Hello everyone

First time poster here… we’re doing a complete house renovation and designing the kitchen from scratch. I’ve got a layout which I’m reasonably happy with but I have some niggly doubts - and then I came across this brilliant forum! We did have a lovely designer look at the layout of the ground floor for us, she was great, the detail of the kitchen wasn’t in her remit but she gave some advice. I thought I could finalise the design myself….

So I am posting the floor plan of the ground floor, this just shows the general layout of the kitchen but then there are some block diagrams with more detail of the kitchen layout as well.

We’re a family of 4 with quite young children. We really like the idea of an island where we can look into the room whilst prepping / cooking. The seating at the island will be for a breakfast bar / somewhere to sit with a laptop / chat / entertain and wouldn’t be a dining space.

The thing I’m most uncertain about, is the fridge and freezer. They’re in a gap created by the structure of the house, which is only 1350mm wide but it is 740mm deep, giving plenty of space at the back for ventilation. Planning on getting 2x larder fridge / freezer. But it’s not a lot of space for doors to open so we're proposing to install with the fridge on the LHS and freezer on the right.

I’ve considered switching the fridge /freezer and oven locations round but that would impact on the amount of space at the southern end of the island and also not be as convenient for cooking.

The other thing is the dishwasher is right in the northernmost corner, should it be away from the wall? It’s the least likely place for us to trip over (since we have a habit of leaving the door open), but the disadvantage of course is that you will see the draining board on full display as soon as you walk into the room. Our house is usually slightly chaotic!

One final niggle that’s occupying me, should we make the island shorter so that it lines up with the wall of the original house? That would give more space round the bottom of the island (and for the lighting over) but I’m not sure if visually it’s important or not. I’ve always wanted a really long island like this so it’s a hard decision!

Thank you to anyone who thinks about this and responds. Opinions gratefully received.