![]() (The temptation is to hang them from an expensive pot rack, which won’t hold deeper pots or lids and gets in the way of your view.) The space under cooktops is great for deep drawers for pots and pans. If it’s a cooking island, then pots, pans, and spices should be at hand. On the working side, make sure there’s room to store the things that are needed for the activity the island supports, because an island’s strong suit is also its biggest downfall: It’s isolated. On the public side, take advantage of shallow cabinets (installed back-to-back, with deeper cabinets facing the kitchen) for serving items-napkins, cutlery, platters, etc.-that don’t need to be in the food prep area. You can gain valuable real estate on both the “working” side and the “public” side of an island for storage, always a critical need in kitchens. Whatever type of lighting you choose, make sure it can be dimmed when you don’t need maximum illumination for working. ![]() It’s easy to end up with them at the wrong height, which can either block your view from the island or blind you with a high-intensity bulb shining directly into your eyes. ![]() Pendant LightingĪnother option is pendant lights, which hang from the ceiling. If the distance from the countertop to the ceiling is greater than 6 feet, you’ll need to use fixtures or bulbs specially designed to project light down rather than spread it out. The most common choice is recessed lighting, which is relatively easy if you have standard-height ceilings but trickier with high ceilings. For islands, that means dedicated lighting-you can’t count on ambient light to illuminate your workspace, and you don’t have upper cabinets to hide task lights, as you do elsewhere in the kitchen.Īs with most task lighting, you want the light to come straight down onto the island. (For more on practical dimensions for islands and the minimum space around them, see “Island Minimums,” above, or watch Tom Silva discuss how to size a kitchen island.) Lighting Unless your kitchen is at least 8 feet deep and more than 12 feet long, don’t even think about an island. At minimum, an island should be 4 feet long and a little more than 2 feet deep, but it must also have room for people to move and work around it. Remember, these are minimums it’s better to be more generous if your floor plan allows. Here are the minimum clearances the author uses between islands and cabinets, as well as minimum sizes for islands with different uses. Shoehorning an island into a kitchen that’s too small is a mistake.
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