New kitchen help - is this a good design (with pic)

[Kitchensanta]

DH and I bought a house with a long covered terrace which looks out onto a walled patio garden which gets great morning and afternoon sun. The current kitchen is small, and badly located in the house so we are trying to work out if we should knock out the exterior wall between the house and the terrace, and turn the terrace into a kitchen or not. The room we would be knocking through from is actually our dining room so to us it kind of made sense.

It's narrow, about 2.9m .. but long .. 8.50m ... and has great high ceilings 2.8m. There are 3 evenly spaced arches (structural) 2 of which we thought we would put doors into so we can have that indoors/outdoors feeling, and 1, at the farthest end where we would put in a window.

In this design, because we want to keep the feature of the old stone wall (it is an old village house and we don't want to hide the true character of the building) we tried the idea of just having a long, fairly wide island (about 6m x 1.2m) rather than a more traditional design of cupboards along the back wall.

The window/door side of the island would have an underset (space for legs) so bar stool seating can go on one side, and on the side near the wall it would have the dishwasher, small fridge, and storage for pots, pans, plates etc. We have a separate area of about 2.2m x 3m which would sit just off on the left hand side of the picture (just before you would walk into the main kitchen area) which would hold main fridge, freezer and serve as a walk in pantry too. On the far end of the island we would have an inset sink, and on the nearer end a ceramic hob with extractor overhead. The far wall will all be more storage and also house 2 ovens (we cook a lot and entertain), and have the microwave and coffee machine.

It is pretty different to anything I've had before and I am really attracted to a minimalist style.

Do any MNs out there have any experience with a space like this? Or any suggestions / drawbacks you can see. This is a big project for us and I really don't want to screw it up! I put this design together using an online app, but can't seem to get it to do a rendered picture from any other angle .. so apologies for that.

Please help me judge if this is a good design or not TVMIA

I'll also suggest rethinking the fridge and pantry location. A well set out kitchen has the "golden triangle" - ie a triangle between sink, stove and fridge. That gives the best flow and efficiency.

Things work a bit differently here I think @Gunpowder. So far my experience has been that kitchen suppliers (at least those near me) charge for having designs drawn up ... understandable I guess as nobody wants to work for free without the guarantee they will actually sell you the kitchen. I guess they then knock a bit off the price if you do buy from them using their design. That is why we were trying to get a good idea of what we wanted before going and asking a company to do a proper design (all safe and checked with clearances etc. as PPs have pointed out) which would cost us.

But, I know in the end that we will have to pay to have an expert translate our idea into a tweaked design that meets all safety and legal regulations.

@k1233 I had heard of the golden triangle before, but was never sure how that could apply in a long narrow space. Am going to Google it now

So many amazing suggestions already but the only other big thing that stood out to me is your fridge. You absolutely need that near your oven and hob, especially as you're into cooking and entertaining. It will drive you absolutely potty having to walk far to get bits out all the time.

Do you have a plan you could upload? Showing the ground floor? I agree with everyone above, this doesn't work at the moment...

You need enough clearance to open the cupboard doors and still be able to walk past them. Your plan is too tight either side of the island - I doubt you’ll be able to open those doors.

I actually quite like it. We went for a huge peninsula as our only workspace, facing out into the room and it's honestly fabulous. Yes you don't have much space but you don't in agilely kitchen either, and this essentially is a galley kitchen.

I'd move the hob nearer the cooker though. Also you can put the sink in the island too (we have our sink and hob 1.2 m apart and it fine)

What I'd add:
Big hanging pan rack from the ceiling.
Narrow depth shelving all along that beautiful back wall to either echo the ceiling beams, or contrast with it. You can have some practical stuff on there (toaster for example) plus a few chosen beautiful things, like a coffee pot, or iconic Starck lemon squeezer. And a picture or two resting on it. Soft lighting coming from under and pointing up too. Will make that stone wall really stand out.

It's a beautiful room

Does your DH do most of the cooking, OP?

I’m just wondering why he wants to change from a gas hob. I agree it goes with the minimalist look and they’re easier to clean.

But you don’t really see them in professional kitchens and they offer less flexibility if you like to char-grill things directly on the rings (like peppers or flatbreads).

I know lots of people love them because of their low profile and low maintenance but if you’re more into the cooking than the look, I’d stick with a gas job.

Have you got an overhead plan so we can see dimensions and clearance?

I actually quite like that design, especially if there is another dining table elsewhere.

Or hob even

Have to disagree on the hob front. Induction (a decent one) is just as responsive as gas. We have a chef in the family and she loves ours.

Hi all, sorry for the delay, have been trying to draw an empty floor plan. Here is the space we have, now also showing where the walk in pantry could be. The dimensions are a bit rough but if anything I have under estimated a bit. I think the overall scale and proportions are pretty accurate though.

Will love seeing any ideas you have.

@sittingonacornflake thanks, totally get what you say about fridge and distance ... this is a hot country... everything gets kept in the fridge so it gets used a lot

@competitiveconnie hopefully the rough floor plan I uploaded will give a better idea

@Tuberoses yep, definitely agree, so many PPs have said that too, and we now 100% take that on board

This is asking for a sort of P-shape kitchen, going alongside the wall to the left and around the bit you haven't shown us before, with or without a small peninsula (personally I wouldn't have a peninsula, it's narrow). Then the part you showed us is asking to be a dining room. Accesorize with sideboards, possibly a nice statement kitchen trolley would be cool too, you could make it your own. I am seeing hard flooring and a nice rectangular rug under a statement table and chairs in the diner, and retain the brick wall.

@lightlypoached

Have to disagree on the hob front. Induction (a decent one) is just as responsive as gas. We have a chef in the family and she loves ours.

I agree, I was a very reluctant convert but it’s so much easier, safer and cleaner

Or in fact a C shape thinking about it, with a peninsula between kitchen and diner, that would look good, be practical and also give you an option to both separate and connect the spaces.

The only addition I would suggest is to be really really careful in how you think about lighting when you've got a high ceiling. You can't do downlighters if changing a bulb needs a tower etc. You might end up using a frame to get decent task lighting, potentially ruining the minimalism etc.

@lightlypoached my DH is sending a big smile and wave to you ... you are the first to say his idea of an island is quite nice so you made him very happy ... but we do see the point that it makes things tight. Maybe he just wanted it too big? But then again don't men always love things bigger?

I loved the image you conjured up about the back wall shelves and hanging pans. And we actually do have an old orange squeezer from the early 1920s

We do love the space, especially as the patio it looks out to is so lovely ... we really want to do it justice no matter what we end up putting there (kitchen or not).

@Warmduscher .. we pretty much cook together which we love, although I am more of a baker and he likes doing meat and fish, so we do spend a lot of time cooking. Also love having friends over and snacking, chatting and drinking wine with them as we cook, which is why we wanted seats for them near us ... and we can rope them in chopping veg and salads etc.

He isn't too precious about gas, induction or ceramic. It was just we wanted something super easy to clean, and he had had ceramic before (pre marriage to me) and loved it.

Gas here isn't super practical as we would have to use gas bottles as we aren't connected to the town gas supply, hence going electric route.

@YellowFish12 ... yes, we do have a formal dining room elsewhere in the house ... actually it would be the room you enter from the kitchen when going past the alcove with the little window. The kitchen would be for informal use, and with the doors open, act as a serving area for buffet lunches we eat in the patio.

Oops @Warmduscher .. forgot to add we have an outdoor grill for doing flamed/chargrilled stuff and DH loves using it even when (rarely) raining

I've just had another idea that is bigger budget but might work.

Take out the windows in the arches, build a roofed extension (glass?) out into the courtyard. The long run of worktop then sits up against the arches. So the arches come down into the work surface. It would look spectacular and give you enough room to have a run of units behind.

Thinking big and outside the box.

I think re the induction -v- ceramic or other types of hobs, we are definitely going to have to investigate further ... but clean surface with no fiddly bits to clean will be a driving factor.