Each year the organizers of the annual Music Hall Kitchen Tour think up a great new place for kitchen design fans to explore and this time it's lovely Kittery and Kittery Point, Maine. Water views, Colonial homes — or older — and fantastic form-meets-function interiors in some of the loveliest homes on the Seacoast will make this 19th Annual Kitchen Tour one to remember. The tour will be held Saturday, May 1, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Ann Kendall, co-chairwoman of this year's event, says, "This year, we are confident that each Kittery and Kittery Point home will thrill and inspire everyone on the tour. The kitchens are so diverse; some are so sophisticated with all the newest equipment, while others seamlessly blend the old with the new. There are spacious kitchens and cozy kitchens and they are all wonderful. Some of us just dream about what we could do to our own kitchens, while others actually take notes and make plans for real changes. It is a spectacular day and each year is unique and exciting."

With guidebooks in hand, tour-goers can start, tour and finish wherever they like, perhaps at the home of Jackie Abramian and Harout DerSimonian, whose renovated barn houses both their living space, kitchen area and their Haley Art Gallery, which is accessible from the family kitchen.

"It was a dairy farm at one time," says Jackie. "Here by the sink is where the cows were milked so the windows are short."

The Haley Gallery complex was the original 1890 Moulton Dairy Farm and it was reconfigured by the former owners in 1994. The old farm house, the barn, the milking shed, and the refrigeration shed were all retained but redone. Jackie and Harout didn't need to touch the kitchen, but they transformed the barn into their gallery and the living space.

"Everything is neatly compartmentalized in the kitchen," says Jackie. "The range is separate from the oven and I love that there are two sinks. We have two children, 14 and 11 and they like to cook. We can all be in the kitchen and still see who is coming into the gallery. Usually my husband and I are doing the cooking, but my daughter, Anais, likes to cook and Artin is usually the sous chef. They'll sometimes tell us, 'We're making dinner tonight.'"

Jackie says that when they first saw the farm, the kitchen was an unexpected pleasure.

"It's an antique farm and you don't expect to find a modern kitchen. We kept it about the same but we like to bring our multicultural things into it. We're also very friendly with our artists in the gallery and they come in to cook. We have the Art & Dine events each month and it's the circle of the experience of art, the community and the food completes that circle."

The open spaces in the gallery and the kitchen come in handy when Jackie puts on one of those monthly Art & Dine dinners featuring cuisines from other cultures and eras as well as her Victorian Tea Time. The tea will be set up during the tour and attendees can get a pick-me-up from a good "cuppa." The gallery will also offer discounts for tour attendees.

"The Tea Time is so that people can sit and relax. You don't need to leave after looking at the art in this gallery. Sit, rest, and look at the art from a different perspective, and have some tea from a real Vicorian tea cup," says Jackie.

, off of Route 1 at the outlets. For further information contact 207-439-7612, haleygallerycomcast.net or visit www.haleygallery.com.