Toying with knocking walls down...

[mistressploppy]

We're about to move into a late Victorian semi which is basically a square, with each floor divided into four rooms; dining and living room at the front, kitchen and ?dayroom? at the back.

The rooms are smallish and I'm wondering about knocking them together - making a kitchen/diner at the back and one big reception room at the front. There's a decent hall in between, with stairs etc

Has anyone done this and can offer advice? Would it be prudent to do just one or the other? Load-bearing issues etc will obviously have to be checked....I don't want to bulldoze the Victorian character but equally, larger rooms seem to suit how we live these days...

TIA

bump

I don't quite understand the layout? Is it that the house has a side entrance?

I think I'd go for big kitchen / diner at the back and keep the two rooms at the front, one sitting room and one dayroom / playroom.

Yes, I'm puzzled, post a floorplan but in the meantime, depending on the size of the rooms, I'd go with Hetty's suggestion.

Oh sorry! Yes, side entrance, with a separate vestibule thingy. Will try to upload a floorplan...

Ok, have put floorplan on profile

I made a big kitchen/family room at the back and kept 2 separate rooms at the front. When Dc were tiny we were always in the back but know they're bigger I appreciate the extra rooms. I would knock thro' your kitchen first because this is the room you'll have to fit out and then see how you use the rest of the space and decide later whether you want to knock thro' the front.

Oooh, great house. I stick by my earlier post, big back room, separate fronts (but possibly, if you have lots of guests/parties, link them with really grand reclaimed double doors so they can be opened up when necessary). Loo and utility space in the funny sticky out bit at the back (may already be that, the pix are too small to tell).

What's in the basement?

Basement - the room with the stairs is a study; there's a window which is halfway to ground level, IYSWIM. There's a connecting door to a storage room (ie not plastered, but dry etc). The head-height is only 6'2" in both though (DH is 6'2" )

Oooh, nice house.

Yup, I'd knock through at the back and keep two rooms at the back. Big doors out into the garden?

Thanks everyone.

DH was leaning towards knocking the front two together, I was leaning towards the kitchen/diner so I'm pleased with your responses. Am SAHM and I do spend a lot of time in the kitchen, and it would be nice if I could see 15mo DS playing while I was in there.

Mmm, Hetty; bigger doors to the garden? Now I'm thinking extension..... conservatory....

Maybe we'd better move in first and live in it for a bit!

Oh, if you can move in a really live there for a while before you do anything, that would be ideal. IME/O it impossible to really know what needs doing with a house until you know it quite intimately IYSWIM.

A sun room to the depth of the bathroom is surely logical?

Actually, do I see stairs to an attic room?

There's enough headroom to convert the loft, and there's a velux window in there, but no stairs, just a hatch above the landing (the stairs you see are probably the ones down to the half-landing). So you'd probably have to lose a bit of bedroom to do it properly. I think if we were going to embark on something, an extension would be better, but you never know!