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susan508_gw

Please Review Floor Plans

Susan508
9 years ago

My DH and I are are building our retirement home in rural southwest Missouri. We'd appreciate any insights/input on our floor plans. We have a lovely 5 acre plot with a large number of mature trees. Because we wanted to leave the trees intact, it rather limited the width of the house to about 50 ft. We also wanted a basement and storm shelter, so we went with putting the master and living areas on the main floor, then 2 more bedrooms and a full bath in the basement.

I have screenshots of both floors and will attach the basement shot in a subsequent posting since I can only attach one at a time.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

Comments (5)

  • robin0919
    9 years ago

    Is there anyway you can enlarge the pic?

  • Susan508
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    I had a request to enlarge the image. I have done that by "cutting off" the garage area.

    Thanks again for reviewing.

  • dekeoboe
    9 years ago

    Still cannot read any dimensions.

  • Susan508
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    As I cannot seem to enlarge the image enough to be read, let me try this. Here are the room dimensions:
    Living Area 18'5" x 20"7"
    Kitchen 17'7" x 17' 8"
    Dining 14'3" x 15'9"
    Pantry 6'7" x 6'7"
    Master Bedroom 17'8" x 20'7"
    Master Bath 13'10" x 10'11"
    Master Closet 10'2" x 6'2"
    Laundry Room 13'2" x 6'7"
    1/2 Bath 3'6" x 6'7"

  • mrspete
    9 years ago

    - The porch will be lovely in a rural area with mature trees.

    - I had to search for the front door. Will the porch be on the side of the house, or will the front door be on the side? You want your guests to be able to find the front door easily -- and perhaps this won't be so complicated in real life. A simple gable of some sort over the door might be helpful.

    - You seem to have a lot of empty, wasted space in the area between the front door /master /dining area. No suggestions on this.

    - I would not like people on the porch to be able to look in my bedroom . . . or worse, my bathroom!

    - The kitchen seems to be too big for efficiency. Yes, kitchens CAN be too big, and a U with an island in the middle is almost always inefficient because the island works as a barrier. As you've drawn it,, this kitchen is so large that everything will be several extra steps away, and you'll run yourself ragged cooking a meal. Also, things aren't arranged in a logical order. One example: You come in with bags of groceries. It would make sense to have the pantry RIGHT THERE by the door -- where the laundry is located. Instead, you have to walk through the kitchen (getting in the way of someone who's there cooking) to reach the pantry. You want your "food flow" to work in a straight line: Door . . . pantry . . . prep area . . . stove . . . table. You don't want work lines to cross.

    - The dining area looks nice.

    - If you swap your laundry and your pantry spots, your dryer can vent directly to the outside -- always a plus.

    - If you're putting secondary bedrooms into the basement, those stairs will get a lot of use. Do you have a comfortable amount of space in the "here's the stairway" area?

    - Consider your sight lines. When you walk through a door, you want your view to be something positive -- a focal point like a window with a view or something nice like your fireplace. When you walk in your front door, your sight line is . . . straight into your bedroom. Walk into your bathroom, and your sight line is the side of a sink. Walk into your kitchen/dining room, and your sight line is the garage door. This can be better!

    - The opening between your living room /dining room and kitchen looks nice -- I'm picturing nice pillars on each side.

    This post was edited by MrsPete on Mon, Jun 30, 14 at 23:58