One of Honolulu’s answers to homeowners is Homeowners Design Center. The family-owned company is a convenient, one-stop shop for kitchen and bath design. Its newly remodeled, 12,000-square-foot showroom is where homeowners can “test drive” hundreds of samples and displays of the latest products.

“When homeowners come to our showroom, we walk through all of their options, so that they can picture how their homes will look,” says kitchen designer Randall Omoto.

A Kahala couple, Milton and Lani, learned about Homeowners Design Center from a feature in Hawaii Home + Remodeling magazine. Walking into the showroom, they were convinced they had found the perfect resource. They worked closely with Omoto to choose each element of their dream kitchen. Their main objective was to create a lot of space and storage.

The architect’s original plans included a wall that separated the kitchen from the dining room. This didn’t leave space for all of the couple’s requests. To make the kitchen feel larger, Omoto removed the unneeded wall. He also added a central island, with extra storage underneath, in the newly created space.

The large island is the focal point of the new kitchen. The island features a lowered bar area, where Milton and Lani eat most of their meals. To decide on the bar’s height, the couple tried out an assortment of bar stools in the showroom. They decided that a table-height arrangement was most comfortable. On the other side of the bar, Lani whips up international cuisine with a professional-grade Thermador gas cooktop.

Homeowners Design Center’s cabinetry choices are almost endless. “The cabinet line that they chose has 6,000 cabinet combinations,” Omoto explains. Because the kitchen felt large and open, Omoto suggested natural wood cabinetry to warm up the space. The couple took his advice and decided on Canyon Creek cherry wood cabinets with a natural stain, framed with a Shaker-style door.

Then, it was time to decide on countertops. “We explained the pros and cons of each countertop material, such as acrylic, stone and solid surfaces,” Omoto says. Rich granite now covers the counters, coordinating with the natural wood.

As proof of Homeowners Design Center’s power to offer complete kitchen packages, Lani found her kitchen’s finishing touch hanging in the company’s showroom: track lighting with suspended glass pendants. “When I walked into the showroom, I saw that exact rail system, and I said, I have to have that.”