Could you put the bath and laundry into the current dining area? This way you could get windows in the dining too. I would then make the living the dining area and the old bedroom/ stairs the living room.

I can't say I'm fond of having the master entry from the foyer. Could you switch the access area to the closet area and move the stairs forward? Would eliminate the odd jog in the rooms upstairs too.

Is it weird to have to walk through a room to get to the dining room from the kitchen? It's not an eat in kitchen if that matters.

The master would be in the rear of the house in this setup where the views are nicer and not so close to the road. The back door is the only door that is used here. Since we've lived here, not one person has used the front door except when we moved in appliances to the kitchen. It was originally in the center of the front of the house and no one used it then, so we tucked it over in the side to make the kitchen more functional and added a covered porch. Still no one uses it.

The stairs can change as long as they stay in the addition. I'd like to have the stairs stacked to prevent losing any additional space. I don't mind changing the master entrance though, but would it be weird to enter from the dining room assuming that I kept the dining where it currently is? I'm not sure I'm ready to commit to hauling food from the kitchen any farther than necessary. It would be nice to have the living room in the rear of the house as well though.

oops double post

This post was edited by mrsmortarmixer on Fri, Jul 5, 13 at 2:27

If what you have labeled as living becomes the dining it is just next to the kitchen. Create an opening between the walls.

Yes if the dining stays then it would be odd to enter straight from the dining unless you create a little vestibule/hallway into the master.

Just seems like a waste to not have windows in the main living areas of the house if you have the opportunity to do so.

This is how the kitchen is laid out. It's less than a year old, has a brick wall along the current dining wall, and all of the plumbing and electrical come in through the living room wall. There is really no other way of rearranging it to make a doorway to the current living without redoing the entire kitchen. We could still move the dining to the current living though if you don't think that extra steps would be a huge hassle.

I'm having a hard time fitting a full bath and decent sized laundry room in the dining room no matter what I do without losing the back entry. The door between kitchen and current dining room can't move, so I'm stuck there.

I'm also struggling with fitting a master bath and walk in closet when I move the entrance to the master without putting the bath and closet in the back of the house. Maybe it's not as big of an issue as I'm making it out to be. Our road isn't busy unless farming is in full swing and then it's traffic at all hours of the night. Tractors and semis are loud at 3 am.

Do I open up any options if I move the stairs somewhere else?

It would be very nice to have a door from the master bedroom leading to the screened-in porch, since it would be a lovely place to sit out early in the a.m.

Although your original dining room is a nice size, it's going to seem cramped and claustrophobic. My in-laws added on to their old house, and they had the same arrangement. It was dark and uninviting, and every time you wanted to get somewhere, you had to walk around the table.

You may have to enter the laundry room from the new dining room, but as long as that door is shut when dining, it shouldn't matter so much. You just have to make the most of the hand you've already been dealt. :) It's just a fact that if you are remodelling a 100 year old house that things might not be where they would be if you had built a house from the ground up. But you do have all that old charm in the house. Lucky you!

OR - Another option for stairs - looking at the second version above, move the stairs to the right "into" the foyer, and then make them "L-shaped." (Safer anyway with a nice landing in the middle.) Perhaps move back that "dining" room wall two feet to enlarge the foyer. You are left with a much bigger bedroom area (approx 22 X 19). You can use the dining room for your laundry and hall bath, and reconfigure the bedroom area for your master bedroom and closet space. You can still probably take a bit of the dining room for the master bedroom or bath.

Good luck!