Kitchen Conundrum: More Inspiration, Neighborhood Edition

Along with the Internet, open houses in our neighborhood have been another source of ideas for our future kitchen. Many houses near us have very similar floor plans to ours, and they have been reworked in a variety of ways. Here are two recently-for-sale kitchens within a couple of blocks of us:

This kitchen is very pretty. I love a lot about it: the two-tone cabinets, school house light, and wood countertops are great. It manages to have a light and airy feeling in a small footprint and an individuality that isn't common in a lot of the remodeled kitchens I've seen around here.



I'm not sure very many of these solutions are practical for us (we'll be leaving the doors on our cabinets and keeping our walls where they are; it's safer that way when you have avian flock, er, family members). However, notice what these folks did with their cabinets/countertop behind the door, where their microwave sits:

A narrow continuation of the counter to provide more space yet still let the door open! We've got a space just like that; it currently houses a kitchen cart, but this makes me think we could do an actual cabinet there.

Another nearby kitchen:

This one is not quite as lovely or well lit. However, it has another clever use of a difficult space that we can translate for our kitchen. See the shallow cabinets and countertop on the right wall, beyond the microwave and range? We've got a space just like that. It currently houses an antique pie safe, but I am thinking we could add lots of cabinetry, and a bit of work space, there as well.