Sure, most of these kitchens could eat ours for breakfast, but it's still fun to look at kitchens that were designed with entertaining in mind. And there are plenty of usable ideas here for opening your kitchen up to guests when you're entertaining at home:

• Arrange a dining table in the kitchen. This way, the food's never far from the action.

• In our last tiny apartment, we always hated the fact that our kitchen was in our living room. But embrace having a kitchen in the living space! Let it be part of the party.

• Get serious with island seating. As in image 3, provide comfy bar-height seating and set the table just as you would at a formal dining table. Our main drawback with this? How awkward would it be having everyone sitting in a row?

• Small and large kitchens alike can be made more inviting with comfy lighting, greenery, and candles as in House Beautiful's Kitchen of the Year 2009 (photo 6), a recreation of Ina Garten's own (photo 8).

(Images: Bulthaup, Benjamin Benschneider/The Seattle Times, Eric Perry/HGTV, Interior Design Gallery, Southern Living, House Beautiful, Sunset, Canadian House and Home)