Which floorplan please? A or B?

[Goingslowlymad123]

This is A

How about this, taking a PP's suggestion of making the extension slightly narrower.

So black line is new walls of extension. Red line is incorporating the storage in the hallway into the second reception so as to make it wider. Blue lines are remove that wall. Green is new window into second reception

Thank you for all these amazing suggestions. I will be going through them all next week.

Thank you for all these amazing suggestions. I will be going through them all next week.

Update - we've decided to go for B. I still though have the nagging feeling of the windowless second reception room......

We went and looked at A again (it's been done on our street) it felt rather small. The corner of A's kitchen that doesn't have any light felt incredibly dark. I asked the owners to turn off the lights and it was 11am and as dark as the windowless second reception in B.

They also have converted the garage as now their kids are tweens they are desperate for another space for them - they have the 'adults' reception room. Converting the garage is not an option for us.

I have emailed a couple of agents, waiting on some responses back and so far, 2 have said B is the better layout for re-sell.

So are you keeping two reception rooms - one without a window? A windowless reception room is not goid but does it have a glass roof or roof lights?

Yes, that's right bubbles.

The only way of getting light in is through the rooflights not in that space but from the opening behind where the dining area is. It's on the original post, can you see the ground floor layout of B?

In Option B the toilet door on ground floor has to open outwards (a Building Regulation). Also, Is it realistic to place that room in the middle of the house in terms of drainage?

Yes that's OK. I'm fine with that as the hall is spacious. I already have a very poky WC in hall. Drainage would be fine as utility next to it.

The waste pipe still has to cross the utility room to get out. Will it go under the floor?

LIGHT TUNNELS

are amazing we have them and have the largest ones (about 50 cm across iirc) and the amount if light that comes in is amazing, they are pointing south

Which way is north and south on your plan

Is the back facing north?

IMHO I would make the island a movable one or non permanent as far as flooring goes, cos I would put the table there and put a settee where you have you table

So if you are doing it to sell, I would want to take it out and then have to redo the flooring

Why do you want an island there?

It looks a bit far out from kitchen, your back would be towards island when cooking or preparing food, wouldn't you?

I would also turn bathroom other way round so door going in from utility room not hallway

Cos if you come home with muddy children or dogs they come in thru garage wet and muddy so don't spoil hallway

Also if in future you want to knock down the wall from 2nd reception you would be facing toilet door

A

Thanks for input,the light tunnels I don't think will work as there is a bedroom above it. It's a semi.

Think the soil pipe must do, architect is pretty good, will ask her.

That WC door will then mean guests go though hall, kitchen and utility just to go to toilet. Even if they do come through garage, there will be sink in utility if they are super grubby.

I would ideally love an island and dining room table - I will hopefully have a window seat instead of sofa. I'm not keen on sofas in kitchens.

Ok I get what you mean about island but I thought you wanted to design it for selling in few years time

Hence why I said do an island but build it so that new owners can move or remove it without having to change flooring

What are the width and length of rooms?

I thought they were quite large but perhaps they aren't

BTW I prefer A

A. I couldn't cope with the second reception with no window

Just to play devils advocate, neither.
My thoughts on A are that:

• You've lost an important reception room. Your front room is now you're lounge - both formal and informal. Whilst you've gained a great ktichen diner, you've done so at the expensive of a dining room - so it's a very large extension and a lot of work to create effectively a bigger kitchen that could could achieve other ways much easier.
• Accessing the downstairs WC through either the study or the utility is a bit of a compromise too far.
• It just looks a bit unbalanced to me.

MY thoughts on B are that:

• You've created a very long long long entrance hallway which could potentially be quite dark.
• The landlocked reception 2 is a challenge. Keeping the wall between it and reception 1 will make it dark and serve what purpose? Keeping reception 1 and 2 combined will be lighter but will perhaps create a space of questionable purpose. We had a very similar set up a pervious house and made reception 2 the dining room. We then had seating in the kitchen area behind and 'informal' dining.
• The kitchen layout is a bit awkward. I presume that's an island on the RHS? So you have island seating and dining seating? - could you put the dining table where the island is and have 'informal seating' where you have the dining table pictured?

Option C

You have good width where the current kitchen is and behind the garage. Did you explore keeping reception 1 and 2 as they are, but then just extending backwards behind the kitchen section only? You should be able to get a very generous kitchen / diner in that space without compromising the existing 2 reception rooms. You might also be able to squeeze in a downstairs loo around the back of the stairs, although you might have to compromise on no utility. IT would be a much cheaper build and you might end up with more usable space..

Oh I've done it again! Failed to spot pages 2,3,4 before posting! Apologies :)