Synopsis: Architect Richard Shugar was hired to design a kitchen remodel to fix a major flaw with an otherwise decent room: its distance from the living and family rooms. His design began with a 10-ft. addition, creating a great room that includes the kitchen and a new family room. The addition also enabled the kitchen to expand, permitting the installation of an island and the creation of a pantry. Shugar highlights three features that make the new kitchen stand out: a two-tier island, a visually dramatic cooking area, and smart storage.

It’s fun to see dramatic before and after photos of old, derelict kitchens transformed into sleek, modern spaces. this kitchen, however, was still in pretty decent shape as we found it. Sure, it was a bit cramped and suffered from poor circulation, and the dark countertops and traditional upper cabinets weighed down the space a bit. But the real problem was that it was removed from the living and family rooms. That’s not what families want today.

The homeowners asked me to design a new kitchen that would connect better to their active lifestyle, which can include one person cooking while another is doing homework and a third is watching TV, all wanting to be close and feel connected. They were looking for spaces that would create intimacy without crowding. They wanted a great space that could serve as a multipurpose center for most daily family activities.

My instinct was not only to rearrange the spaces but to expand them so that the kitchen and family room could become the heart of the house. These spaces were situated on the middle of three floors, so pushing the exterior kitchen-and-family-room wall out 10 ft. would also expand one of the bedrooms on the level below and create the…