Best layout for small terraced victorian house?

[MinimalistMommi]

Currently, the front door goes right into small living room, which then has door which leads into small square hall area at bottom of staircase which splits the front and back rooms up. The back room is the dining room with lovely fireplace and leading off this is a small galley kitchen.

We are looking at moving staircase to improve layout upstairs (simply turning it so it starts and finishes the opposite way it does now) but I've been wondering if we should move staircase completely and reposition it, knocking living room and dining room into one big space?

What do mumsnetters think? I can't decide!

I would move the staircase to run up the side wall of the house (so you see the staircase running in front of you as you open front door) if this was feasible/didn't compromise the upstairs layout. I hate the front and back being split by a staircase and I'd knock through into the back room as well.

I have also seen people create a kind of corridor that screens the front room from the front door by building a set of open shelves from floor to about 2 metre height for a couple of metres or a run of full height cupboards so that you have somewhere to put shoes/coats etc. This makes the front room feel more private and creates useful space rather than just a wall.

Thanks lala one of our neighbours has the staircase running directly up close to front door, I want to get the courage up to go and knock to see how they figured upstairs layout. My worry with this layout (and this is why I've been resisting the idea of knocking through) is losing space in upstairs main bedroom as it is a lovely size right now. I figure we would have to cut into floor (so losing space) so there is enough head clearance as the stairs are being climbed. I've been going over and over how to figure this out without losing chunks from the two bedrooms upstairs.

Lala I'm finding the two rooms being separate a bit annoying to be honest but can see how the separate rooms would be useful when we have older teens and they have their friends around etc.

I have a terrace with the stairs running up the centre of the house, as they did when first built. The front and back room have been knocked through so it's one huge airy space. With a lovely but small kitchen extension at the back.

With regard to the open plan living area - I would prefer two rooms tbh, as my DD's are preteen and the seperate space would be better. Although it would have been ideal when they were little.

Miss I'm confused, are your stairs still splitting the front and back room or have you moved them to a side wall?

Sorry, I didn't explain very well. The stairs are still between the front and back room. They have used open banisters to let light through which makes it look bigger.

Oh, I see Miss so it's simply the staircase and not walls/understairs cupboard etc.

Yes there's empty space under the stairs. Although we have a huge built in cupboard between the front room and back room, on the opposite wall to the start of the stairs, that goes up to the ceiling. If that makes sense.

It's hard to explain

Miss I wonder if your house is a bit wider then mine, just trying to imagine cupboard directly opposite foot of stairs here, a human would not be able to squeeze through, my house is very small tiny though

If you're worried about the staircase cutting into the main (I'm assuming) front bedroom, site it further back or put a turn in it.

Lala yes I was talking about front main bedroom.
Without seeing stuff physically I can't really picture it. What would putting a turn in it do?

A turn means that the staircase turns, usually at 90 degrees at some point. So you could have the first few steps at the bottom facing across the room, then a turn, then the rest of the steps running up the wall like this one. Turns mean that the staircase takes up less linear space.

Haven't done this myself but some friends have recently opened up their Victorian house entirely downstairs, moved the stairs to against the side wall and also totally changed the layout upstairs too. They've got a lovely open space downstairs but the noise (and mess) from the children spreads throughout the entire downstairs space. Personally I like to have at least one separate room that DH and I can escape to. Another thing to bear in mind is that you might not get building regs to allow you to open it up completely as they can require you to put in a wall/door between the kitchen and the front door for fire regulations (as most fires start in the kitchen so there needs to be a wall between there and your main escape route, ie the front door). I think our friends are planning to erect a temporary stud wall, get the building regs people to come round and approve it, then remove the stud wall again. Faff.

vin that does sound like a faff, I'm assuming they would then have to re-erect the stud wall if they ever sold in the future.

Our galley kitchen is in the extension at the back of the house with a doorway frame, but with no door on it at present, I guess if a door got put on it, that would solve the fire wall problem?

Lala thank you for explaining, I understand that now.

Yes I think that would solve the problem.

I think moving the staircase would be a bad idea. I am in 2-up-2-down terrace at the moment and would hate to have only one reception room. A house with this done in near to us found it very hard to sell their house as it wasn't what buyers wanted in one of these vic properties. You need 2 separate spaces for different functions. You definitely won't be improving the price for the house, we sold ours for slightly more than our neighbours with one big reception room and bathroom upstairs. Why do you want to change it?

Mrs I'm not sure that I want to change it yet, it's just something I've been thinking about. We're having a woodburner put in and I thought it would be nice to be able to heat the whole space if it was just one room for example.

Also more room for furniture? Being able to use whole space better....

To be honest, we will most likely leave stairs in the middle (but turned around for better lay out upstairs) rather then move them completely to a different place. No matter how hard I think about it, I can't see how we wouldn't lose space in the bedrooms if they got moved to a side wall and I don't want to lose space upstairs.

Plus I do not want to affect re-selling in the future!

I've turned the stairs in mine

front door goes straight into the living room

go through a door into the kitchen which we have taken a section off to build the staircase -this would be your current dining room
the galley kitchen would be a breakfast area in our house

it's made bedroom 2 slightly smaller but still a generous single and the l shaped kitchen is a lovely social space

I would leave it as it is, two rooms can be a big advantage and it leaves the character of the property intact. Spend the money on extending the kitchen if you can.

Yeah, i would put your money into the kitchen rather than turning round a staircase. Anything else may not see an increase in the value of your property - not an issue if you aren't selling for a long time of course. I wouldn't want to do anything to make our bedrooms smaller - its comfortable with a double bed in either but only because we don't have lots of bedroom furniture (just bed and chest of drawers).

Mrs we have to turn the staircase 180 degrees, the upstairs is a super funny layout at the moment and by turning it, it will become a 'normal' layout (with one landing with the two bedroom and bathroom doors off landing. At the moment, both the bedrooms have two doorways off each bedroom which is just silly

You are right, there is no way I want to make the bedrooms smaller.

Ah ok, I see. Sounds like the wisest thing to do then.

sausage your house sounds lovely by the way!

Hiya
We live in a Victorian Terrace.
We have a hallway with stairs directly in front, a door to the left goes into the dining room, double doors lead into the living room. At the back of the dining room we have a door that leads to the kitchen. In the kitchen we have two doors- one for outside and one for the cellar.
Up the stairs we have a bathroom, then up two more steps there's the boys room, and directly in front our bedroom.
We are hoping to extend into the loft in a few years.

We went to view a house like yours before we bought this one, but we found the stairs to be very steep and the back room very dark.