What would you do with this house? Ground floor layout

[PetShopGirl]

We are in the process of buying this house and will be looking to do some work to the ground floor. Currently it is a bit of an odd arrangement with an extension to the kitchen, making it a kind of elongated L-shape. This makes it a bit dark and generally not very usable. The plan is to take out the entire wall between the kitchen and the family room at the back to make one large cooking, eating, living area. The most obvious place for the kitchen (although all other ideas welcome!) seems to be along the back and adjoining walls, with an island facing out to the garden. The eating area would then be roughly in what is now the long thin bit, with the living area in what is now the family room.

I think this will be a lovely, light space, but I’m just a bit concerned about the lack of utility area, as well as storage space for hoovers, mops, buckets etc. We’ve talked about having some big cupboards/units either as part of the kitchen or built into the back corner of the living space, and these would be fine for hoovers and mops, but might there be any way of having a proper utility area built in where we could store that sort of crap but also have the washing machine, washing baskets and possibly even some drying racks? I obviously don’t want to sacrifice too much light, but the space is a large one and I’m just wondering if there’s anything I’m missing as I can’t really see any way of doing it at the moment. In theory this is our ‘forever’ home and if at all possible I would really like a more organised way of drying and sorting washing than our current arrangement of having drying racks and washing baskets dotted around the house!

Has anyone got any ideas, or done anything similar?

Thanks.

[Sandbagsandgladrags]

Could you consider a) running a utility room along the back wall of the kitchen (ie where it meets the front room), and having a door to it off the hallway, or b) taking a small chunk out of your planned living area in the bottom left hand corner and using that? I've seen a house near us with the second utility layout.

[GibbousHologram]

Floor to ceiling cupboards along the length of the wall to the living room with bifold doors. Make them the depth of a washer/drier. If you can stack the appliances you get plenty floor space for mops/hoovers etc and no asked space that you have to sidle past to reach the back corner.

[Believeitornot]

Agree - squeeze in a utility room immediately behind the living room.

You could have a run of wall to ceiling units on the back wall of the kitchen, then an island then your eating area by the Windows. Imagine how you'd use the space - you cook then everyone sits down and enjoys the view to the garden.

[GibbousHologram]

*no wasted space

[GibbousHologram]

OMG, want.

Shame you'd probably not have room for shower tray under hanging rack too...

[PetShopGirl]

Thanks all.

I had briefly considered building a utility across the back wall of the kitchen but wasn't sure whether it would work as there wouldn't be a window. Am I being dim - can you have rooms with no windows? (Although having said that I suppose it's not a problem for the under stairs loo/shower...). It's an end terrace house so the wall furthest from the stairs is external, which I guess might help with ventilation issues.

Running some kind of deep cupboards all along living room wall that would fit washing machine is also a good idea, although I'm not sure about noise issues if we have a TV in that vicinity.

Gibbous - I love that, where is it from?

[olafisking]

I want to know where that unit is from too, it's lovely!

[GibbousHologram]

I googled 'utility rooms behind bifolds'. Turns out Pinterest loves them.

You can have rooms without Windows but they need to be ventilated so you might struggle with that. I think a utility room would be a waste of your lovely living/dining/kitchen space. A utility cupboard on the other hand...

[GibbousHologram]

The other thing I thought about saying was do you need washer/drier downstairs? I've had mine upstairs for years now and it's so very much more convenient (except the few times a year I want to dry outside).

If upstairs would be okay you could use the same trick in a spare room (plumbing allowing) though you'd still probably want a Hoover cupboard downstairs.

[minnymoobear]

gibbous think that's genius!! makes so much sense to have washing and drying upstairs for me as I have a dryer and am too lazy to put washing out anymore!
We're having an extension done so will see if we can get them stacked in bathroom rather than kitchen :)

[GibbousHologram]

I don't know why it's not a thing, I really don't. You (mostly) get dressed upstairs and keep clothes upstairs, right? It's so obvious now! (First house I did it in was because of tiny kitchen. Had to install plumbing to third floor but even that wasn't a particularly big job.)

[MyFriendsCallMeOh]

My utility room is upstairs (it's the norm where I live in the USA) and it's brilliant. The only things I have to take upstairs to get washed are dishcloths and towels and the hand towel from the downstairs toilet.

[thewookieswife]

Just looked at this quickly before I start work - you could maybe apply to put a glazed side door (or window) into the pantry to give light and access to garden ?!? (Then add boot room to the name label too !)
Will need to speak to a contractor re adding plumbing there, if you wanted laundry in that but too - to be honest - upstairs is usually more convenient!
Although it would be handy to have an extra sink in there so you can put all the used dished etc through there when entertaining.

[OnePlanOnHouzz]

Meant to add - you will need a SE to calculate the RSJ needed for wall whip out - Nd corner I left will probably need to stay !

[thewookieswife]

Whoops ! Forgot to name change - but you all knew it was me anyway I guess !!!

( cover blown !!! Lol )

[TheKingSits]

We have a long thing utility room with no windows and it's absolutely fine. In fact it's brilliant and totally worth sacrificing some space for. It's the most useful room in the house by miles.

We used to live in a house with an upstairs laundry room and it was amazing! It was so easy to put away and if there were clothes hanging up to dry they were in the bedrooms, so no running around grabbing bras off radiators when the neighbours pop in! If I was designing my own house I would definitely have that. Now the washing machine is 2 floors away from the bedrooms and it is such a pain! I would still want a utility room near the kitchen though for additional freezer, mops, cat litter etc...

Hope the move goes well OP!

[PetShopGirl]

thewookieswife - thank you so much, I love this arrangement! The house is end terrace and on the corner of a road, so that external wall is right on the pavement. I guess that means we wouldn't be allowed to put a door there? Would be amazing if we could (although I tremble at the additional cost...).

I can see that having a utility room upstairs makes sense, but I wonder about washing machine noise in the evenings with small children. We also quite often have it on timer to start a couple of hours before we wake up. Also, I think it would need to go in the box room on the first floor and I had earmarked that as a chi-chi little dressing room for me . Wouldn't it be quite tricky to reach the plumbing that far anyway?

[GibbousHologram]

Is your dressing room the one next the bathroom? Would be easy to get plumbing in there (either from bathroom or via external wall). But it would reduce the space available for your beautiful wardrobes...

[PetShopGirl]

Gibbous - no it's the teeny one at the front next to the biggest bedroom. DC will need to go in other two bedrooms on first floor as they are still little and can't really go on top floor at the mo. Small room is too small even for smallest DC as bedroom really, so only one 'spare' on that floor.

[GibbousHologram]

I hadn't even noticed that one - thought it was just part of the landing! Yes, that'd be awful to try to plumb.

And if you used a too floor room, it'd be no more convenient than having it downstairs.