How would you design an easy-to-clean house?

[CoalTit]

If money was no object, how would you design a house to make it as easy as possible to keep clean?
I resent the time I spend cleaning the house, and I've started to fantasise about a house with an absence of stainless steel to polish, wall-hung toilets, cupboard doors with no handles to clean around, hard flooring on the ground floor, curved corner tiles in the bathroom, blond wood with a matt varnish everywhere so as not show up the dirt while being fairly easy to clean without being dark and gloomy.
I'm wasting a lot of time on these fantasies but I enjoy them. Can anyone else fuel my fantasies with ideas for an easy-clean house? Especially if you have pets and/or children.

Matt slab cabinet doors for kitchen and bathroom, no grooves for catching dirt and no gloss for showing smears.

uPVC wall paneling in bathroom, also consider it for out kitchen renovation.

Wood effect Vinyl flooring (either plank or just sheet which ia about a 3rd of the price. This is amazing with a Dog and young DC.

Toilet with concealed floor bolts as they are a total dust trap.

Machine Washable sofa covers (Ikea)

Make sure any Shower bath screens have good range of motion, we had to change to one put in by previous owner as it hit a sloping ceiling, and to clean the bath/shower properly I had to climb in the bath.

Invest in a good cordless vacuum cleaner, and buy a soft dusting brush attachment for it (this is how I do ALL my dusting now).

Paint every room pure brilliant white, so that then when you are updating one room you can do a quick wash down and top up paint on any other high traffic areas.

If money was really no object, I'd have a nice annex built for my housekeeper and maid to live in.

I'd alternatively have a robot hoover and no steps in my house.

Probably a thing to stop all the lime getting in the water- our taps and sinks are encrusted weekly.

skirting boards with a 45 degree angle.

no carpets

Hard floors, very little say on them, as open plan at floor level as possible - then a robot hoover on each floor... that would decrease my cleaning time with a daily programme...

Also kids programmed to clean up after themselves...but that's another thread!

But the noise of the Hoover and the guilt I feel when someone else cleans is exactly what I want to avoid in my fantasy!

Induction hob not gas. We’ve just moved from an induction hob house – easy to wipe! – to one with a gas hob and it’s such a pain.

Other than that, unfortunately aesthetically I like all the dirt collectors: real floorboards, tiles, handles, period skirting and architrave, shaker cupboards, fancy taps. But those are all built-in: the real trick is to have less stuff: quicker and easier to clean if there’s no clutter to move. That’s my fantasy: a giant skip and binning all the DC toys and all DP’s junk and having clear floors and surfaces. The dream!

Make sure any Shower bath screens have good range of motion, we had to change to one put in by previous owner as it hit a sloping ceiling, and to clean the bath/shower properly I had to climb in the bath.
Oh, yes, I've come across that problem, except the screen hit the bidet when it opened.
The owner kept a squeegee in the bathroom to wipe the screen down, too. Just what you need when you're trying to get yourself clean --- more cleaning. That made me think a shower curtain would be better.

the real trick is to have less stuff: quicker and easier to clean if there’s no clutter to move
Yes, OH likes to put ornaments on every horizontal surface, and I've become rather minimalist after years of dusting them and moving them out of the way whenever I have to put something down.

I’ve currently got a very possible fantasy about changing all of our beds to ottoman style ones which touch the floor. We’ve got a robot vacuum cleaner who really is wonderful but he can’t pootle about upstairs because of the beds and all the shit under them, which is ironic because they’re probably the filthiest place in the whole house.

I also think in your fantasy house there’s something to be said for a magical source of heat which doesn’t involve radiators. No dust!

I have laminate in every room because I hate hoovering. Also bought furniture that it was possible to get a robot cleaner under, long before I had a robot cleaner. Both very good decisions.

I also think in your fantasy house there’s something to be said for a magical source of heat which doesn’t involve radiators. No dust!
Yes, my fantasy house has a heat pump and excellent insulation, partly to control the humidity. When I lived in a very cold, damp house the dust turned sort of semi-solid and couldn't just be dusted away. That was awful.

No skirting boards

No carpets

underfloor heating (no radiators)

Large bathroom with a shower away from the walls in the middle of the room with nothing in the vicinity to get wet, a powerful extraction fan

No animals

Leather sofas

Handle free kitchen units / Induction hob / large dishwasher

Toilet seats that don’t have the nooks and crannies for piss and dust to gather in

I dream of cupboard doors WITH handles! They get less fingerprints on them and the grooves at the top of my base cabinets and drawers to open them are horrible dirt catchers.

For me the biggest impediment is clutter. Stuff all over the floor and surfaces that has to be moved before I can clean properly. So my design would incorporate:

A large basement with plenty of open shelving where I can put all the decorating kit/camping kit/sports equipment/Christmas decorations.

An easily-accessed attic for longer-term storage (items of furniture not currently in use but don't want to get rid of, boxes of childhood treasures, family heirlooms etc)

Large sheds outside - separate ones for gardening kit, bikes, garden toys and outdoor furniture.

Lots and lots of built-in cupboards, including both upstairs and downstairs broom cupboards.

I often daydream about it. Usually when I'm gathering up armfuls of crap so that I can sweep the floor.

Storage space, build in endless storage space for everything in your dream house. We moved into a house with excessive amounts of built in storage, over time its slowly filled up with all our clutter but it's easy to spend 5 minutes chucking everything out of sight to give an illusion of show home tidy.

Things like under the stairs drawers for shoes and bags, etc (have hopefully attached example photo) will keep your hallway magically clean and clutter free.

Mine was always hard to clean. This was solved when

All the kids grew up and moved out
The dog died
We bought two robot vacuums and a robot mop so the only floor cleaning I ever do is sweep the stairs occasionally

Look at Nordic minimalism. It's a bit hospital like for my taste, but quick and easy to clean. Decluttering is key, so no kids too 😁

Sadly yes, the dog passing away has made our house so much cleaner and easier to keep clean. It’s such a difference that the cleaner has suggested she doesn’t need to do as many hours

The floors would have an underground hoover that sucks the whole carpet in one go and puts the dust straight into the bin.

Blast down through the radiator with a hairdryer, then vacuum up the dust at the bottom. That way when you turn the heating on there isn't any dust in the radiator to be lifted up and floated round the house.