Cute exterior elevation!

First of all, I worry about judging plans not drawn to scale, because when they are to scale, the usability and function can be quite different than what we're seeing. I looked at the 2nd floor first, and saw that closets and bedrooms that are labeled the same, but are drawn different sizes. The kids' tub looks like it's drawn too narrow, and the door swings aren't to scale, so it looks like the laundry room door will probably hit the dryer. I'm not sure if there's enough room in front of the dryer to stand and unload it into a basket. These things make me wonder what else may be 'off,' and whether or not the floor plan will really work as envisioned. You'll want to make sure wall widths, door sizes and swings, furniture, and fixtures, as well as room dimensions, are drawn accurately so you don't run into problems later. You don't want a laundry room you can't fit a washer and dryer into, for example.

Main floor.
The closet in the kitchen: Will you be able to access anything stored on the side behind the fridge? Nice pantry storage. I'm not a fan of island cooktops, but the kitchen looks pretty good...Are your ovens dbl or under the counter? Do you really want tall cabinet, regular counter, then a tall cabinet right in the center of that wall? (Not saying it couldn't look or work fine...Just asking) Do you have a fridge with which you can adequately open the doors if it's up against wall? Usually, they need a foot or so of cabinet in between them and a side wall, unless they're the higher end ones that need less clearance.

Do you use the dining room regularly and not mind going through the mud room to get there? Guests will have to loop through your kitchen or dining room to go into the mud room to use the powder room. Again, these may be compromises you're perfectly comfortable with, but I'm just throwing out things that may need thought so that you're sure.

The closet sticking out into the office is unfortunate for the design of that room. I might do one on each side of the French doors to improve the visual balance.

Will the style/construction of your stairway enable you to have that window to the left of the fireplace under the upper section of the stairs?

Will the kids always come in through the garage?

There are good things going on in your plan, and the overall layout looks workable to me. Best wishes on your house sale and your new build!

It looks fine. Is this a stock plan? Looks like it's about 3000 sq ft. It's rather plain. (Better plain than some plans we see with features from six different styles!) A center entrance colonial is always one of my favorites.

Do you think this house might look a little small set on two acres? Could you spread it out a bit? Maybe detach the garage and add a connecting piece?

My perspective may be skewed. We have a single story 2900 sq ft on one acre; that's the normal per acre footprint here. May be entirely different where you live!

Chisue, I (very respectfully) find it an interesting approach to decide house size based on lot size, other than if the lot is small or narrow. I think especially with woods, the size on the lot is particularly a non-issue, since it's hard to judge lot size when it's covered in trees...and we don't know the shape, topography, soil condition, or exposure of the OP's lot. In our case, we had to choose our house size and simplicity of foot print by family size and budget. We have 2750 sq ft with no garage (2 story with 1500 sq ft simple footprint) on a 2 1/3 acre, partially wooded lot. For our neighborhood, and considering it replaced a 900 sq ft mobile home, it looks large. :-)

Lessee if I can drag the pics over here...

I think it's very nice: I like that there aren't any huge long halls, and most areas are well thought out. Are the dimensions not to scale? This can be a real problem when mentally walking through a drawing. A foot, even a few inches makes a big difference sometimes.

It should be an efficeint house to build and live in, but still has a good sense of character. I don't notice a 'back door' area other than through the garage, which would be a problem for me. With a 2 acre lot, maybe you could offset the garage a bit more and have another door in that area.

Maybe consider replacing the 3 unit wide windows with 2 single unit double hung windows. I agree with placing the mudroom in a small connector between the garage and house...maybe use the area where the mudroom was as a breakfast room? The walk-in-closets at the front of the house upstairs wont work. Even using a 2' wide door (tight) with 2' of hanging space on each side requires 6'. The closets may have to take on (in a smaller form) the configuration of the master bedroom closet. If you did away with the alcove entry into the bedrooms and had the bedrooms open directly off the hall, that may give you the room you need.

Hey everyone,

Its close to scale though not exactly. Of course some of the door sizes are off and some other things as I just did this on a spreadsheet basically. To answer some Qs

1. It is not a custom plan, its something I designed myself. I designed my current house as well (totally different in stlye) Its something I really enjoy doing. I am a very hands on person.

2. The kitchen. There will be a little space (2") or so to the right of the Refrig. I currently have the same setup in my current home and it works great. It opens so that the counter on the left is perfectly located and cups and glasses will be in that upper cabinet.

3. THere is actually a sliding glass door in the family room just to the left of the window seat. (FW6068) That will lead to a patio or deck off the backside.

4. THe lot will not be fully cleared, maybe 3/4 or so cleared and the house should actually look quite nicely proportioned on it.

5. Dinning room will not be used a great deal. I kinda like the seperation from the kitchen, I may have both openings from the foyer by french doors not sure yet.

6. THe plan is a bit basic on purpose. We will spend 80% of our time in the family/kitchen so those are the biggest spaces and they open to each other. The back of the house faces south so with all the windows off the back it should get very nice light in those 2 rooms. Adventually when we can afford it the front will end up with a full wrap around porch.

I think it looks pretty darn good. I probably would want a small breakfast nook but you did mention you would be using the dining room alot. And I see a small area at the counter for eating so maybe that's enough for you. I also notice many closets upstairs around the hall bath. I love lots of storage but just noticed how many there are for that one area. I like your plan alot! ;c)

Nice plan. My only comment would be to ask about the closet outside the office. Is it suppose to be in the office? Putting french doors on the DR and Office would look beautiful.

I also think the mudroom seperating the dining room from the kitchen is awkward and could prove awkward when it comes time to serve food, etc. I'm no architect so I have absolutely no recommendations on how to change the plan though. Sorry, I know, I should just keep quiet. LOL

The closet in the office is for the foyer. I added that after getting some feedback from my dad (whose built 2 houses) and the builder. I had just planned to use the closet in the family room for when guests arrive and may still. I am not crazy about how it throws off the semitry of the office.

I think you all have convinced my on the double doors to both office and dining room. That would look sweet.

I may have gone a bit over board with closets but our current house is lacking storage space so I did not want that to happen again, lol. The only thing I am worried about is my wife finding a way to fill everyone!! Maybe I will go with no closets ;)

Oh and yes there is planned space for eating at the island opposite the cooktop and a lower desk height counter on the side of the island for snacking while at the computer.

I added a pic of the house with the porch, god I wish I could afford that from the get go!

Here is a link that might be useful: porch view

Maybe I didn't say it right? The house looks overly 'vertical' to me -- especially when you have room to build more 'horizontal'. I feared a 'peanut on a mountain' effect. No offense meant. I thought you might 'spread it out' a bit. How high will your ceilings be?

You're way ahead of me on the front elevation. Giving the entrance more weight will be nice.

Im glad oruboris imported the plans for us. There are a couple of things *I* would change. (It's still *your* house!)

I'd still like to see a 'connector' between house and garage. Could house a larger mudroom/pantry/storage/back door.

If you don't use the DR a lot, where will you all sit down and eat together? We virtually *live* in our kitchen/breakfast room. (Except in summer, when we live on a screened porch off the breakfast room. Is a porch on your radar?)

How will you vent the island cooktop? I had one on my first plans but switched to a wall location so I could have a powerful overhead exhaust fan.

Will you really use a mini-bar? I haven't seen one on a houseplan in years. I'm looking twice at that area because I'd like to see a powder room good for both family and guests. (May be impossible. Family comes first!)

Upstairs: The laundry is too small for me as anything other than a secondary laundry. In the hall bath I'd like more than five feet for double sinks. (There seem to be too many doors in this area.) How would you like a vanity sink in the dressing area of the master bath -- outside of the bathroom proper?

How strong does the sun get in summer where you are building? We have a southern exposure at the rear of our house and I wish I had more overhang. Actually I wish I had a loggia!

I'm not trying to drive you crazy, I promise. LOL What is the closet on the right, just past the foyer for? I thought that was your "entrance/foyer" closet because that's where we put ours. See my plan below. Aren't you going to miss not having a closet in the office? Also, when and if it comes time for resale, that office can be called a bedroom if it has a built in closet.

It's your house and you have to live in it. I'm just pointing out some things that you may find interesting.

I know you must be sick of everyone talking closets, BUT it seems as if you have many little closets that aren't going to be very useful for storage. Also, I am in agreement with the office closet being in the closet for resale so you can call it a 4 BR house which in my area are more marketable than 3 BRs. Can you sneak anything in under the stairs or is there a basement? Do you really think you would use a wet bar or would you just use the kitchen since its so close (I would make the closet bigger and get rid of the one in the foyer and make the built in bookcase by the window seat such that there is storage in it for "bar" items)? Upstairs you have an area marked HVAC, is this to house the HVAC or just some sort of chase? It eats up quite a bit of space in the Laundry. If you are housing the air handler there, why not put it in the attic? there seems to be some space over the garage area that could be used to get some more interior space (pull the laundry into the bonus room area and expand it as well as pulling the hall bath down so the entrance to the Master BR is not so tight). All the little closets upstairs in the bath area is awkward. If you have a linen closet in the sink area why do you need a second in the toilet/shower area (or vice versa)? I do like the the big window in the master but be careful how big you make it, you need some wall space for furniture. The window in the WIC upstairs looks great from the outside but makes that whole wall of the closet unusable and you will have to do curtains or something such that you don't see clothes hanging from the outside. Just some obervations.

I noticed you said dining won't be used much and that eating will be where the island is. Keep in mind that splatters from cooking can burn and do you really want to sit and eat there with the mess from cooking or do you plan to clean-up before eating?

The door to the toilet room in master you'll have to get behind the toilet to close it and then open again. Is there space for that?

What is the wasted wall behind the closet in the 2nd bath upstairs? If just empty space why not just make the closet larger or make it an angled closet like an angled step-in pantry. Then you could use the area in front of the current door for something.

The door on the powder room. Could you put it on one end of the wall so when the door opens it is out of the way. Place it so the vanity is across from it and not the toilet. I would choose to put it against the wall on the kitchen side so you can't see into it from the dining.

I wouldn't worry about the size of the footprint. There are 1000sq ft, 1 story houses on several acres and I don't think it looks funny at all. The only time things look out of place is when a large home is surrounded by smaller homes or a small home is surrounded by much larger homes.

A 5ft opening from dining to the mudroom is going to give you a very nice view of that whole area. You will be able to see it pretty much no matter where you sit in the dining except for sitting with your back against it.

The closet across from basement stairs - put narrower double doors so you have easy access to the full closet instead of the awkward hard to reach corner that is there now.

Closet into the kitchen. How about making a shorter door with access to the blind corner behind the bench too.

I would be tempted to move the pass through to the kitchen to go through where the powder room is and re-work the area to the right of it to hold the mudroom and powder room so you don't walk through that area between the dining and kitchen, but rather it is to your right and then have a pocket door to it that you can close when having guests.

The roof design is poor over the garage. Half of the roof drains into the inside corners front and back. This is trouble in a downpour. Consider moving the whole garage wing forward or backward; that would eliminate one water trap. Or, better yet, turn the garage so the ridge is not opposite to the main roof but runs in the same direction. Then create the bonus space with shed dormers. This eliminates the expensive unequal pitch valley rafters that are such a pain to cut. There would be no need for a heavy girder above the garage doors, as they would be under the gable. The garage would be the same dimension, but running the other way- it would be 27x25, not 25x27. This change would simplify framing and cost less, but does change the appearance.
Casey

I agree with most of the comments on here, but I also think there are more fundamental problems with these plans. While the exterior design is simple and pleasing, the inside looks awkward and cluttered. You have made some spaces too big -- a large dining room that you won't use much and some too small -- eating space in the kitchen which you will use frequently

I don't think it's a good idea to use a spreadsheet program to draw house plans. There are very good software programs designed for this purpose that will show the correct scale of each design element and also allow you to get 3-D views of what you're designing and avoid obvious mistakes.

It looks to me like you approached your design by first defining your exterior walls and then fitting into it blocks that define the various rooms and spaces. That approach has left you with a lot of needless corners that stick out into the hallways, especially on the upper floor. One result is that you have practically unusable walk-in closets (they are too narrow) for the two smaller bedrooms because you've wasted a lot of space on a short hallway that you need for the bedroom entrance doors. Why not design these bedrooms so that the doors open off the main hallway? Why not locate the bathroom between the two bedrooms where it would be more convenient? Why have a tiny closet next to a five-foot vanity? Trying to fit two sinks into such a short counter isn't a good idea.

Your design has many short walls which define small spaces (many of them closets). This not only gives the design a choppy feeling, but will also increase you building costs. You should strive to streamline and consolidate this choppiness into larger and more useful spaces. That would also improve the flow of the design.

I also have trouble understanding how the stairway goes. Do you have to walk across the living room to go upstairs? If you look at stock two-story house plans, you will almost always see stairs immediately adjacent to and accessible from the foyer. This is not only much more convenient than your arrangement (because one can enter the house and walk upstairs without crossing any rooms), but is also more aesthetically appealing to most people.

I think these general comments have been touched on already, but FWIW:

1. Too many small closets upstairs in the laundry/hall bath areas.

2. Window are not Colonial in style. They are maybe circa 1950's Colonial revival in style. The small center gable reminds me of a 1950's house too, although I don't think that feature is necessarily a bad thing.

3. I don't think you have adequate casual dining space. The dining room is awkward for other than occasional use because of the mudroom and the island is fine for a quick snank or lunch, but I wouldn't want to eat three meals a day there.

I think these plans are very, very preliminary. For instance - you can't fit two 5'x8' closets AND a door into a space that's only 12' long. I also think you may be over estimating the amount of usable space you will have in your bonus room. If you don't want to use a specialized program, then just use graph paper.

I also meant to point out that you have two instances where door swings interfere with each other -- the mudroom entrance door from the garage with a closet door, and the entrance door to the upstairs hallway bath with a closet door.

I heartily second what solie, feedingfrenzy, and s mongrel have said. Another thing which struck me immediately is that the window in one of the secondary bedroom closets renders it far less useful.

I would plan the fixtures in the master walk in closet before placing the door in the middle of the wall. It doesnÂt need to be there and you might want a longer wall for hanging space or drawer space.

Do you want the wardrobes and make-up areas across from the closet? If not, you could do two separate closets by moving the door to the bathroom over. It feels like there is a lot of wasted space in the middle of the bathroom. By moving some things around, you might get rid of that wasted space, particularly the dead end wall opposite the door.

I would hate two doors to have to worry about shutting when I was in the upstairs bathroom. Once again, it looks like there is wasted space in the vanity area.

How many people can sit at the island? The only other space for eating is the dining room. We eat at our island nearly 100% of the time. Even guests eat there.

If you had a closet to the left as you walked in the office, the space would be equal with the closet in the foyer. That being said, I would flip the office and dining room. It separates the owner occupied spaces with the guest spaces. It is a far walk from the kitchen, though.

Do you need two closets so close to the foyer? Could you put the door into the bathroom where that closet is, making it easier to get to from the living room and dining room? I donÂt know what that is that is labeled 36". Looks like maybe shelving?

Hey Thanks for all the feedback. I have tweaked the plan a little bit, some based on feedback here. For the most part I am happy with this plan. A couple comments below.

1. I know stairs usually go in foyers, but I dont see why they need to. THe stairs lead to the private area of the house, 90% of guests will never go up to the bedrooms so why have the link to that part of the house the first thing guests see? I like the idea of having it back off the main family living space.

2. The dining room will get used. I like the separation of it so you could have a conversation with guests while kids are running umuck in the main living area. I have added some more space for casual eating in the kitchen and may add even more to the island in final version.

3. I flipped the bench in the mud room area so it is now hidden from the dining room. I also lost a couple closets but still think we have enough on the the first floor.

4. The mini bar area is not a wet bar. It will be a built in with a 36" counter, 24" mini frig, 12" cabinet drawer below and a 36" upper cabinet. It will store beer, wine, snacks. I never have room for these things in the main frig, they end up in garage or basement so it would be nice to have off the main living areas. I think it is a good use of space for that spot.

5. I cleaned up the upstairs bath/laundry./closet areas, I think it makes more sense now.

6. Still see closets in front bedrooms as potential trouble spot. Yes I hate having a window in a closet but the house needs to have a window there, sometimes you must make small sacrafices.

Now that this is really happening I am of course freaking out, that I have done it all wrong, but I think this is going to work. We will spend most time in family room/kitchen and I think that space is very open and functional.

Also I am about to get on my knees and beg to somehow figure out how to get the front porch in my budget. The house does not look right without it, it gives it its character. I know the windows are not traditional colonial style but this is more of a nantucket/cape cod inspired design and often large windows are used to take in the views of the ocean. No we don't have an ocean in our front year, but I think it will help bring in lots of light and give it a different feel than most colonials.

Here is a link that might be useful: Updated plans

I like your plans a lot! I LOVE windows so I hear ya on that. Good luck, can' wait to see you progress onto the build!

marjen

Definitely better.

But you still might want to consider whether it's a good idea to have the only access to the second floor so far away from the two major entries into the house. There will be many times when you will be entering through the garage entry and going straight upstairs. The route you have for doing that is both long and circuitous.

I didn't mean to say that your design is terrible. It's very challenging for an amateur to design a house of that size and complexity and you've done better than most of us could. But I think that a good professional could tweak your plans to come up with a better flow from room to room, and to take better advantage of the space you have.

Maybe a pro could even give you as much usable living space in a smaller footprint, which might leave you enough left over to put on the large front porch that you want and which a house of this style. cries out for.

Just a thought.

Well here is a small update, the drawings are with the architect. I should have something back later this week. He was going to look at a couple areas for me and come up with a couple alternatives.

Talked with my builder and we are going to figure out how to get that porch on. This house needs the porch so we will get it on if I need to be picking up trash and getting lunch for the crew for 8 months.

Also here is a link to new front elavation with the color scheme we are looking for.

Here is a link that might be useful: new front

You've done a very nice job with your plan. I hope it comes back from the architect the way you hope. I do agree that I like the front exterior with the porch. I just wanted to add that the window in the closet, (and maybe you already thought of this or perhaps the architect will change that), would make a great place to put a window seat with storage underneath, maybe even making it with cedar to store sweaters, etc. Although I'm not sure if a seat would fit in there, but when I was growing up, it wouldn't have mattered how big or small, just as long as I could hide for a bit, (I was an avid reader and dreamer!--still am!LOL!)

Good luck!

Well I got the first drafts back today. This is exciting as it finally is starting to feel real. I like some of most of the small changes he made, especially upstairs. It flows pretty well I think. The bedrooms and cosets uptairs worked out great, the dining room can fit our large 8' table comfortably and I like some of the front changes as well. Anyway here is the link

Here is a link that might be useful: Prelim Plans