yep, stunning. I been drawing something similar for a while and it's awesome to see your ab fab results after your OP. I got interested in some ikea solid timber benchtops, not nearly as nice as yours, and thought I'd combo them with black cabinets, white stone and white walls (just a "what if" design). so I totally love your kitchen. it's great how well the tiles look now compared to when you first posted, they really excite me! and the lightshades against the black wall. and what's that dining area I see? that smoked glass table top with timber trestles and black chairs and that black and white rug? where you get those?! I want to see more! congratulations, it's hard not to gush! big ups to Mldesign too.

I guess it depends on how much walking space you want. In this current configuration you have quite a lot of space for moving around, but do you want that? I would personally go for an L shape to maximise bench space with one section at a different height for seating. Alternatively, you could just have a standard L shape with seating on one side. Either way it's going to be quite a nicely sized kitchen.

Hi I just thought I would leave a comment about the visibility of joins in reconstituted stone such as Caesarstone tops on islands longer than 3 metres. From a patern point of view; by selecting a style that has a fine grain certainly helps with reducing the visibility of a join. As for the join itself, the technology and tooling used to make such joints has come a long way in the last 10 years; therefore if you use a Kitchen Manufacturer who uses up-to-date stone fabrication methods, then such joins can be next to near invisible. Below is a kitchen we made with an Island that is over 4.3 metres long and has a join through the centre; where the join actually has to be pointed out to be seen. We have seen Kitchen Manufactures use the two height method but you really don't have to do this to achieve a long island. If you would like a long island, then you should not be put off by having to have a join; careful selection of your material, manufacturer and planning can achieve great results. Hope this helps anyone reading this article and the comments above.

I have had both arrangements (stove in island bench and now on a wall) and each was exactly the right solution to the particular challenges of each particular house – taking into account views, orientation, passageways and articulation with other parts of the house as well as the number of people in the household etc. I would say though that when we had the stove in the island bench that island bench was a very deep one so that people sitting along the non-working side of the island were well clear of any spatter and still had space for their meals (if it was just family sitting up at the bench for breakfast or lunch) or for guests with drinks and nibbles in front of them). And for both situations I felt the need for a high-quality, very quiet exhaust system – there is no point having an exhaust system that only shifts (or recycles) a small amount of air or sounds like a jet taking off (the worst is a combination of the two) – if you want to use your kitchen for a combination of serious cooking and socialising (and you don't have staff!) then you need a super quiet, super efficient exhaust system to make the combination work.