A "butler's pantry" with a pocket door (and no sink, so more counter space) at one end of the kitchen would be the ideal solution, but of course that depends on dimensions of your kitchen and whether you can squeeze in enough space for that pantry. We have one off the end of our kitchen, which is maybe 1.5 m square and offers a lot of extra counter space out of sight of the lounge. We have friends who had a fairly big kitchen area, put a blade wall down the middle to create a U shaped kitchen, so the oven and bench face the lounge on one side of the U, the sink is at the end on the short side of the U, and the small appliances and pantry are on the other side of the U, with the blade wall hiding the mess.

Congratulations on your new home, from the photo it appears that you need more storage for your art gear, could you create an island bench on wheels ( so that it can be moved when you want to work out) to work at with storage under, plus some extra wall storage. It looks like you have three walls without windows to work with. Maybe swapping the tall cabinet with the side board would help you could then place the lamp on it instead of the CD? stand The shelving on wheels below is from Ikea some of your plastic storage bins can fit into this cheers

Always, always these things/decisions/projects will come down to how much money there is to work with.........don't underestimate the knock-on cost effect of renovation..........the thing is, does the house need a complete overhaul anyway? If so then potentially there is opportunity for reconfiguration, but don't be surprised with the general scope of what you are thinking about will equate to $300K for pulling the whole thing apart and putting it back in a similar but different format within the general existing footprint .......if you are thinking under $100K then really the only options are strategically consolidated refit updates to critical areas without any significant structural changes......... Finally, as always it pays to get some professional design advice when you are this stage of the process, even just to give you the accurate information and options to help you make informed decisions for your investment.. Good Luck :) PD www.pauldistefanodesign.com

not hard just tedious...depends on the fabric but assuming sheers? the wave effect is created by a band stitched to the top of the curtain (available at Spotlight or similar) but will look much better if you first decide if you want your new curtains to push back to one side or open in the middle, push back to both sides or stay fixed in place, then decide on the suitable track length allowing enough extra width to push the curtains away from the window if necessary to expose the glass, then check the length and measure the flat width of each new section of curtains (ie measure the bottom width) to work out how much total width of fabric you have, then, for sheer curtains, it usually looks better if you use at least twice or more the width of the flat curtains to create the folds...more generous looks better than skimpy, then, unpick the header tape and hems at least 10 cms on either side of where you need to cut.. then lay the curtain flat out and carefully measure and mark where you will cut, then join the sections with French Seams (instructions on line) redo the hems and header tapes ready to hang, yay!! we have some curtains that were bought second hand about 20 years ago that have been cut, patched and rejoined for three different homes and i've even cut off the dirty worn edges and reversed the panels to get more wear so investing in good quality second hand curtains can be a great buy, good luck!!