch

This kitchen was designed to be a kitchen, and a breakfast table. It should remain that way. Keep the kitchen in the kitchen. The island is much too large, and blocking access to the door. Unless you want to completely rework your exterior and interior both, and spend several hundred thousand dollars doing that.

The current layout is SO much better than the proposed. It just needs s peninsula. Sometimes, changes, just to change, is frying pan to fire.

I don't like the island blocking the slider in your proposal. Some of my neighbors have done this in their remodels, so I guess some people like it, but I can't bring myself to do it. I'm not into feng shui as a rule, but there's something about it that blocks the flow for me and it seems wrong.

Questions:

Also where does the deck go outside? Does it go across the dining room? Can you open that up and move the slider into the dining room then run the kitchen all the way down.

Something like this?

Or if the room is long enough, do an Lshape onto the right wall and open into the dining room.

Just some thoughts. It's too bad you ripped everything out before having a plan done. That's added pressure.

It’s wonderful you are asking for reviews. I did and it saved me from making huge mistakes. Though, after I saw how much there is to know/learn, I understood the value of working with a kitchen designer. I went through three KDs before I found someone very reasonable and who could deliver what I needed. Message me if you’re interested.

I also read as many ‘getting started’ posts about floor plans and kitchen design and construction.
One of the best getting started posts:

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5972404/new-to-kitchens-read-me-first-2020-interim

Taken from the Featured Answer of the "New to Kitchens? Read Me First!" thread (link also posted by TLV 123).

Could you please post a fully-measured layout of the space(s) under consideration and a sketch of the entire floor. Both can be either hand-drawn, computer generated, or drawn up with computer/app tools.

By "fully-measured", we mean a layout with the widths of each wall/window/door/doorway and the distances between each wall/window/door/doorway labeled. See a sample below. If something cannot be moved or changed, label it precisely on your layout (see post in sample) and tell us why it cannot be moved/changed -- we may have some ideas for you.

The sketch of the entire floor lets us see how the Kitchen relates to the rest of the home. It doesn't have to be to-scale, but it should accurately show how the rooms relate to each other and should include all interior & exterior doors. In addition, it will help us see how traffic flows in, around, and through the Kitchen. Label the front entry and family entry. The family entry is usually a garage or side entry, but it might not be. It's helpful to know which door you use to bring in groceries.

Regardless of how you draw it up (by hand, computer, etc.), please be sure all measurements are labeled. (Note: Computer generated layouts often lack key measurements and, sometimes, measure to/from things like the middle of a wall or the middle of a window. Neither are useful. Measure each item and the distances between each item.)

Other questions...

• Tell us about you and your family and how you plan to use your Kitchen. All-adults? Empty Nesters? Children (now or in the future)?
• What appliances (& their sizes) do you plan to have?
• Where are you flexible? Can walls/windows/doors/doorways change (move, change size, add, delete)?
• Do you have a basement under the Kitchen or are you on a slab?