Which option?

[Chocolate1984]

The second picture is my planned extension - the shower is no longer off the kitchen. Pretty typical layout with kitchen at the back. I was recently in a new extension where the kitchen was in the middle with the dining room and sitting area in the back. Do you think the kitchen in the middle is better? The extension can’t be made any wider or longer for various reasons. It’s currently 7m x 4m.

I like kitchen in middle and family and dining area overlooking the garden. Do you really need a shower downstairs?

We really need an extra shower but in the final plans it’s accessed via the utility.

We had planned a rear extension with an additional bedroom and bathroom above the garage but the quotes are £200,000+ Our house is on a hill so our foundations seem to be causing a lot of expense.

You probably want to be spending as much time as possible in the part of the house with the best light and the best view. I am assuming that will be the new ground floor extension with french doors and sky lights.

Therefore I would personally put the kitchen in the darkest part of the room (the bit next to the current living room) and leave the view from the sofa to the back garden unobstructed by washing up! Then you can have living/dining table & sofa by the french windows under the sky lights. You'll need regular window-cleaners!

Do you need the bit of wall in the middle of the new room? The space to the right of it looks a bit dead? You could get rid and have a much more spacious open kitchen with trendy island etc.

You could put a sofa-bed in the old living room to serve as a guest room if that would be valuable given you couldn't extend upstairs.

We have a very different (quirky) layout but a similar essential topology to your first picture in our house, post extension, and it works very well.

Don't underestimate what a nightmare building projects can be. O Lord just don't even get me started Don't do downstairs and upstairs work simultaneously if you are thinking of that. Always have one floor habitable. Builders always estimate that projects will take three months, and it means nothing.