Design a grill station — a working edge, a cook zone, and a serving table
A grill station is a working edge, not a lone grill on the lawn: the grill anchors the top with 24 inches of cook zone kept clear in front, the rolling kitchen cart sits at its shoulder as the prep-and-platter surface, the round table stages and serves, the garbage cart parks downwind, and a planter box grows the herbs that actually get cooked. Five catalog pieces in 10×9 feet — search the exact names in the Furnish panel, place them in your own plan, and check the cook's path in 3D.
Watch it
Design a grill station in 40 seconds
Every piece at its true size, clearances checked, then a walk around it in 3D. The list, sizes, and steps are below.
A grill dropped in the middle of the lawn cooks fine and works terribly: no surface for the tray of raw burgers, no landing for the done ones, the trash a hike away. This layout is a working edge — grill and prep cart side by side on one line, so raw-to-fire-to-platter is a hand-off, not a lap of the yard.
Every piece is in the RoomSketch3D catalog — search the exact names in the Furnish panel, place them in your own plan, and measure the cook zone with the Tape measure before you wheel anything across the grass.
Or let the app place it: tap the Auto-furnish wand in the toolbar, drag a box over the area you want to use, type Grill Station in the search box and pick its card. Every piece lands against your walls, with a Fits or Tight badge for the space you drew — then edit anything. More in Auto-furnish.
What you'll need
- •Grill (60″ × 24″, 48″ tall) — the working edge; keep 24″ clear in front
- •Kitchen Cart (30″ × 18″, 36″ tall) — the prep-and-platter surface, on wheels
- •Patio Table (Round) (42″ round) — staging and serving
- •Garbage Cart (24″ × 28″) — parked downwind of the smoke
- •Planter Box (48″ × 18″) — the herbs you actually cook with
- •A 10×9 ft patch of patio, deck, or lawn
Step by step
- 1
The grill anchors the working edge
Search Grill (60″ wide) and set it along the top of the zone, facing in. The 24-inch strip in front of it is the cook zone — the cook stands there, the hood swings there, nothing else lives there. Flow Check only flags pieces that actually overlap the grill, so check the strip with the Tape measure.
The station on the plan — grill and cart on one working edge, table in the serving half. - 2
The kitchen cart is the prep-and-platter surface
Search Kitchen Cart (30″ × 18″) and park it at the grill's shoulder on the same edge. Its 36-inch top is one turn from the grates: the raw tray waits on it going in, the platter lands on it coming off, and because it rolls, it carries the whole load back to the kitchen in one trip.
- 3
The round table stages and serves
Search Patio Table (Round) (42″) and center it in the lower half of the zone, clear of the cook zone. It holds the buns, the sides, and the people — the hand-off point where the cook's job ends and dinner starts.
- 4
Garbage downwind, herbs on the edge
Search Garbage Cart and put it in the corner downwind of the grill — close enough for drippy plates and spent foil, out of the smoke's path and the cook's. Then search Planter Box and run it along the opposite edge: rosemary, thyme, and basil two steps from the grates, because herbs you can reach are herbs you use.
- 5
Walk the cook's path in 3D
Switch to 3D and stand where the cook stands. Check that the cart is one turn from the grill, the table is reachable without crossing the cook zone, and the lid has room to swing. If the hand-offs feel long, slide pieces on the plan and look again — cheaper than repositioning a hot grill.
The station in 3D — one working edge, one serving table, everything a hand-off apart. - 6
Or let Auto-furnish place the Grill Station for you
Everything above can also be done in one go. Open your plan, tap the Auto-furnish wand in the toolbar and drag a box over the spot, tracing the walls you want the pieces against — at least 10 × 9 ft for this layout. In the Ideas list, type Grill Station in the search box and pick its card; if it isn't among the first six cards, tap Show more. A Fits badge means the layout fits the box you drew, Tight means it is up to about 12% too big and a piece may sit a little past an edge. The five pieces land against your walls, and Variation 1–5 offer other arrangements — mirrored, turned to another wall or corner, or with a piece swapped for a similar one; where it can, it skips arrangements that would land on furniture already in your plan. If the plan still looks empty after you pick the card, tap Variation 2 (or any other variation) and the pieces appear — a known glitch can leave the first variation undrawn. Tap View in 3D to check it, then Done: the whole placement is one undo step, and every piece stays editable. More in Auto-furnish.
Drawn over the top-left corner of a plain 14×12 ft room, the Grill Station lands in a few taps — five pieces, a choice of variations, every piece still editable.
Tips
In the real yard, keep the grill 10 feet from the house
The plan places the Grill relative to its own zone — but when you site that zone, keep the grill at least 10 feet from the house, deck railings, and anything overhead. Draw your actual yard, drop the station in, and measure the gap on the plan before you measure it with a tape.
The cart earns its wheels
The Kitchen Cart is the station's runner: load it in the kitchen, roll it out, prep on it, platter on it, roll it back. If you swap it for something fixed, you've traded the one piece that moves the food for another table.
Measure the cook zone yourself
Flow Check catches pieces that overlap the grill itself, not ones parked in the 24 inches in front of it — a chair, the table pulled too close, the planter drifting over all pass silently. Run the Tape measure out from the grill's front; if anything sits inside 24 inches, move the furniture, not the clearance.
Common mistakes
Anything in the cook zone
The 24-inch strip in front of the grill belongs to the cook, the hood swing, and nothing else. A chair, a cooler, or the table's edge parked there means someone standing in spatter range every time the lid opens. Keep it empty — that's what the clearance is for.
No surface beside the grill
A grill without a prep surface at its shoulder means the raw tray balances on a railing and the tongs get set on the grates. The cart lives one turn away for a reason — if it drifts across the zone, the working edge stops working.
Trash upwind — or across the yard
A garbage cart upwind of the grill sends every whiff across the cook zone; one across the yard means greasy plates travel. Downwind corner, two steps from the table — close enough to use, out of the smoke's path.
Frequently asked questions
What furniture makes up a backyard grill station?
Five catalog pieces: a Grill on the working edge, a Kitchen Cart beside it for prep and platters, a Patio Table (Round) for staging and serving, a Garbage Cart downwind, and a Planter Box for cooking herbs. Search each name in the Furnish panel.
How much space does a grill station need?
This full version fits 10×9 feet: the grill and cart on one edge, the 24-inch cook zone in front of them, and the table in the serving half. The minimal version — grill plus cart — works along any 8-foot stretch, as long as the cook zone stays clear.
Can the grill station join a larger patio plan?
Yes — draw the whole patio and give each zone its own logic: this station on the working edge, a patio lounge circle where people linger, or a balcony bistro pair where space is tight. Keep the cook zone and the walking paths clear between them and the zones share one yard without fighting.
Start designing your room
Put this into practice in the 3D room planner: draw it, furnish it, walk through it in 3D — on web, iOS, and Android.
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