Orangerie kitchen? Yes or no

I have a conservatory-esque kitchen. It was there when I bought my flat. We don't eat in there- there isn't the room, but I do second what everyone else has commented. It can be very hot in summer and the floor can be freezing first thing in the autumn and winter months. Be mindful of ventilation as well!

I like it, if we moved I'd really miss it but I'd be very exacting if I was considering one from scratch based on my current experience. Some places absolutely aren't meant for them. Previous student accommodation had one as a dining room. It was absolutely too cold to use 95% of the time we lived there. It got no sun. My aunt had one on her last house- a glorious little sun trap and toasty warm, although she was quite easily able to cool it in high summer.

True that.

Lovely on the right house.

I read on here once if you have to ask if it's tacky it probably is.

A guide to small conservatories and orangeries:

https://www.valegardenhouses.co.uk/articles/small-conservatories-and-orangeries/

Make sure to ask about bespoke features for period properties. You might like an Edwardian looking roof lantern or door/window features that pick up the designs through the rest of the house.

Firstly it’s not true that you can only add them to big houses what on odd idea, equally odd is the idea that an orangery is “posher” than a conservatory.

It won't be an orangerie with underfloor heating - too hot for citrus trees. They just need an unheated greenhouse.

My kitchen is on a conservatory and I designed it that way. It’s east facing and beautiful light all year round. It’s quite modern but actually fits my old house (early Georgian 4 floor town house) quite well. It’s metal framed and just lots of double-glazed glass. I love it.

But mine is a big house and we kept it in proportion to the size. It extends the back of the house rather than changing the shape of the house IYSWIM. And it wasn’t cheap.

Will it be too hot in summer? Or too cold in winter?

Are you overlooked? How far are surrounding neighbour houses/windows

We have family members who lived in a house with a (pre-existing) glass conservatory kitchen.

The first time I went to visit I absolutely loved it and was so envious. Unfortunately, it turned out it was a complete nightmare - freezing (and prohibitively expensive to heat) in winter and boiling hot in the summer. I felt really sad for them, because they’d imagined themselves living in it a lot of the time when they first moved in.

It was already there when they arrived - and I suspect it may have been done on the cheap. Sadly, they didn’t have the money to throw at heating and cooling it to make it useable.

As someone who absolutely loves light and the outdoors - I can totally see the attraction of a conservatory kitchen. I think I would just be taking a lot of advice up front, making sure I had enough budget to do it properly AND also to heat and cool it so we could get loads of use out of it.

I'd go for a proper roof with skylights, you get the light and airy feel but I expect they'd be easier to maintain a proper temperature

Ah, your extension sounds exactly like our imitation orangery...😂

Ta for that 😁
Okay I'm buggering off to sit in my pretend orangery, low-class peasant scumbag that I am.

Have fun with all your reverse snobbery, guys.

We had one in our old house. A period house in London, designed by our predecessors to blend in beautifully. We had no direct sunlight at all, so it never really heated up to unbearable temperatures, and we found it trapped the cooking heat in the winter to be warm. It had an outside inside vibe that was so soothing in the mornings with a coffee. It became a social hub, we could never move anyone into our dining room. They would gravitate back to the kitchen.

I liked seeing the stars at night - even in London you could see them and the moon. Weirdly I felt more connected to the world, the planet, the changing skies than anywhere else. Cooking quietly. It had a certain peace about it. We never left the place. We used it for reading, cooking, socialising and relaxing. I would have another. My only gripe was not enough kitchen surface space but it was a very small issue compared to the he enjoyment we had.

No. I wouldn't add a conservatory onto my house. I knocked the one that was on my house when I bought it. It was too hot in summer, freezing in winter and suffered from condensation to boot! Awful!

I built a proper extension with brick sides and a French doors that fold right back. Didn't want bi-folds as they eat up too much space. I did add a sloping ceiling with velux windows which is a great feature and keeps it all light and bright.

The builder who did it said that he always dissuades people from doing orangeries as the flat roof can cause problems plus the glass is a pain to clean and always looks dirty.

Nice idea but it'll be like a giant greenhouse.

My house has a conservatory and what made a massive difference when we moved in was having a proper roof installed on it so it functions more like a normal room of the house through the seasons. Maybe you could do that? The material looks like slate to match existing roof but is actually a much lighter weight material.

Westbury are ££££££. Prepare to tip your pockets out.

If you look at their brochures, their work is all big, big houses. Orangeries don't work on anything smaller than a big, period house. Anything else is just a conservatory with a bit of extra brick and an owner who has delusions of grandeur😂

We have a conservatory and it's absolutely deafening in there when it rains heavily, (but has doors we can close from the lounge) we don't use it a lot in the winter.

Yes, very good point - I do need to mention that - it has made our kitchen and front room very gloomy having the orangery, or additional room that now apparently has no name 🙄

We have a French door that locks at the back of the house. When the extension was built we were told it was an orangery due to it having solid walls and tiled roof but apparently that must be wrong 🤔 but it's definitely not a conservatory so what do we now call it? Dunno...

But anyway, yes, the downside is a very gloomy kitchen and front room that need lights on all day. They are nicely cool in summer though when the "not orangery" can be like a furnace as it faces west.

So, on reflection, while it is a useful space in and is handy for the dogs, I think in some ways I did prefer the house before, with all the light flooding into the kitchen...

From experience large Velux windows are are effectively a glass area of sloping roof and can be very noisy; roof lanterns rise above the rest of the ceiling and they lift the noise upwards away from the rest of the room. Not saying there’s no noise but it’s not as loud as Velux. But still, another reason for not having one large single roof lantern.

I have no view on orangeries, sun rooms, conservatories or extensions, but can state with confidence (and many years behind me) that 'lounge' hadn't been pretentious since 1973. Sitting room is posher but I think also just classic (I had a sitting room throughout childhood and that was in a Croydon council flat).

I have no idea what distinguishes a living room, having never lived in a house that needed more than one label for the room where you sit. These days, I expect living room might be what you call the ubiquitous knocked through kitchen-diner and the sitting room your front room?

What OP is describing is an orangery extension - with more glass and less brick than a regular extension - built by firms that specialise in garden rooms including orangeries and conservatories.