Too complex, IMHO

I like the boot pantry idea very much though. Same cabinet with a washable rug, or water hog boot tray would accomplish the damp mud room storage more simply.

I think what may better serve is a true transitional space, Can you fashion a vestibule? Either literally, or evoke the feeling with furniture adding a sense of enclosure before you expand into the larger space.

That would feel strange to step directly from the street into an active living room, although I suppose billions do. We once visited a home on a busy beachfront street that had frosted glass panes providing privacy from (mostly) tourists walking by a couple feet away. They frosted it themselves, leaving little linear designs the family drew to see out of if you put your face right up to them.

That particular small feature doesn't strike me as any more complex than a scrub tub in a back entry, just very compact and efficient. You'd probably (hopefully) seldom need the water, but when you did it'd be there. Quick and easy.

A vestibule, actual or implied, would be awfully nice, but I imagine if you could you would?

Yes, there will be a vestibule but it will be so small that there will be no room for furniture. The house is 20 feet wide, and the door is in the center. The vestibule may be longish but will have a Maximum width of about 40".

The floorplan of this house is interesting. There is a full-width Living Room at the back of the house that is all glass along the back and leads to a private patio.

The third floor is one room called a "studio" on the original plans that has a glass wall that leads to a private terrace.
Some people use this as a Master Bedroom.

The weakness of the plan is walking in the front door into a room adjacent to the kitchen that must be for the dining table.I will create a vestibule, I think but that will leave a very small room (about 7 ft wide) next to the entryway on that side. Maybe a small library.

This may seem very out there, but could you use some very cool tile in the vestibule, and a center floor drain? Maybe an old one?

Here is a Listing photo of the space. You can see that creating a vestibule will leave a narrow room of about 7+ feet wide. I don't want to make the entire space the vestibule, so it will just be a narrow area separated perhaps by sliding doors on this side. The house alternates between high or narrow windows and all glass.

Well, I guess it's time for me to chime in with my very-small-walk-in-to-supposed-LR-that's-really-the-size-of-an-entrance-hall experience... I'm about to rip down the wall that hides the kitchen, to boot. At least that will open it up and give the illusion of space as well as play to the backyard, which is one of the few assets of this house.

I'm turning it into more of an entrance/greeting area which will see little practical use but should keep it very clean for when people DO knock on the door. lol The tv and couch etc are going into the adjoining (very small) den, separated with french doors. The plan right now is to have a pair of chairs with a table but I might just go for for broke and put a darn entry table smack dab in the middle of the room! ;) We will keep tile at the door, because we have to here in Alaska.

The sliding doors sound intriguing. I'd just be twitchy about further closing the space in, but that's me. I love those Asian sliding walls/doors. And their spaces are small.

I love those windows, by the way. And the floors look like they are a rather great color. Could the front door be changed to a glass one? We just put a full panel front door in with an interior shade that raises from the bottom or top and I am loving it. It brings so much light in and gives the illusion of an airier, roomier room. It's all illusion around here.

What if you transition by creating a vestibule that has open shelving (or plexi glass)to let light and gives an airy feeling? I have seen both used well in modern homes. The shelving can contain our decorative stuff or you can use it in utilitarian way by putting in your every stuff that needs to come in and out of the house.

Regarding the floor, I would put tile on the vestibule with lots of rugs that can be washed easily. I am not a fan of floor drain on somewhat formal spaces. It looks too much like a public bathroom with floor drains every where, IMHO.

There is no back entry to the house so this is it for everybody. The tiny vestibule is pretty common here and many people who take it out end up regretting it because it does serve a few purposes.
I was intrigued by the floor drain idea and first looked into something along the lines of a walk-off grate, but this would be really expensive and high tech looking, and then there would be the problem of cleaning it out periodically. I had a client once who wanted a center drain in her kitchen and bathrooms but this would have been complex.

So I evolved into this idea of annexing the blind corner in the kitchen, which is right there and this morphed into the idea of having a floor-drain of sorts in the bottom of the cabinet.

We did discuss turning that whole room next to the kitchen into an entryway, but in the context of the house it is really too big to serve just that purpose. so then we are back to the narrow vestibule idea.

I don't have a problem going against the 'open and airy' and creating a feeling of slight compression at the front door. Contained entries do a few things: they separate the outside from the inside, they funnel people to where they are supposed to go, and they create a "sense of entry". The LR of this house is large and backed by a wall of glass, so the contrast between the two spaces is a good thing. Architects like Frank Lloyd Wright did this all the time. A tiny room led into the big space, and the sudden sense of expansiveness heightened the experience of entry into the main room.

The issue with installing your shallow sink is the same one with installing the floor drain. You will have to have access from underneath for the P trap and to route it (and it's vent) to the main drain. You periodically will need to prime that drain to keep the sewer gasses out. The fact that 7 out of 12 months are probably too dry for the drain to be functional would sway me against it, unless it were expressly for the cool factor. Of the two, I'd rather have the floor drain. It's more functional in many ways. I can see you doing a simple terrazzo tile pattern in the entry to semi-disguise the floor drain. And because it's visible, you won't have an unremembered dried out trap filling a whole cabinet with sewer gas that on a very very outside chance meets an electrical spark and "BOOM"!. ;)

If this is the main entry to the home, I think your blind corner cabinet would be better served as some type of "passthrough" cabinet for groceries to travel from the entrance to the kitchen if you are not already planning some type of shutter/tambour/ pocket type door at counter level. If you are already planning on a counter height passthrough, then I think that it would serve well as the trash, if the front door is the trash elimination route. If there is an alley trash set up here, then no, not for the trash either. :)

If you are going to create a wall here for space definition, then I think one of glass block would suit the home's modern architecture. It will still allow light into the interior, but physically separate the spaces. I love the idea of the compression/release architectural psychology. Possibly accentuate that with darker colors and more pattern for the entry. And then the light spacious rooms will feel even more so.

Creative idea, I just use a copper boot tray from ballards and sometimes hose it off. The only concern I might have are the tiny pebbles I often find in the bottom of my shoes going into the sewage pipes and system. I guess the drain cap would prevent that though. I have a tiny vestible that neighbors tore out of there house but I do like having the separation between the outside and my entry hall. It helps lessen the cold or heat coming into the house as well as the dirt.

Luckily whatever route I go there is access from underneath.

I do have to think about the trap. Its similar to the trap under a washer and dryer pan...it could dry out.

I would like to be able to have a simple boot tray in the vestible at certain times of year but I don't think it will be big enough.

I think part of the issue is psychological for me. I am moving from a large house where my apartment is entered in a series of processional-like spaces into a right off the stoop smallish house.

The old place has a vestibule, a 40-odd foot hall, then two flights of this:

So you can see, it's quite a shift to this:
{{gwi:1909080}}

I am not complaining, mind you. It's a great house except for this one weakness, and more practical, and not part of a homeowner's association.

It sounds like you are definitely moving your kitchen back but have you seen the Brooklyn Limestone's blog - she posted her kitchen a few years back - and it was in the front of her brownstone - to the right of the door! But I do love your FLW idea of surprising vistors with an expansive space beyond the small vestibule they enter.

Also, being from the Northwest where everyone is trained to take off their shoes upon entering a home (rain or shine :)), another idea for dealing with the dirt, dampness, and slush is to install floor heaters (i.e., under some entryway tile, etc.). It really helps to evaporate moisture and it's a nice welcome (i.e., warm toes!) to your home. And, have you looked at Asian design for the entry - I bet there are some amazing ideas for that- and the elements of your home would seem to lend itself well to it.

P.S. I love those clerestory windows - looking forward to hearing what you do with them!

Here is a link that might be useful: Brooklyn Limestone kitchen

The kitchen will stay where it is but the entry to it will be shifted. The LR with the glass along the back is the eye candy on this floor and I don't want to fiddle with that.

Floor heat sounds interesting.

If you're not going to use it as the dining room, why not make it a beautiful, big entry? A bench for taking off your shoes, under the window. Maybe some built-in storage or cubbies, for coats, hats, gloves, etc.

Have you seen Sarah Richardson's farmhouse entry? Something like that would be practical and pretty :)

Here is a link that might be useful: Link to pictures of Sarah's farmhouse

I'm also very big on transitional spaces, indoors and out, and what they do to enhance the experience of a property, so the way you're headed sounds good to me. Including small opening to large.

Since your kitchen will apparently be entered from the private space an entry helps create beyond, I imagine any small front space created might also be? This ?library nook? opening off a dining room could be an extremely nice feature, not least of course by bringing in light from another direction.

Since the vestibule would be THE entry, though, have you discarded the possibility of using most of that front area as a generous entry closet? Although it'd be a shame to waste that nice sunshine on a closet, it could make it a particularly appealing one to be in and out of frequently. Perhaps you have sufficient storage elsewhere on this floor, tho?

BTW, I really like what you've shown so far of your new place. It looks very promising and is going to be especially fun to watch develop.

I have heated tile floor at the entry. Almost everyone takes off shoes entering someone's house. (Seattle, WA) I guess its a regional thing. People (and my family) love having the heated floor at the entry.

I have matching tile on the covered porch and in the vestibule entry. The two are visually connected with front door with a large inset-glass door, they call these store doors because stores tend to have them. The glass door is similar to above farm house door, except the glass is even bigger. Because the door faces into the blank wall of the vestibule rather than into the house, there is no privacy concern with the glass door.

This maybe something you can experiment, glass door that faces into the wall of the vestibule (not into the house), if you want to transition into the house that way. This creates punctuated way of entering, a bit of glimpse into the house that is not actually seeing into the living part of the house.

We created multiple transitions from the street into the house. First there are multiple steps that are broken into several points. We have about 7 or 8 steps that are broken into 2 dicrete points with a pad in the middle. (we had to pour the concrete steps, not cheap....)

Then we have the covered porch outside, which we added. Then we have a glass door that looks into the vestibule. Then the hall/vestibule turns 90 degree before you look into the house. These points were deliberately created with the architect when we did a large remodel 10 years ago.

I think the entry sets a tone to the house and it is extremely important for the house. Like you, I really like articulated entries which start far from the street.

Can you create a different type of walkway from the street?
Landscaping to define the walkway?
Covered porch?
Modernist awning over the front door?

There is a 3x3 stoop and the public sidewalk abuts both the house and the street. That's why there are only high windows. I am glad they added parking on the side of the street the house is on because it is less likely a car will end up in the house someday. The good part of the house is the private patio at the back and the private terrace on the third floor. The immediate streetscape outside the front door...not so great.

I think the landscaping will consist of a couple heavy planters with boxwood or something.

I would like the awning, but there are vertical concrete fins of the front of the house that could make this unworkable. I would have to play with this on paper.

Hmmm. Seems to me that a drain...whether in the vestibule itself or in the nearby cabinet is needlessly complicating matters. I can't really imagine wanting to bend down to hose something off in there. I'd be more inclined to carry muddy boots into the kitchen.

As you suggest, using the blind corner from the kitchen by making it a cabinet accessed on the entryway side is brilliant. And if you don't wear shoes in the house and will have a small entryway, I'd probably just make it a shoe/boot storage cabinet, on the theory that then your shoes will be handy to put on just before you go out. (Since the cabinet would probably be deep, how about using slide out trays?) And I'd put a waterhog mat or boot tray to catch drips in the bottom for snowy, wet boots. If I were going to get fancy about it, I'd maybe try to find a way to add a bit of ventilation and gentle heat rather than a drain, so that wet winter stuff would dry out.

As for the vestibule/entry issue itself: I agree it's nicer not to walk directly in to living area, and I like the enclosed to open transition. BUT, I think full walls on both sides of a narrow vestibule may be a bit claustrophobic. How about making the wall dividing the entry from the rest of that room...be it library, office or whatever....only as tall as the bottom of the clerestory windows. You could mimic the size and framing around the windows above the wall, but with no glass. That would, hopefully, give the same enclosed space sense, but with more light and openness on both the entry way and library side. And I think it would feel more deliberate and less an afterthought.

If it's a wood structure, know this. Joists can be cut down to lower the top by an inch (or two). Then, joists can be strengthened. This is common, not hard to do, not hard to have done. It's easy to have this done. Doing this gives you the space to let your floor be sloped. The floor's slope can be almost imperceptible, and all in one direction, one flat plane. Flat, not level. Put the drain in a corner and "make it invisible" by one of the following ways. Any drain: a round drain, a square drain, or a channel along the wall. See "linear drain" concept in the Bathrooms forum. Imagine the slope went towards the front door. Then, water draining towards the front door can be caught in a channel, which drains towards the blind corner. The channel itself can be hidden in the door sill, or covered with a grate over it. Imagine the slope went towards the wall where the blind corner is. A channel inside the blind corner is almost invisible. Another option is to have a standard (round or square) drain, inside the blind corner, and a small slope coming out from there. I have two rooms with floor drains. The tiles are huge, the slope is minimal, and the "crease" where the tiles' slope changes direction is invisible unless you know where to look for it. A shower floor only needs four flat planes coming out from the (round or square) drain, so it is possible to use large tiles. The largest imaginable size is four pieces of stone cut to fit the entire floor. Or four pieces of Kerlite. The drains are invisible, because they are hidden. If the drain has to be (e.g.) several inches from a wall, put it where you will have a bench or footrest. This makes the drain invisible or almost invisible. Finally, cut a piece of the floor tile to rest on top of it as a loose cap. This also makes the drain invisible or almost invisible. (Only works if the drain is not in the center of the room). No one sees the slope of the floor towards the drain. The slope is minimal. This is not your average everyday inverted cone shaped shower stall floor. You are not expecting the floor to drain a shower quantity of water. Never.

A marble sill can define the end of the sloped floor and give you the height you may need if you do not sink the floor into the joists. I have this.

Tiled floors can have electric heat cables in them. A small space can be heated easily, for a small cost.

Dry and warm boots and shoes are a sensual pleasure. Heat the floor. Your heat cables _may_ also extend into the baseboard.

A plant watering can holds enough water and distributes it well enough to rinse down a sloped floor of the size you are envisioning. You will need an old squeegee to send the water and dust to the drain. Water doesn't move fast when the slope is minimal. Water doesn't move fast on a shower floor either, when it's a small quantity; it's the fact of a Large quantity of water in a shower that gets water to move to the drain fast. So, think of a minimal slope floor. Water doesn't carry stuff to the drain either; you use a squeegee to push it. Your floor is sparkling clean after that.

So, yes, you can have a drained, flat sloped floor. The drain _can_ have a trap primer too. Key words for web search are " trap primer ". In another post I can explain how to make a trap primer for $10 and a channel drain for $50. Since there is no running water in this room, its slope does not have to be shower slope, and no waterproofing membrane is required. Don't let the carborundums get you down.

hth

You mentioned the possibility of a sliding door to expose the pass-through cabinet in the kitchen. In the winter, would that let too much cold air into the kitchen from the just-entered vestibule? Perhaps an internally insulated door (as inspiration I'm visualizing an old icebox door type of thing with a secure latching handle, which doesn't seem to fit the brutalist design but I can't think of anything else, sorry!) that accesses directly into the blind cabinet. That cabinet would still get cold but not the whole kitchen. And maybe have the boot access on the bottom with a shelf so you could still pass some groceries or trash back and forth via the top shelf.

We live in ski country and lots of places have grates in their decks/porches or their vestibules (with catchpan or drain underneath). Since you have underneath access, maybe this approach could work for you. And the grates are maybe more brutalist looking?? or at least industrial, certainly. Here's a miniature grate to hopefully demostrate the concept:

hth, cheers

How deep is that entry room? If it is deeper than it is wide, could you close it off in the other direction (cross-wise) making a 10 ft wide room by X ft deep? You could have coat/shoe/bag storage off to the left of the doorway.

On another tack, is it possible to move the front door, and would that improve anything?

Is there a way to enclose the stoop into a vestible without losing your front curb side accuracy? Lovely staircase in your old digs but think of how much easier life with groceries will be in your new digs:)

I put in a recessed cabinet used primarily for shoes, boots and backpacks similar to what you are thinking about for your blind corner. I think the need for a drain is over estimated. I live in a city with a snowy, icy winter, and heavy salt/sand usage on the roads so I get the dirty boots thing. I use rubber boot trays and the shoes dry off fine on them. They are easy to pick up and clean. It's not like there is a wet mess all the time. Stuff dries pretty fast.

I would comment that by the time you get done framing an opening for your recessed cabinet, you will not have much space for shoes/boots, at least not width wise. Is it possible to eat into your kitchen space a little and get a larger, more functional closet space? I recessed 30" wide, 15" deep cabs so a variety of boot, shoes and trays would fit. It was well worth the 19" I took from my kitchen.

I am already a member of the trench drain party since I would like to change the former powder room (upstairs?)-turned 3/4 bath (by the Monroe Brother from Green Acres) back into a powder room that just happens to be a wetroom)

The various suggestions for the front hall are all things to consider. Any door or panel that goes anywhere will be solid core so it has some insulating capabilities but I think any windblock will be better than what currently exists (none).

I can't enclose the stoop or change the facade. I doubt the house could even be reconstructed as is: the setback would probably have to include a stoop now rather than allowing the stoop in front of it.

This house also has a very strong, (if kinda ugly and blank) facade: It consists of the door flanked by the clerestory windows and a single large window centered above the door. It almost prefigures post-modernism in the way that it says "House" almost in the way that a kindergartener would draw one.

There is a parapet and the front wall on the third floor is glass. (invisible at street level.)

These houses were built at a time that the neighborhood was borderline dangerous. A variation built by the same architect has nothing but a garage door and entry door on the lower front of the house at all. The houses with inset entryways were all fitted with security gates since someone could lurk there. These doors are more exposed and yet were probably safer for it at the time they were first built.

It sounds like you have a lovely space, beyone the initial entry...and wonderful views out the back. I'm wondering why you want to make the entry so small, when you have such a nice, large area. Again, I would make it a larger entry and let people enter into the home as a group, rather than trying to fit in single file, in a much smaller entry space.

I would consider the responses above, recommending a larger entry/welcome area. Just my two cents :)

A drain is good to have. It's handy. There are products used to fill P traps that get no action. RV antifreeze doesn't evaporate. It is often recommended at the terrylove.com forums to fill P traps that are seldom or never used. F.y.i.

Would you consider fashioning a narrow hallway that separates the kitchen from the dining room? Maybe with clerestory windows at the top, so the dining room is a smallish room with clerestory windows on two walls? I think clerestory windows would look good at the top of the wall to the kitchen as well. Would the hallway be too narrow?

Another idea would be to put in a wall that is parallel to the front wall of the house, set far enough back to accomodate a small table plus a shoewear removal bench with shoe cubbies underneath. Maybe this wall could have clerestory windows. (Apparently, I like the idea of carrying the clerestory window theme into the interior of the house.) The shoe bench wall would butt up against the kitchen on one side and end just after the bench. So, you'd open the front door, set your keys on a small landing table directly in front of the door, and then sit on the bench to the left and remove your shoes.

If you don't like the idea of directing traffic away from the kitchen entirely, then maybe the wall can be open at both ends. The width of a bench.

Lavender, if the entryway includes the door and the space to it's right, then the first floor becomes smallish kitchen and combined LR+DR and relatively big entryway (it would end up bigger than the kitchen, since the kitchen has the same amount of space to the Left of the door).

So the space is a bit small for a real room but a bit too large for an entryway. I am estimating that the kitchen will be between 77 and 84 square feet. (its a little over 70 now). but the entryway would include tne circulation space and that could end up being 77 + (3.5 x 11=38.5)= 115 square feet. In a house this size that seems a bit big. It would be nice, but I would like it to be usable for more than entry.

Okay, I'm finally awake enough to make sense of your issues. I don't have any experience with slush and all of that, but do know what wet, dirty boots are. I think your Franke boot tray with drain is a great idea! Maybe not with a faucet, per se, but a sprayer with a brush would be great, wouldn't it?

As I see it, one of the big problems with the plan is having to kind of stoop down, into the cabinet, to clean the boots. You said there's access underneath...I wonder if you could install a flexible drain and have a whole pull out boot shower?

I can also see having wire shelves above the pan for putting boots to dry, leaving the pan itself for the next person's muddy mess. They could double as shoe shelves for the Summer.

Since there isn't room for furniture, perhaps you could turn a couple of studs, and have a jump seat that folds flush into the wall, and maybe a couple of niches for things like a boot jack.

This is the brutalist house, right? Because my other thought is all wrong for that, but I was thinking a curved niche that didn't look so much like the blind cabinet could house a tiled fountain that was disguising the bootwash and be kind of cool.

Maybe you could do a shallow fountain (modernist) set into the wall above the bootwash cupboard, that would also have an exterior drain where you could rinse hands, or whatever, that looks decorative, and otherwise recirculates. I'm thinking a fountain would also be useful in creating a transition space, with the sound of water covering street noise, and the ionization making the air fresher as you come in. The kind of thing a front garden usually does.

So, it's more about being too big, in relation to the kitchen? That makes sense. Can you combine the entry space with something else? What about your library space? If you don't have people coming over, at least not very often, while you're using the library...it shouldn't be too cold. You could use a couple of comfy upholstered chairs and maybe a desk...that could double as chairs for taking off boots and a place to stash gloves and scarves.

It just seems like such a little space will make both areas feel very small. By making it more flexible, you can use the space for two functions, but keep the light and openess, at the same time. Kind of like a dining room/craft room/study. Multiple functions, same space. Just a thought :)

I haven't read through all the posts yet, and I'm not sure I completely understand your goal (in fact, it's entirely possible that I don't) but your front door/lack of division situation made me think of a gorgeous frosted room divider Sarah Richardson put into the entry in one of her homes (photo 6 at the link below). It lets in light and provides a division but barely takes up any space. It's definitely got a modern vibe, too.

Here is a link that might be useful: Sarah's House, season 2, Living Room & Front Entry

I think that the space seen in the photo to the right of the door will in fact Serve as entryway and be left with the sliding panels open most of the time and on social occasions.

I just don't want it to serve Only as entry, and have the ability to be sectioned off--in cold weather, as a sometimes office, kind of a multipurpose area. Perhaps the only "fixed" partition will be something for the front door to swing open against, if I change the doorswing.

So the ideas about making it the entryway are correct and are good ones, but my reasons for potential separation are to make it more flexible in use.

Another thought. I'm wondering if instead of sectioning forward from the door, you might not be able to make an entry way that follows the window wall? With a glass partition on the other side, and a closet at the end? Entry through passage and into the flexible room. More of a sense of arrival.

Maybe even have different sections of sliding glass walls and something to look at. Greenery probably doesn't go with the style, but sculptures perhaps. And a low bench. Partition on one side of the bench and it's in the entryway for removing shoes. On the other side, it's in the flex room for additional seating. The partitions themselves wouldn't be a great thermal barrier, because of the movement, but the ninety degree turn would do a lot, I think. Wouldn't it?

That's a possibility too, although getting furniture in might be a problem. Well I have a year to think about it, almost. Maybe I need something like "Get Smart", that opens and closes as one passes along.

I don't think weathertightness is as much of an issue as the sense of entry and perhaps preventing the blast of cold air from shooting straight through.

I was once in a modern house that had an entry with open tread stairs and there was a sheet of plexiglas mounted on the bottom of the stringers about midway up the flight of stairs, and we didn't know what it was for. Then someone opened the front door. It was to keep the blast of cold air from hitting people in the face or back of the neck when they were seated in the area beyond the steps. Kind of an ad-hoc adaptation, but it worked.