Remove doors from doorway

[shushiea]

I have a double door separating my living room from my kitchen. The doors are ALWAYS open.

There's even a little table on a lamp in front of one of the open doors...

I've decided to take the doors off to create a bigger space.

My home is a large new build.

What does everyone think ? In general of just taking the doors off in a situation like this ?

It feels really different with the doors off and I like it. My H doesn't like it as much.

But surely it's silly to have open doors as a constant feature of your living room walls, if that makes sense ? Now they're off, you can actually see the walls and it creates more wall space. Now the lamp on the table is against the wall and makes much more sense.

Thoughts ?

It's fine to do this OP. Many builders actually don't put doors on the show homes so that the rooms look bigger, so if you're happy with it go ahead. It's your home after all, although obviously you do need to take onboard your DH's opinions.

Does your husband ever cook stinky food?

Are you kids all over 5 and you don't have any pre-school grandchildren?

Is your heating sufficient to heat both rooms properly?

That's the only reasons I can think of to keep the doors on.

Though to be honest I would remove them next late Spring/Summer so you don't have him moaning about being cold.

Could you fit folding doors? They fold in half and don't take up as much room.

Sat here and I have double doors between lounge and dining room - one is always open, other one always shut and has stuff in front and behind so couldn’t be used anyway
Do what works for you!
I’ve permanently blocked off my back door as it’s right next to French windows!

I've got one open and one closed too. Mine are glass.

I think it's a good idea to take them down. You never close them so you don't need them.

Stinky food, not really and even when we cook, we always have the door open !

Heating is not an issue as both rooms have under floor heating.

We do have children under 5 but the doors are open anyway and they can open them if they want to anyway.

I just felt so silly looking at doors for the last three years.

My parents removed our kitchen door at some point in my childhood! Can't remember when but decades later it's still not there 😂

You go through hallway straight to kitchen. Door never shut anyway. Lounge door is also usually open and I'm surprised that remained!

I removed my living room door for this reason, was always open and took up space.
Would do it for kitchen too but dog could escape!

If these are doors between the kitchen and the hallway, and there are no other doors between kitchen and the staircase then I think it could be an issue under building regulations. Not an issue while you live there as it’s no different to you propping them open, but if you come to sell you might be asked to reinstate them as it would be non compliant.

@LondonOx that's a good point.

All the people I can think of who have open plan kitchens and living rooms have a door between their downstairs and upstairs.

Most but not all have a separate utility room with door(s) on it.

There are actually doors between kitchen and hallway and also living room and hallway. They're also always open but we won't be getting rid of those, so should be ok. You can separate the hallway and stairs from the living room and kitchen entirely. I often do this when I leave the dog home, as otherwise she runs upstairs and sets the hallway alarm off.

In terms in building regs, you can have an open plan ground floor if the house is only 2 storeys as long as the bedroom windows are suitable for means of escape. So yes, you likely can remove the doors.

I was only flagging the BC issue as something to think about. What you’ve said is true, but only applies if the bedroom windows meet the requirements for emergency escape windows which isn’t a given. Irrelevant anyway given there are other doors between kitchen and stairs!

If it’s a new build, the first floor bedroom windows are going to be suitable for means of escape (unless there’s a protected route which is unlikely).

Given ~85% of UK housing stock was built before 2000 when that regulation came in, I don’t think it makes sense to assume first floor windows are going to meet the standards to qualify as means of escape when giving general advice about things to consider.

Sorry, just reread the opening post and spotted the OP said it’s a new build which I had missed!

I think it is fine.

After we had been living in our house for over a year we realised that we never shut the kitchen to hallway door once, the door now lives in the garage and hasn't moved for 15 years.

I would take them off and open up the space if they serve no useful purpose. It's easy enough to put doors back on if you change your mind. I like my living spaces to have an open flow. Modern, well-built homes shouldn't have any problems with odours or heating.

Yeah my kitchen door was removed but they hadn't kept it.

As I cook stinky food I wanted a door so had to buy a new one.

But you should have fire doors on the habitable rooms i.e living, beds etc.

Nope. This is incorrect. You only need them in a property with a storey over 4.5m or where a protected route is required due to no escape from the first floor.

Other than this, the only place you have to have a fire door is to an integral garage.

I've done this several times. You may have to put filler in the holes it leaves in the doorframe and paint over for it to look decent.

One bit of advice, if you have room, is to keep the doors in the garage/loft or somewhere. Then if you sell the house the buyers have the choice to reinstate them without the expense of buying new ones.

We did this in our old house for very similar reasons.

What we did do though was wrap the doors in old sheets and tucked them in the far corner of the loft. When we came to sell the house we took them down and fitted them again

@ForPearlViper WOW! Are you my OH?!! 😂