If you have some question about how (or if) you would use the 4-season room, have you considered omitting it and capturing some of that area to enlarge your great room?

A wall to separate the 4-season room from the dining area? You could, but what would you gain?

What orientation is the living, dining, sun rooms? Where are you located? Hopefully these spaces are facing south.

Is the second small office actually usable? It's not much bigger than a small walk-in closet...

Would it worth considering putting a wall up to separate the sun room and dining area, leaving it only open to the great room?

I would do a half wall, if it were me.

But I have a house full of children, so you may not share my preference for slightly less-open spaces (it's nice to have a barrier of some kind between the eating areas and everywhere else, if for no other reason than should someone drop a glass, you aren't picking up shattered pieces from 5 different rooms, lol).

I also don't care for posts in the middle of houses, and it looks like you have one where the 4-season, great, kitchen, and dining rooms intersect.

To address the questions - the back of the house will be oriented to the southwest. Eliminating the 4-season room is definitely worth considering, and I agree I'm not a big fan of the post either.

We have small kids as well, so we envisioned the 4-season room as sort of a playroom area for now, but the more I think about it the less I like it.

The second office is designed more as a pocket office/command center space than an actual sit-down office.

How will the floor plan sit on your land?

I would not close off the room as it would eliminate the light entering the kitchen area

Had a sun room in a home once and really found it a waste of space. Ended up using it as a formal dining room (which again was not used very much. My suggestion would be to make the great room larger with an area for the children to play. Storage for them to put toys away.

Pocket doors on the coat room and entrance to laundry room from hall.

Open railing from front hall down to basement.

Wood floor in big office. These are the doors we put on our office.

What part of the country are you in? How many kids? Does anyone in the family work/stay at home? What does the rest of the floor plan -- basement, upper floor(s) -- look like?

I am thinking opposite from everyone concerning the sun room. From personal experience I would keep it open from the kitchen table into the sun room. As my family aged, the kids got married and had children we went from a family dinner of 4 to a family dinner of 10. I like when we have family dinners that we can all sit down at the same table at one time and not be spread all over. 15 ft may seems long enough, but my last dining room was 15x13 and at the max could only fit a table for 8 comfortably. You might want to consider leaving the wall down so as your family expands you can expand the table as needed into the sun room. If you decide on not having the sun room I would extend the back wall straight across to make one big larger room. Then I would extend the deck all the across the back of the house. 12 foot isn't very long for a deck.

Who lives here? All bedrooms upstairs? ? Where is North on your plan? General location and size of lot? You have a lot of stairs, and I agree that they impinge on the Foyer. How tall are your ceilings?

A 'sunroom' can get beastly hot. I would skip it and extend the Great Room to where the Deck begins. You might want to screen some of the Deck. If you need a separate space for young children to play near Mom...maybe a smaller space? The Deck will shadow whatever is below -- what IS below? I like your Family Entry with the walk-in closet and powder room.

Without having any of the answers to the questions I asked previously, I'd just say this about a playroom -- kids grow up very, very quickly and then their stuff, and the amount of it, shrinks dramatically.

I will also say that I'm a curmudgeonly dinosaur who thinks that families and their homes work better when children and their needs are folded into the adults' needs and wants, not vice versa.

All of which is to say, don't plan your main floor around a playroom : ) .

Family of 4. House will be about 4500 sq feet. All bedrooms up. Ceilings are 9 feet, but the foyer where the stairs is will be 7+ feet wide, so I think that will be OK?

North is to the right of the plan, the garage side.

I am liking the idea of extending the great room towards the back, but might not do it the full length of the house to save some $, maybe only 6 feet or so. This would also get rid of the post in the middle of the room, which I am not liking more and more based on the comments.

I guess I'm with the majority here in not loving the sunroom. It doesn't provide acoustical or visual privacy from the main house ... so what's it's function? That is, why is it a different room?

I'd lean towards enlarging the great room /cutting it off so it's even with the dining room at the back of the house (for practical reasons). You could then divide off a bit of the great room for a kids' area with furniture placement ... but you'd have the option to use the whole great room as a great room later.

In general, I think the best division of space is an open floor plan for the majority of the house PLUS a smaller "away space" where one person can have quiet. You have this "away space" in your office.

Two other thoughts about the house:

- I don't like the kitchen. It's the heart of the home, but in this case it's also a pathway to everything else. I like that it's convenient to everything else, but I think the cook will constantly deal with people walking through the work space.

- I'd lean towards one flooring throughout the downstairs area. Changing the flooring "chops up" the look.

All of which is to say, don't plan your main floor around a playroom : ) .

Agree.

Family of 4. House will be about 4500 sq feet.

The average American house is 2400. My house is 2400, and even when my two children were still at home we had unused space. Are you sure you want to pay to build /heat and cool /keep clean /pay taxes on a house this big?

Thoughts in no particular order.....

1. The sink should not be behind the stove. Too much booty bumping.

2. The fridge is disconnected from the kitchen by a walkway. You need to figure out a place to put it to the dining area of the stove wall.

3. Kitchen order is fridge to sink to stove. You need to work that in better than the design you have.

4. The sunroom will be a great place for the kids and their toys. After they are grown, you can figure it out.

5. Where will you put your TV? With the fireplace centered and windows on each side and the sunroom not having a wall, where will the TV go? Can you uncenter the fireplace and remove the windows?? You have a huge sunroom that will provide a lot of light.

6. If you have an eating area connected to the kitchen, do you have to have seating at the island? Kind of a waste of space. You could put cabinets on the back side of the island that open out into the great room.

7. The garage access is a bunch of very small rooms that serve what purpose? Why not a very big laundry room for taking off dirty clothes when you come in the house? A dog wash space? What is that small office?

Just some quick thoughts on seeing the plan.

- I don't like the kitchen. It's the heart of the home, but in this case it's also a pathway to everything else. I like that it's convenient to everything else, but I think the cook will constantly deal with people walking through the work space.

I agree about extending the living room to where the dining room ends and getting rid of the sun room.

However I'm also not a fan of where the kitchen is right now. If it were me, I'd flip the kitchen with the dining room. Why?

So the kitchen is somewhat more isolated so no one is walking through it constantly.

It will bring more needed light into the kitchen area.

Also when we dine, we are not generally looking out at the views. We are more likely to be looking at one another as we eat and converse. And when we dine at night, the tendency is to lower the lights.

By moving the kitchen and then extending the living room, it will then give you a natural area to turn into a temporary play area for the kids.

If you end the living room where the dining room is now, I'd then move the sliders to the living room back wall and extend the deck.

I'd make the kitchen an L shaped layout with the island facing the back wall. And I'd make that back wall a wall of windows.

One thing you didn't answer is how big is your lot? I ask because you have a garage sticking out in front so I can assume it's a small lot?

Kathi has good points. Kitchen needs help. Move Fridge (most-visited appliance) to eating area side. Do you eat at a counter now? We don't, and wouldn't do it all in a row or with so little knee room.) I wondered about the TV setup against window glare, too.

No need to cut up the Family Entrance so much. I'd want a laundry/mop sink. Presume laundry is upstairs here?

I like the orientation. Extend Great Room to DR level.

Why more than one step up from the Garage?

I have ten feet from my bottom step to the opposite wall (with furniture) in the Foyer. Maybe the plan shows more risers than necessary? Will there be a door from Foyer to lower level to contain heat/noise? How will it swing?

What IS lower level? Is that part of your square footage count?

Add a side window to Office.

While I also prefer the kitchen where the dinning is, it won’t be as convenient when packing in groceries etc on a regular basis. You will be carrying everything thru the dinning. I’d enlarge the great room also. Just too small for a family with all the furniture you will need to accommodate everyone plus company. Or, is there somewhere you can add a small playroom?

First, is that post at the corner of the sunroom supporting anything upstairs?

Second, what if the LR is across the back, and the dining room where the LR is now?

Also, it looks like you may be in snow country since you have a heated garage with drains (you will LOVE that), so would you also need a guest closet, and maybe an outside door from the mudroom?

Finally, two offices?

As drawn right now, the kitchen and the great room (which seems not so great) will be dark. I don't like the carpeted aspect of the sunroom if the rooms around it are wood.

If it were my house, I'd prefer the sunroom to be off another room, rather than directly open to not just one but two rooms, as a sort of retreat. You might consider making all the necessary provisions (concrete etc) to have a sunroom added off the great/living room several years down the road. You may decide, if you add more windows to the living room, that you don't need a separate sunroom. And whether you go with a great room with lots of windows or a sunroom, please orient the main living areas more south and less west, or the heat and glare will make those areas unpleasant and unusable, even in a more northern climate in the winter (I'm in Alberta and it's the case here for folks who have western exposure).

The kitchen as drawn is inefficient, and also small for a house of 4,500 sq feet, esp for a household of four with two kids who will want to/be encouraged to help. I'd suggest reading through this post at the Kitchen forum, New to Kitchens? Read Me First!, and also posting your main floor and kitchen plan to the Kitchen forum as well.

I would not recommend closing this room off! The openness allows so much more light into your home. You can always get creative with built-in storage and furniture if you're concerned about too much open space. And you can use that column to help define the spaces. There is a way to cleverly layout the furniture such that this column becomes a non-issue. If it were my clients space, I would suggest a round breakfast table in the sun room for casual dining, saving the dining table for more special occasions. It could also be used for crafts and kids games too. Another idea would be to create a smaller more casual / comfy family room. This could double as a playroom but it wouldn't be the primary purpose of the room. See some images below for inspiration.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. We met with the builder last night and decided on a few things:

Going to keep the 4-season room where it is and consider a half-wall to create some separation, otherwise we will be arching it off or creating a division to create a separate space. We also asked them to see if we could expand the great room a little bit based on the comments about it being too small.

Lastly, we are expanding the kitchen counters/walls and re-configuring it a little bit, so should be good to go there.

Lastly, we are expanding the kitchen counters/walls and re-configuring it a little bit, so should be good to go there.

At the very least post your plan in the Kitchen forum, where layout geniuses hang out.

Yep, did that - thanks for the suggestion.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. We met with the builder last night and decided on a few things:

What happened to the architect? Why aren't you discussing it with him/her?