Kitchen layout

Ky-An

Hi all, just moved into my house and I hate my kitchen. The kitchen is at the side of the house and has a back door and a window that has no opening. The light isn't even central to the kitchen. Therefore the kitchen is so dark. Beyond the kitchen is a L shaped living room and dining room. If I knock through I will gain more light but the view from the kitchen would still be next doors 10foot fence. This is because it's the side entrance that leads to the garden. To top it all there is not enough base units where you could put a couple units it houses the radiator. There is because there is no more available wall space. Finally the washing machine is in the cupboard. I like the idea of a utility cupboard but then I have no cupboard space. My vacuum is in the garage. Help!

ChristineL

Not sure how to solve all your problems but I can help with getting space for the base units - you can get rid of the radiator and have a "wet" plinth heater installed. It's a small unit that sits in the space below the base unit. It's connected to the central heating pipes so gets warm when the heating is on and it has an electric fan that blows the warmed air into the room.

http://www.smiths-env.com/products_view.asp?productid=1

We have one in our kitchen. It's small but very good at heating the room.

Ky-An

Thanks also thought of under floor heating. No idea where to get matching units from. The list just goes on and on.....

vansboy

Its hard to understand the layout without seeing it, but you could re-plan the kitchen, on line with Ikeas kitchen planner, from their website. Other kitchen retailrs also have similar systems.

That way, you can mess about with lots of options, until you see something that suits you. It would also price the units, as you go along, so you know how much you'll spend. But it wont add installation or moving sockets and pipework or taking down walls, to the price - you'll have to do that independently.

VB

Owain_Moneysaver

Photos and floorplan please.

ACG

I cant really help with most of that not being a kitchen designer and all but I bought my house and the kitchen was really dark.

We were debating putting an extra window in, however with a bit of thinking about it we managed to brighten the whole room up to the point of not needing an extra window by using white cupboards, lighter flooring/walls and a huge mirror on one of the walls to reflect the light. You would never know it was a dark room. We even managed to get away with a dark work top so it could have been lighter if needed.