AIBU to ask how you'd extend this ground floor..?

[EmbarrassingMama]

Advice welcome and encouraged from all the rightmove and property show addicts!

This is my downstairs floorplan. It's a good size, but my kitchen layout doesn't feel very spacious due to the peninsula cutting the room up. We have the opportunity to extend but I need help. How would you do it? We have a 1m side return we could use and can also go out the back. Our garden is only 11 metres long so the max we'd want to build out is 3m. I'm actually thinking 2.5 m might be better, to preserve more of the garden.

Not that interested in getting a sofa in there (we have a nice sitting room for TV), so it'd really be a kitchen and dining space.

Extra points for: pantry; downstairs loo.

YABU: Bugger off and find an architect
YANBU: Where are my pencils? I live for this stuff.

TIA!

You don't seem to have much storage downstairs, I'm thinking of coats, wellingtons, shopping. All those things that make my house really untidy ie:if you've young children where do you put the pushchair etc. A larger open plan area doesn't necessarily sort out any of those issues so I'd always plan around storage.

Slick drawings and diagrams are most impressive, while here I am with tape and string and chalk going around the house measuring door width and worktop depth. I love this space and what makes it so good is the shape. It's the width that makes it such a good family house with your three good-sized bedrooms and bathroom upstairs with bath and separate shower and potentially your spacious family dining kitchen, sitting room and utility, wc and shower downstairs.

You could move your table a bit nearer to the run of worktop as it's better to be a bit more connected with the kitchen rather than pushed out too far, looking detached, sitting in the middle of nowhere. This also leaves you loads of room for your wc, utility and cloakroom / shower room on the far side and you have a window there on the back wall, ideal for ventilation and light.

And not forgetting the larder! It would go in the right-hand corner so you can have an air vent through the back wall and is near your worktop and preparation areas, where it needs to be. Your run of cupboards would start next to it.

If you put those in and you have a great working house and the whole package when it comes to sell.

@EmbarrassingMama your 3D sketch is basically our kitchen but I think our table is nearer the worktop and our sofa is under the old kitchen window (it’s 150cm wide so a small 2 seater).
We have a round table rather than oblong that seats 4-5 and extends to an oval of 7-8 as we found it took up less space and flowed better, the table is 130 diameter.

I wouldn't extend it at all. I would just move the kitchen to the opposite corner and ditch the peninsula. You will have plenty of room for your table then and the room will feel more spacious.

Thanks everyone!

@Griselda1 you're right that there isn't loads of storage in the kitchen, and I'd be losing the understairs cupboard in favour of a loo, but I'd have about 50% more cupboard space in the kitchen. I currently only have ONE FOOD CUPBOARD. Can you believe that?! My current kitchen doesn't have any wall units, and the base units are taken up with: under sink, oven, microwave & dishwasher. It leaves me with a total of five cupboards and one set of drawers!

It's a 1930s house with a wide hall, so my buggy and the kid's coats and shoes go in the hall. There are lots of hooks up and a bench for seating and to contain gloves and hats and so on. You make a good point though (the skinny hallways have always put me off Victorian houses!).

@Abitofalark how deep would that need to be, though? The utility come loo, I mean? I'm just thinking that if that's a minimum of 1.5m off the entire left side, wont that make the kitchen quite narrow? Open to it just felt like it would create a smaller space, but perhaps it's a better use of space.

@seven201 for the plans I posted (which aren't great but do provide a good visual) I used the free Ikea tool.

Thank you!

I’d be inclined to move the kitchen part to the diagonally opposite corner, doing away with the need for the peninsular unit. You wouldn’t need to extend then...

Loo under stairs
The End

@Feetupteashot yup, a loo would go under the stairs but it’s not quite as easy as that because the ceiling height is not high enough, so the entrance to the kitchen would need to be pushed back about a metre or so.