Would you rather Fantastic Utility or a Bigger Kitchen

[Jacaqueen]

Just got plans back from the architect for our new extension.
Really pleased with them apart from the size of the utility room.

As the plans stand at the moment you would enter the utility and on the right would be a run of units standard 600mm deep. This would have sink, washing machine, dryer etc. Internally it is around 3m long. However he has only left 800mm floor space which is very tight. You then go through another door(facing the door you came in) to the wc. There will be an understair cupboard you access from wc, which I could use to store hoover, steam cleaner etc. But this plan has no room to put up the ironong board or to have shelves on the wall opposite the washing machine etc.

I could (I think) move the internal wall and borrow 600mm from the kitchen. This would give me a gap of 1000mm making loading/emptying the dryer etc easier. It would also allow a wall of shelves or units 400mm deep on the opposite side. I am thinking old fashioned pantry/ larder type shelves with maybe space below for various laundry baskets.

However this does change the proportions of the kitchen area making it rectangle rather than square and compromises the size of the island (yes I know they are old fashioned but I want one)

As it stands the kitchen area will be L shaped but both arms of the L are the same size. Approx 4m. Opposite one of the walls (what would be the long wall) will be the open plan dining and sitting area with doors out to a terrace. Opposite what would be the shorter wall is windows and steps down into the back hall that lead to the utility.

If you are still reading this, what should I do?

Make the utility into a much more useable space or keep the kitchen big.

thanks

Are you saying that there is only 800mm between the front of the washing machine and the opposite wall? Clearly your architect has never unloaded a washing machine if so! You won't be able to bend down and reach in unless you crouch sideways, which is going to become boring very quickly. I would think you need at least 1m and preferably 1.2m in front of the machine for comfortable use. I base this on the space recommended for getting things out of cupboards safely.

Send your architect back to the drawing board, or home to do some washing!

Can you post pics of the plans? Hard to say without seeing them but I do agree that 80cm to unload a washing machine sounds mad, if that is what you mean.

Is there another space you could use for ironing? A spare room maybe?

Hard to picture but I think I would go for utility and pantry

You need more room to load and unload laundry id say. Not sure you need extra room to actually do the ironing though? Does anyone actually do their ironing in the utility room? Pretty boring in there unless a tv no? I store ironing board iron and massive pile of ironing in utility but take it next door to living room to actually iron it (occasionally).

Are island units old fashioned? What are we supposed to have instead?

Thanks for the feedback.

I will try and post plans later.

I have been planning this for a long time and the utility is probably the space I am most looking forward to.

There is another room I could use to do the ironing but the idea was to have all the laundry gubbins in the one area.

Thankfully DH agrees that the utility space seems tight so we will go back to the architect and see what he suggests. I dont think we can change the plans to make the footprint bigger which would be the easiest thing. That way I could have massive utility and lovely kitchen.

I don't think island are old fashioned but some people on here do.

I do tend to iron in my utility room and it isn't huge but it is quite useful to have a bit of space in it. I would make sure you have some room to unload washer etc. also you may want to dry washing in there out of sight which is what I tend to do. I could have had a big kitchen with no utility but I prefer having the 2 separate spaces. also houses the boiler and megaflow tank.

Could you potentially change the layout within the existing footprint / plans so that for example instead of having the washer and dryer along one wall with the 600mm cupboards, you have the washer and dryer stacked on top of each other in the corner (ie so the front of the machines face you rather than being on their side). You can get kits so the dryer stacks on top of the washing machine. Thats what we had in last house and it worked very well.

I agree that you need a decent-ish size to be able to unload/load washing and also have stuff drying (although I have something like this - www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/10177178/ mine is ceiling mounted on a pulley system) and some shelves / cupboards for storing / stacking clean laundry. For me personally, I would hate to iron in the utility - I find it mindblowingly dull at the best of times (in front of the TV) nevermind looking at 4 walls!!! But thats just me....

If you can't change the layout within the existing plans, I'd stretch the 800mm floor space a little , but not to the extent that it would compromise a big lovely kitchen.

P.S. I love island units :-)

I iron in the utility room too - in fact I seem to spend half of my life there! I think you need more space in the utility room.

Are islands old fashioned?? I was planning of having one in my new kitchen.......

Me too - I want to dispute this MN judgement about islands being old-fashioned - where's the thread!?

Maybe very centralised ones but you need some sort of surface in front of the units surely - if only to get away from the rest of the family. Am intrigued to know what MN had judged we should have instead - back to one large square room empty in the middle? Surely you trip over the kids?

Can't seem to get the plans to scale down, but it doesn't matter because we are definately getting a bigger utility.

As I said ,I have been planning this extension in my head for a long long time. It is my one chance to get exactly what I want so I am not going to compromise. Well not on the utility.

Now onto this island issue. I have always loved islands. I have never had an island. I will be having an island.

However I have definately seen threads on here where they have been declared as being old fashioned and dated.

I really wouldnt worry if islands are considered old hat, it is your house so choose what you want and what will suit your kitchen and style of cooking.

My only issue with islands is that they can become dumping grounds (bad news is you are messy like me)....

Dumping Ground!

No that is what the utility room will be for.

Actually I'm going to go against the grain here - 800mm is big enough to unload/load washing machine or dryer. Our utility room is long and thin with a L shaped arrangement of units/appliances 750mm gap in front of appliances (tumble dryer & fridge freezer which have biggest doors) and it's perfectly usable. I don't iron generally in there because I prefer to do it in front of the telly or listening to the radio rather than staring at a blank wall in the utility room.
We have shelves with baskets up the Walls above the units and hooks on the blank wall ( + a sink and drainer & boiler) which gives us plenty of storage which is good because as we don't have any garage/ shed space so all DIY/ kids garden / craft stuff etc all resides in here too.
I didn't design the utility it came with the house but I am an architect and I personally would go with a serviceable utility and larger kitchen as I feel you would get more benefit from the space this way as a family -larger utility rooms often end up being dumping grounds. I am about to recommend this for a client with a large storage cupboard adjacent for 'stuff' which they have an awful lot of. But you know how your family works best and as long as you explain this to your architect clearly they should be able to make that work within the plan.

Thats interesting wonky.
We are having a similar dilema, trying to decide if we should increase our kitchen and have a small combined loo/utility (with 3 windows its a bigger to design) or leave the kitchen smaller and create a downstairs loo and keep the utility simply as a utility, no loo.
The extra space is only around 1m x 2m so not huge but enough for a loo. Do you think this is worth converting to kitchen space?
We dont have a garage and no other cupboards to hard to find storage for DIY/craft things as you mention.

It depends on the layout really and it's hard to tell without looking at it but I'd be inclined to have a separate loo and rearrange the utility to accommodate more storage if as you say you have little storage elsewhere.
I'd usually go for as big a kitchen as possible as modern living practices usually work better with more space but the space should be usable and adding small bits of space here and there doesn't necessarily add to this. It sounds like you already have an awkward space to plan.
You could consider when you take the loo out of the utility adding a large larder type unit / cupboard to take some of the kitchen storage, which would help without increasing your actual kitchen size.
It's hard to say really as I can't see the space and it would also depend on how your family would use it. Its probably worth doing a pros and cons list for the options with regards to you as a family. Sorry can't be more help.

Thanks wonky, we do indeed have a difficult layout, it's an old house and the floorplan is quite unusual (on my profile in fac) and the kitchen is typically small (other reception rooms are quite big).
I have done a pros and cons list and having a separate loo and utility wins but every kitchen designer who has come round has suggested removing the cupboard so we have room for an island - limited worktop otherwise.
SO I keep going round in circles!
But perhaps kitchen designers don't understand the importance of storage...

We did get an architect to do drawings but while he had some nice ideas he was hopeless on storage and practicality.

Would you consider not putting in the dividing wall at all and having a utility 'end' of the kitchen. You can use either large cupboard doors, sliding doors (or my favourite) bi-fold doors. You simply have everything behind those doors so that when they are shut they look pretty much like a wall but inside everything is well laid out.

i would rather have a more useable utility room and smaller kitchen

if all your white goods are in the utility room you will not need as much space in the kitchen anyway

More opinions I see.

We have gone back to the architect so will wait and see what he suggests.

I am now concerned that the kitchen area is not big enough to accommodate the layout and units that I would like.

I think the ideal would be to have one big kitchen area the size of the original plan, and then add a fantastic utility onto the side of that. However DH, aka the sensible one, has knocked that idea on the head.

Knowing how much time and space the laundry takes in this house I definately want a seperate area.

Interesting to hear wonkylegs, that you think 800m is big enough and that still leaves enough room for hooks etc.

Unfortunately I've spent half the day in ours today sorting through a mountain of washing so I know it works, it's not huge but it is adequate. Only thing that tends to make it fail is when DH decides to dump awkward stuff like random bags of cement or boots in hope they will magically put themselves away

Jaca
My friends have a new build with a small utility off the kitchen. The dimensions of the utility are similar to what you describe, plus it has a biggish window which minimises the wall area available for storage. It is an appalingly poor use of space and if it was me I'd have gone for the larger kitchen.
In our extension DH built what is essentially a large cupboard near the back door which houses the WM, TD and boiler, laundry baskets etc so is a solution similar to what Chipping in said. This meant we could maximise the space for the kitchen. I would've loved a big utility room as well but we didn't have enough footprint space available, so the kitchen space won.
HTH and hope the architect's revisions are better than the originals.

Our utility room was formerly a galley kitchen and had a washing machine and tumble dryer in. It was incredibly narrow and the space between the units on either side was about 800mm. I never found it particularly difficult to unload and load the washing machine. It's now a utility room off a large kitchen extension (bliss!) and we've only got base units along one side, so about 1400mm in width I guess. I really can't say it's any easier to load the machine! There's enough space to iron in there, but as others have said, I tend to do most of the ironing in the kitchen because I want to listen to the radio or talk to whoever's in the kitchen!

I would go for the larger kitchen every time as although I spend a lot of time doing laundry, I definitely spend much more time in the kitchen!