Knock through kitchen

[itsmehere1]

Hi. We have a 3 bed 1930s terraced house. We wanted to knock through to make a opened up kitchen diner.

1. could you tell me the process to go about it? Contact builders or do I have to go to architect first? Will I need planning permission?
2. if any of you would be kind enough to share pics of your opened up kitchen diners for ideas.

Thanks much.

3. Also you have done something like this recently in south east London, how much did it cost in total?

We got an architect round to have a look first. Unfortunately for us, it wouldn’t work out the way we had wanted, unless we had knocked all internal walls down and started from scratch, so can’t help with any other questions. Good luck!

We did ours when we moved in to our house 3 years ago.

Didn’t need an architect. My uncle is pretty handy and had a mate who is a builder so they did it us. Took a few hours to put ceiling supports up and knock out wall. We had to put a steel in and then get a building regulator from the council to come round and sign it off. Then had a plasterer come and replanted and all was good.

Cost less than £1000 in total.

Just to add ours was simpler than yours as there were no kitchen units, radiators or electrics along that wall.

You shouldn’t need an architect or planning permission. The builder will need building control to sign it off as he will almost certainly need to put in additional support if you take out a supporting wall.

I would consider losing your back door and making the kitchen a U shape. Also consider a cupboard for your washing machine/ dryer to minimise noise.

If the dining room window isn’t currently a patio door or French window then that looks lovely.

Lastly consider if you might extend in the future and if so ask your builder for ideas so you don’t end up redoing things unnecessarily.

Pretty much as @Purplepricklesalloverhisback for ours. I was renovating the whole house, so it was mixed up within all of that regards price (plastering etc), but we had a structural engineer draw up a plan because it was a supporting wall, builder knocked it out, put the RSJ in, fire boarded it, building regs came and inspected it, and then everything was plastered (I would say less than £1000 total but I honestly can’t properly remember as it was 2.5years ago now and mixed in with other work as I said earlier)

We did end up having to add in an extra supporting metal beam to the wall on one side- that was because the wall integrity was questionable. That added an extra £250ish.

This was before and during

We did it in SE London, about 5 years ago. Lost the wall, had an L shaped kitchen, moved the doorway forward, blocked up the back door and put a window in instead. Had an engineer calculate the load, got a steel in, was all fine. Probably cost £1500 including the engineer fees and building control sign off.

Definitely do it! Consider a L shaped kitchen with an island - ours is square with a bit sticking out on the dining room side with a couple of stools under, and power points. The cooker could potentially go in the island with extractor above though not necessarily recommending it. You could make the kitchen area a bit wider. A good builder will advise you, and go to a few kitchen planners to see what they suggest. Make the kitchen door a window.

You might want to check out the Apartment Apothecary blog, as your home seems very similar to the one featured in the blog. They've opened up the downstairs space so one big space instead of three separate rooms.

www.apartmentapothecary.com

Thanks all. Dh and I are looking through all the responses. The pictures of your kitchens look really impressive. Thanks for sharing. Looking for more replies.

I wish I had knocked through from my kitchen to my dining room years ago - it's the best thing I ever did. As a dining room it was a white elephant but now it's the space we live in most of the time.