Kitchen / Diner design advice

Ballymoney

Looking for a little advice please. I’m designing our new kitchen / diner and the dining element of it will be at the end with bifolds looking out to the garden.

My question is what is the minimum space I can get away with for a dining table measuring 1400 x 900 allowing space to walk round it?

The kitchen dimensions are 5850 x 3700, and my favourite kitchen design that I’ve come up with is cabinets running along the 5850 wall with an island (2200 x 1200) running parallel. This leaves an area of 2800 (width) x 2600 (depth) at the end of the kitchen. This would leave 700 clearance at both ends of the table and 850 clearance on the sides where seating will be used. From experience would this setup work?

Thanks

Doozergirl

Pictures speak a thousand words! 

It's tight, but I really can't picture it.  

EssexExile

Pictures are great but I'd get some boxes and chairs and things and move them about, experimenting with the space.

Ballymoney

Please ignore the measurements in red, they’re slightly wrong. It shows the overall layout design though with a wall of cabinets and the island with dining area at the end. 

The dining area at the end will be 2800 wide (parallel to bifolds) and 2600 from the bifolds to the island.

Ballymoney

EssexExile said:

Pictures are great but I'd get some boxes and chairs and things and move them about, experimenting with the space.

I’ve tried my best (wife thinks I’m going mad) but we’re completely changing the layout of the kitchen so it’s hard to do it in our current setup.

Personally I think it’s JUST manageable but I’d love other peoples opinions.

Doozergirl

Forgive me as I can't see your full floorplan - and they're also quite useful to see how the house flows, but you're squeezing the dining table in yet you've got a lot of clear space to the other side of the island.   

You've got a huge amount of floorspace dedicated to getting to a small laundry cupboard - effectively donating what looks like about 4 square metres of space to your washing machine.  

Move the doorway to your utility room and swap the washing machine position so you can run the kitchen units right down to the corner. 

Have you thought about turning the island into a peninsular instead? Attaching it to the wall so that you free up more space for the table?  You can then turn the table 90 degrees and have more than enough space for the dining chairs. 

yksi

Figure out the minimum practical space to be able to walk past a table with the chair and a human in place. There are other walls in your house, you can do it anywhere. If the table's too big then you look at getting a smaller one. Designing an expensive kitchen renovation around an existing table is madness, it's like planning the entire house's colour scheme around that set of curtains that you got for free off Aunty Dorothy.

Doozergirl

Rubbish phone scribble, but pictures speak a thousand words. 

There's also a bit less work in having the dishwasher near the sink.  It's achievable, of course, but you need a plan for your water feed and waste.  If it's on an island then the waste needs to be sub-floor. 

You probably want to hide the washing machine, but that cupboard would
make an awesome pantry and save a small fortune (and even more space) on cabinets as it would hold so much! 

Ballymoney

Thank you Doozergirl. I’ve attached a floor plan now to help.

What would become the utility is currently a room under the stairs accessed via an external door. The floor plan isn’t perfectly accurate (it’s directly under the stairs) but, due to the stairs, it’s 1400 x 900 and the height ranges from 900 (where washing machine is) to full height where the door is. I was hoping to have the door positioned further inwards allowing cabinets the full length of the wall but due to the stairs the door just doesn’t fit unfortunately.

I originally had the washing machine in the island (the 600 base unit) but my wife thought it would be nice to hide it away in a utility if we knock through.

I also tried out a peninsula design but I’d need tower cabinets on the back wall to get the storage so I’d lack counter space. I’ll upload the design I did when I can find it.

Ballymoney

I hadn’t considered a peninsula off the back wall. Interesting idea. I’d only played around with the idea of a peninsula off the long wall of units. I’ll have a good think to see if we can make that work, thank you.

Ballymoney

Sticking with the island I’ve made a few alterations. Moved the washing machine to the island and made the utility a pantry. The extra storage in the pantry has allowed me to get rid of the units at the dining end.

The black solid walls in the dining end are an extension done by the previous owners. It narrows the kitchen slightly at that end by 340mm in total.

A 2500mm bifold will go in at the dining end.

Opinions are welcome. Anyone with a single wall kitchen, have you found 1900 of worktop space to be sufficient for a sink, toaster, and kettle?

Thanks for everyone’s input so far.