Like a lot of old houses, our windows are very low, which makes kitchen planning difficult. In the area that was originally the kitchen (the in-law suite in our current plan), there are 3 windows and 4 doors, making an efficient modern kitchen layout all but impossible. I might want my kitchen to look old, but it's got to work!
Moving the kitchen to what was originally the dining room helped alleviate some of this problem - the dining room has a bank of three windows that is high enough to accommodate modern cabinets. That's where we've placed the sink in our plan. But there is another window near the corner that drops to about 18" from the floor like the rest of the windows in the house. I decided to place an L-shaped window seat there instead of standard cabinets. I hate corner cabinets, so I'm actually thankful for the low window height. Like the rest of my ideas, I always think it's a little unorthodox until I start doing research and find out it's not an original idea after all.
Our window seat is between the sink and range in prime prep location, but I'm imagining a few little helpers standing on the window seat to help with cleaning extra cake batter off the mixing bowls and spoons (don't worry - there will be a 30" cabinet between the seat and the stovetop, safely out of reach of little hands). Construction will be similar to the built-ins in the girls' bedroom - over-the-fridge cabinets outfitted with ikea drawers to maximize storage potential.
If I discover that I really need more counter space in that area, I've toyed with the idea of adding drop-leaf countertops on the ends of the cabinets. When not in use, they'd lay against the cabinet side neatly out of the way. Again, apparently there's nothing new under the sun. My novel idea has been done!
Fortunately, that's an easy thing to retrofit, so I'm going to wait to find out if it's necessary. I've already made this into a 10-year project, so what's a little more time?
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