The Case of the Space-Eating Monster Fridge

Hey! Lisa here. So I just ate half a pie. A delectable peach cherry berry pie with a decadently buttery, flaky crust baked to perfection (shout out to The Apple Place bakery for being masters of their craft). But as I stood there, fork in hand, standing at the kitchen counter, I thought to myself, “I would really like someplace to sit down so that I could put all my brain’s focus into savoring every delicious bite, instead of wasting subconscious energy on, you know, balancing on my two feet.” But, alas, we have no seating in my kitchen.

The kitchen was redone by the previous owners shortly before we moved in, and they chose dark wood and sleek finishings.

It’s not totally my style, and had I done the renovation, I might have gone in a different direction–but for the most part, I like it and am in no rush to change it. It is fairly average in size, has lots of cabinets, plenty of natural light, and it functions well for me, but the shape is rectangular and it’s a bit on the narrow side. Exacerbating the narrowness is The World’s Biggest Fridge, which came with the house when we bought it. As many people have said, rather creepily I might add, upon seeing our fridge for the first time, “Woah! You could fit a body in there!” Or, as I would rather think of it, you could fit dozens of peach cherry berry pies. When most people look at the fridge, they see enviable storage space. If you need that storage space to fit, say, a pint of every flavor of Ben & Jerry’s (no judgement–hey, I get it), or if you have a very large family, then perhaps a giant fridge is just the thing for you. But when I look at it, I see the Monster Fridge that’s eating up my kitchen space.

Proportion is everything in a room. One out-of-proportion element can skew the perceived size of everything else in the space. Sometimes playing with proportion can be used to an advantage, but in this case, the supersized fridge makes my average-sized kitchen seem smaller than it is. This Monster Fridge is the width of two normal-sized fridges, and removes the possibility for casual kitchen seating. So, as is the case with my living/family room explained in this previous post, our dining room must serve two purposes. It is our formal dining space as well the place where our family eats all our meals every day. And just like with my living room, I am actually happy about this! I like USING all the rooms in our house, and with our dining room being quite spacious and beautiful (it has lovely high wainscoting, a ceiling medallion, crown moldings, and an elegant arched entryway), it would be a waste of very charming square footage if it were only reserved for dinner guests and holidays.

Below are pictures of the wainscoting and the double arches leading out of the dining room into the living room.

So with that in mind, I decorated it accordingly. I chose a custom dining room table and chairs set that is formal enough in the lines of the design, but is also functional and family friendly. We had a finish applied that resists water stains and chose to not upholster the seats. I love upholstered dining chairs, so I struggled with that decision. But after a year and a half of many spills and sticky fingers and almost daily wiping down of the chairs, I know I made the right decision. It’s all about stress-free design in our nest! Anyway, I love sitting down in our dining room every day and appreciating the prettiness of the room.

That being said, sometimes when we’re rushing around in the mornings to get everyone out the door on time for school and work, when we don’t have time to eat together as a family, it would be great to just have the kids sit down with a bowl of cereal in the kitchen. My daughter in particular likes to be with us as we pack lunches and put away the dishes, and often just sits on the counter with her breakfast. But how can we make seating happen in the space we have?

I’ll share my plan! First things first, Gigantofridge has got to go. I’m considering moving it to the basement (THAT should be a fun endeavor) to keep the extra storage, and then getting a counter-depth fridge in its place. A counter-depth fridge is slightly less deep than a regular fridge, and would make the room feel wider. The width of the fridge would be one-half of what we have now, which would open up a lot of extra wall space. I’ve thought about building out a breakfast bar, and maybe down the line if we choose to renovate the kitchen, we will do that. But the easy solution is to put a counter-height, shallow table against the wall with a couple of stools to mimic a breakfast bar. I plan to stick with a dark wood and stainless steel table, as it goes with the current decor in the kitchen. Check out my options below! One table has a steel base with a dark wood butcher block top and the other has a dark wood base with a steel top. I am also considering whether to go with simple backless wooden stools that slide underneath the table to decrease the footprint of the seating arrangement when not in use (shown paired with the second table), or to go with more interesting wooden stools with backs, or if I want to go with one of the two aluminum options to give the arrangement a more industrial look. I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

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So the takeaway here is that proportions must be considered when designing a space. Unless you have other priorities driving your design, think about how oversized (or undersized, for that matter) elements will impact the perceived size of a space. And also, if traditional solutions aren’t available, think non-traditional. We won’t have a traditional casual dining set in our rectangular, not-super-wide kitchen, but I think a little breakfast bar will be a charming spot for me to sit down and enjoy my pie!