Avoiding a long narrow corridor from front to back of house

[MILdesperandum]

Please help! The layout of our house following our planned extension is driving me crazy! However I plan it I end up with a long corridor running from the front door through the house to the big kitchen/diner area across the back. The current kitchen is becoming the utility (left hand side) and whilst I'm happy with the spaces we'd end up to I'm worried that the long corridor is going to feel really odd... anyone got an bright ideas?

I have thought of putting the utility into the back of the garage (we never keep a car in there and have plenty of off road parking) but that leaves us instead with an unusable space where the utility was with doors coming off each wall.

I suggest when you measure up the worktop for the breakfast bar bit - allow for an overhang at the end of the bench (the usual 30cm or so). We didn't do this which is a bit annoying now as it is sometimes useful to have someone sitting at the end.
Also go for drawers as the lower cabinets - much more practical than cupboards.
And really think about where you'll put your small appliances and position the sockets accordingly.

I personally would keep your dining table overlooking the garden. I can also imagine it feeling annoying to have to walk past it to get to the utility room.

I would also keep the garage as it is. Even if it is your forever home, it would give you the option to convert all of it to a teenage den or something if needed in the future

Switch the dining area with the seating area in your newest plan??

We have an L-shaped kitchen diner family room and the sofa is in the darker windowless bit and it works fine.

Yes like that. I hadn't thought about light though that's a good point. A luxurious hallway does sound nice though, perhaps a reading nook under the stairs?

French doors to the side in place of the single door - if you go for your last plan?

Randommess - that does make sense - to have the tv in the darker area but I think all the doors coming off that space make it a bit impractical. There won't really be a wall to put a tv/sofa against

A luxurious hallway does sound nice though, perhaps a reading nook under the stairs? I think this might be the best option to explore... keep the garage and add a utility but try to do something creative with the central area. I keep telling myself that there must be a "perfect" solution that solves all the issues but there isn't is there? Will have to compromise somewhere

French doors to the side in place of the single door - if you go for your last plan? If you mean at the side of the house it would be lovely but they would only look out onto the side of next door's house! (a brick wall!)

What age are your kids? I can think of lots of uses for the bigger hallway - mudroom type storage, homework corner, dog crate heaven. Or just loads of built in storage.

5 and 7. Yes I think I need to get inspired!

View from end of the stairs, the widened hallway is growing on me, will have to find out how feasible moving the wall is...

It's a good idea to access the laundry room as directly as possible from upstairs ( basket on hip going through a few doors is no fun ) and it's a good idea to keep stairs separate from kitchen - as good to keep it a safe exit route out in the event of a fire - and is a requirement if you have more that two floors - so if you decide to do a loft conversion at some point - makes sense to follow fire regs now .

Please get your plans checked by a relevant professional before you start doing /ordering anything !!

Thanks will do! When you say the stairs need to be separate from the kitchen, does there need to be a door separating the 2 or are the layouts I've drawn OK?

I like the one you drew at 10:49. You coukld turn the area under the stairs into a home office type arrangement with built in desk, shelves and a filing cabinet?

MarysPlace - I have drawn quite a few! That's a nice idea because ideally we would have wanted an office space (I work from home 2 days a week)

I have opened up the space in the middle of the house corridor to make an office and entrance way from the garage.

I have put a toilet in the utility room and there is a tall cabinet in the corner for brooms, ironing board, vacuum cleaner. You could put shelving for pantry items.

By having the sliding doors in the kitchen opposite the front door t draws your eye to the garden and also lets in light to the middle of the house.

Copy pasting from here ...
www.homebuilding.co.uk/part-b-fire-safety/

Hope it helps - basically keep exit route safe by putting fire door between kitchen and hallway if you have more that two floors -or if you plan to extend upwards in the future

There are two areas where fire doors are necessary; the integral garage and the third storey or loft conversion. Both require one-hour fire resistance on the separating ceilings (above in the case of the garage, below on the loft conversion), and both require the use of fire doors. The door between the garage and the main house has to be a fire door and additionally there has to be a step up from the garage into the house. This is to protect the house from any burning liquid that might spill out of a vehicle.
The situation on the third storey is more complicated. Here you have to have a fireproof enclosure down to ground level as a means of escape. This involves ensuring that the walls around the stairwell are half-hour fire resistant and that the doors opening onto this enclosure are half-hour fire doors. You also have to ensure that the route down to the ground floor exits close to the front door and not into a high-risk fire zone, such as a kitchen. If this is difficult, you will instead be required to provide a second means of escape via an alternative internal staircase or an external fire escape.

butterfly - wow thanks! there's a lot to think about on your plan! I hadn't thought about the garden French doors being on the LHS but I can see that would make the central part much lighter. We don't need a toilet in the utility as we have one by the front door but I like the large utility you've created, I wonder how simple it will be to get rid of half the garage like that.... we have had plans go to building regs with the initial (OP) plan but I think I may have to talk to the architect again....

Thanks OnePlan for the guidance, good to get a reality check on what is allowed/safe

Played around with butterfly's suggestion. Not sure about the kitchen island as I don't think it would give me enough units although it would be lovely to have the doors on that side... maybe this as a compromise?

Do you really love breakfast bars op? If not I'd consider removing that and making the dining table into a kitchen table IYSWIM. Looks much more spacious and more like butterflys plan.

I thought I needed something for the worktop/prep space otherwise I'd just have a small space next to the hob/sink.

Could you take butterfly's suggestion but flip the seating area and the kitchen around, and make the doors on the right hand side of the extension just a big window instead? This would allow you to have a u-shaped kitchen around that area, table in the middle of the extension and sofas on the left hand side, with the big double doors still drawing your eye down through the house and out to the garden.

The downside of your U shaped corners is corner cupboards - they just don't make the most of storage.

In butterfly's plan I'd move the doors up and have the breakfast bar bit reach the wall so you have more worktop space. I wouldn't have it as a breakfast bar I would make the dining table bigger - you have more space as you don't have the stools to accommodate.

Statistically - possibly, I would have to see how tricky it is to change the plumbing etc.