You don't mention the sex of the 4 children or their ages. I'm a big believer in children sharing a room. The social skills learned will serve them well when they go to college and get marriage. It also encourages closeness.

If the children are old enough, that space over the garage would make a great playroom.

There are three girls and a boy, so there's not a good way to divide them in that way. It's also just personal preference for them all to have a place of their own.

They're still young, so I worry the garage space will be too far away. I envisioned small bedrooms with the play space to be a close extension of their living quarters.

Ditch the double-height "family hall" and put the fourth bedroom there, using the bunk room as the third bedroom. It appears there's enough "width" below the bunk room to add a hallway on the right-hand side to access the back bedroom (over the family hall).

Whoa, what the heck is going on with that exterior.

So, if I'm interpreting this look correctly, this is what I'm supposed to see:

Someone built an old stone house (but not really, because it's fake and probably has vinyl on the side). They then later built an addition onto the left of the (fake) old stone house, but somehow weren't able to match the roof and window line of the original (btw, even the 'old' widows are off-kilter and you will never un-see that now that I've pointed it out). Then, even later, they decided to add a garage over there. But that wasn't enough space, so they threw a lean-to structure onto it. I can't really tell when the front and side porches were added on, but they clearly aren't part of the original (fake) old stone house.

It's like Punky Brewster grew up and decided to become an architect.

I don't know what's going on these days, but I see this strange, mismatched sock aesthetic popping up all over the place in new construction. The other day I counted 5 treatments on a front exterior elevation: horizontal siding, vertical siding, faux cedar shingle siding, brick, and that awful rock veneer stuff. All on a single side of a house. I guess this is just the natural evolution of that aesthetic playing out.

The interior is quite pretty in the photos, but that's a face only a mother could love.

(Edit to include: I am not an architect and the opinions of a random internet stranger don't really matter. But when I do upload my concepts in a 6 months or so, I hope they are roundly teared down in a brutally honest discourse if they are lacking)

Are you really ok walking through your kitchen/dining area to get to the main living area of the house?

I thought about closing in the second story space of the great room but then couldn't figure out the bathroom piece of things. I suppose leaving them where they are?

Thank you Leluni! You're validating some of my thoughts here. The architect's commentary stated that he wanted it to look like an older home with multiple additions. My thought was to certainly even out the heights on the front two wings and keep the materials cohesive across the whole house. The lack of symmetry was really bothering me, and it also necessitated a step down into the left side bedroom upstairs, which seemed unnecessary.

I don't have an issue with the main living being on the back of the house. That's where the view is, so I figured it would likely happen that way. I also foresee a lot of people using the side entrance via the mudroom since that's where the parking will be. Thank you for the perspective.

If this is in fact a "beautiful lakefront lot" where's the water? For most waterfront houses it's obvious.

Have you thought about using an actual architect to design a house for your wants and needs? It would be a shame to get half of what you really want for the hundreds of thousands you will spend and not totally utilize your lakefront views.

We would flip the plan with the garage being opposite. We own half of a point so the water would be behind the house and the porch area would overlook the end of the point. I hope that makes sense.

We were trying to avoid the necessity of an architect- low resource area so there would be the added expense of someone coming in from out of town. The plan feels close to me if the few tweaks can be worked out.

Don't do it. If you want to build a lakefront home, the home should maximize the features of the site. Most people I have designed lakefront homes for (and I've done a lot) want views from every room. It's not always possible, but I design them so as many rooms as I can get have views. Don't just plop a preconceived design on a site, let the design respond and emerge from the site and your needs.

"Don't accept mediocrity if you don't have to." - V. Carter

The plan you are interested in is not a good plan for a lakefront home (I would use more descriptive adjectives, but there may be ladies present).

It sounds like we may need to be back to the drawing board. Thank you all for the feedback.