Joanie Rubin of Brighton worked with designer Jay Tovey to renovate her kitchen — after, above and before, below. Her priorities included preserving the window looking out to the back porch and adding storage. Tovey added cabinets that matched the 1920s style of the home and provided more storage, along with granite counters and a dual-heat stove.

It could be a crack in the floor tiles, a nasty chip in one of the cabinets or one too many times reaching awkwardly for a needed utensil. But it’s usually a small defect that starts the ball rolling toward a total kitchen renovation.

Joanie Rubin of Brighton got tired of pulling a cookie sheet out from under a bunch of pans. And her husband, Tai Kwong, wanted gas burners to prepare his native Cantonese food.

The couple, who both work at University of Rochester, hired Jay Tovey of Tovey Co. Inc. to do the work on their galley kitchen. And they were impressed by how Tovey and his designer on the project, Kim Martin, were able to preserve the touches they wanted — such as a window looking out to their porch and a butcher block they’d used since they were married — while using every available inch for updates, Rubin says. (They moved the window up, for example, angled the sink and added a vertical cupboard by the refrigerator for those cookie sheets.) They were able to meet a modest budget on the cabinets but make them match the 1920s colonial style of their home. They also wanted a dual-heat stove (gas and electric) to meet Kwong’s stovetop cooking needs and Rubin’s baking needs.

Rubin says they were able to go higher-end on some details such as granite countertops because of the smaller size of their kitchen. But she balanced it with other choices, such as buying a lower-end stainless steel sink at Home Depot.

Tovey had to talk them into a backsplash, but Rubin says she’s glad he did. It ties the room together.

If you’re on a budget and have to scale back a kitchen project, Tovey says the backsplash is not something to eliminate.

Gary Pino, owner of Concept II in East Rochester, says nothing beats a backsplash for raw visual power in kitchen design.

“It’s what people see when they walk in,” he says. “It’s like wall art.”

Pino encourages clients to be creative in that area, and he sees more and more elaborate tile designs and vibrant colors emerging as the finishing touch to already impressive kitchens. “The cabinet is the suit. The backsplash is the necktie.”

Here are 10 other trends from the experts on what makes a superior kitchen in 2009. We talked with Tovey; Pino; Bonnie St. Denis, a sales and design specialist at McKenna’s Rochester Kitchen and Bath Center in Fairport; and Dan D’Angelo, owner of D’Angelo’s Plumbing, Heating, Kitchens and Baths in Rochester.

Stove hoods. Stainless steel will always be popular in range hoods — with upper-tier offerings becoming more sleek and futuristic — but many new kitchens are incorporating decorative hoods with ornate stucco patterns, and even integrating the appliance seamlessly into the look of the surrounding cabinetry.

Green features. Environmentally friendly materials are all the rage, Pino says. He sees a growing demand for bamboo, a fast-growing wood.

Tovey says some of the green options such as newer foam insulations can also squeeze more space into a remodeling project. For example, using that insulation on the roof line instead of having insulation from the ceiling to the roof can allow for the popular recessed lights and ductwork for the stove hoods.

L.E.D. lights. The hot trend in accent lighting, Pino says, is the small, concealable, energy-efficient light-emitting diode. “They can be used anywhere: inside cabinets, above cabinets, even in the toe kicks,” he says.

Tovey says he was a late convert to this trend, but is now completely sold on them. The products have gotten better and more affordable.

Countertops. Granite is still in, but what’s the next big thing in counter material? Here comes IceStone, a fashion-forward line of counter surfaces made from sustainable materials, particularly recycled glass and concrete. “It’s a quartz-type product, recycled from soda bottles and other glass materials,” Pino says.

Large islands. These are definitely a must-have for owners whose kitchens can support them. “It gives you more counter space, and a lot of room to work in,” D’Angelo says.

Varied tones and materials. Five years ago, D’Angelo says, dark countertops were in fashion: “They drew your eye and called attention to themselves.” Now he sees more “tone on tone” counter-cabinet pairings, in which understated countertops of varying materials are selected for their similar shades to the undercabinets that support them. “It’s a cleaner, classier look.”

So is varying the countertops with other surfaces. In the Rubin-Kwong home, the butcher block that they wanted to keep is used to break up the space.

In Olivia Cornell’s Brighton home, the granite surface covering a large island is broken up twice, by a deep sink on one side and a swath of Iroko wood built into the other. With two barstools positioned in front of it, the look of dark-toned wood contrasted against the cool granite immediately suggests “eating” rather than “cooking.”

Stone floors. Tiled floors remain popular, Pino says, but some high-end porcelain tiles can mimic the appearance of stone without the maintenance issues of the real thing. “Stone’s porous — it has to be sealed,” he says. Tovey says some glass products also can do the trick.

And many homeowners are turning to larger tiles. While six- to eight-inch floor tiles were once the norm, homeowners are increasingly turning to oversize 12-inch and even 18-inch tiles. “Large format tile in small spaces makes your space look bigger,” Pino says.

Bonus appliances. People can choose from many options, depending on how they entertain and how much they want to spend. There are counter-depth refrigerators; steam ovens with shallow trays sliding out of a wall-mounted unit; warming drawers for entertaining or for keeping food warm when the entire family can’t eat together; induction stoves and ovens; dishwasher drawers; and new high-end coffee systems designed to be built directly into the kitchen wall.

Walk-in pantry areas can help ease the burden on traditional cabinetry to hold everything a kitchen needs.

Customized spaces. For Rubin, it’s the vertical cupboard by the refrigerator. For Cornell, it’s the narrow slide-out shelves built around their stove that hold spices and other cooking essentials.