Almost every kitchen I'm asked to look at started with the tile. Someone fell in love with a backsplash, then a range, then a pendant, and six months later they are standing in a room where the dishwasher door hits the island and the refrigerator swings into the walkway. The pretty part is real and I love it too, but it comes third. Here is the order I actually work in, with the numbers I check on every plan.
Step 1: Draw the room as it is
Before I pick a single finish, I draw the existing kitchen to scale: every wall, window, door swing and the plumbing and gas locations. The plan above is a real one from my files (the name block is cropped off). The dimension strings along the walls are what I'm checking: 133 inches of run on the range wall, 97 inches on the sink wall. Those two numbers decide how many base cabinets fit, whether a 36-inch refrigerator leaves room for a landing counter beside it, and whether the french doors to the patio can stay.
A note I write on almost every plan: "existing door to be replaced with new window, GC please move down." It sounds small. It is the difference between a sink with a view and a sink staring at a door.
Step 2: The clearances I never bend
- Walkways: 42 inches between the island and the counters for one cook, 48 inches if two people cook at once. At 36 inches you can walk through; you cannot open the dishwasher and the oven at the same time.
- Counter beside the range: at least 12 inches on one side and 15 on the other. Pots need somewhere to land.
- Landing counter at the refrigerator: 15 inches on the handle side, or across from it within 48 inches.
- Dishwasher placement: next to the sink, and never in a corner where its open door blocks a drawer you use every day.
- The work triangle: sink, range and refrigerator between 4 and 9 feet apart from each other, with no full-height cabinet or island cutting through the path.
On the plan above you can see how those rules shape the layout: the sink base is centered on the new window, the trash pullout sits directly to the left of the sink where your hand naturally goes, and the shallow storage unit with the top drawer sits on the back side of the peninsula so the stools still have 14 inches of knee space.
Step 3: Decide what the cabinets have to do
Every cabinet on my drawings carries a label: "base unit for micro, 1 pullout" or "base unit, 1 drawer, 2 pullouts." That is not decoration. It is me deciding, before the cabinet order goes in, where the mixer lives, where the trash goes and whether the drawers are deep enough for pots. Drawers beat doors in a base cabinet nearly every time; you pull one drawer instead of kneeling to dig through a dark box.
Step 4: Now the finishes, as a set
Once the plan works, the finishes get chosen together on one board so nothing fights. A kitchen has about eight surfaces that all touch each other: cabinet style and color, countertop, backsplash, flooring, hardware, faucet, sink and lighting. I put them on one page at the real scale they will be seen in and look at the whole thing at once.
The board above is one direction: warm light oak shaker doors, a soft white stone-look counter, a tumbled white brick backsplash, a copper pendant and a brushed nickel pull. The rule I'm using is two metals maximum, one warm and one cool, and one "busy" surface only. The floor is the quiet tone that lets the backsplash be the texture.
This one goes darker and more tailored: a charcoal range with brass trim, iron-and-glass uppers, zellige-style backsplash, a veined marble-look counter and brass hardware. Notice the paint swatch for the cabinet color sits right next to the floor sample. Cabinet color against floor color is the pairing people most often get wrong when they choose each one in a different showroom on a different day.
And a third, for a remodel where the client wanted the island drawers to disappear: flat slab fronts in a pale wood, a creamy quartz counter, black bar pulls and that same iron-and-glass pantry cabinet. Three kitchens, three moods, exactly the same planning rules underneath.
What to do this week if you're planning a kitchen
- Measure the room wall by wall and write the numbers on a rough sketch. Note every window, door swing, outlet, and where the water and gas come in.
- Walk the triangle. Stand at the sink, turn to the range, turn to the refrigerator. If anything is in the way today, it will be in the way after the remodel unless the plan moves it.
- Put your eight finishes on one page before you buy any of them. Phone photos in a single collage work fine.
If you'd rather have the plan drawn properly before you order cabinets, that is exactly what my Flat Rate Kitchen Design package is: a to-scale floor plan and elevations, cabinet layout, finish selections and a sourcing list, done remotely from your measurements and photos. It saves people far more than it costs, usually in the first cabinet order.
More kitchen and room-planning guides, free, over on Your Design Guide.
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