Garage conversion - kitchen or study

[Comefromaway]

We are about to convert the garage in a house we’ve just bought. Dh is an instrumental teacher & needs somewhere to teach from.

We almost nearly didn’t buy the house as the kitchen is small and badly laid out. Our idea was to partition the back of the garage to create a utility room then have the front part as a teaching studio. Ina couple of years time possibly extend the kitchen (but we’d possibly have to lose the conservatory to do that.

However it’s been suggested that we turn the garage into a kitchen/diner and the kitchen into the teaching studio. The dining room could then become somewhere we can have books/display units, maybe put the grand piano in there. We wouldn’t then lose the conservatory, pupils could enter from the side door without coming in the house but I’d lose the proposed utility.

Plan attached.

What are you actually going to gain space wise from the garage being a kitchen diner? As far as I can see your kitchen is approx 10 feet long (can't tell which way your measurements go) and the dining room is 11 feet, totalling 21 feet which is the length of your garage. It is still a narrow space for a kitchen (I should know, mine is this width)

I am assuming the kitchen would be at the front of the house and the dining part the back? You need to think about relocating the drain then which can be hugely expensive.

Personally I would convert the back of the garage into the utility, the front into the music room and have pupils enter from the carport door access.

Adding a conservatory onto the current dining room will make the dining room darker. We had this at a previous house.

I would look to not do the conservatory and instead look into how much it would cost to push out your back kitchen wall. Our kitchen was teeny, only 2.9m wide (9' 10" approx) and the same again in length, we extended by 3m so now have a decent sized kitchen.

In the mean time remove the table from your kitchen breakfast to make it feel bigger and utilise your dining room.

The carport will be used to store bikes and junk. That door into the garage is going to be blocked up for security as the door on it is only as secure as an average shed.

The kitchen part would be at the back. The boiler moved to the left hand side and the sink moved along the back wall to the left of the rear door with a window put in. There is already a radiator in there. It feels spacious.

The current kitchen is tiny & I hate it. We already removed the breakfast bar and relocated the units underneath the display cabinet in the recess but there is no space for a fridge, freezer & dishwasher, only one or the other plus the current units are not full sized doors.

The conservatory is already there but for some reason wasn’t drawn on the estate agents plan. It’s brand new as well. To extend the kitchen backwards we’d have to knock it down.

It will be a lot cheaper to convert the garage than to extend the kitchen, I’m just not sure about not having a separate utility. I do prefer kitchen diners though.

I would knock down the wall between the kitchen and dining room to turn the space into a big kitchen-diner.

And I would do as Giro suggested: divide the garage, use the back as the utility and the front as the teaching studio room, with a separate entrance - either the existing door at the side (just replace it with a more secure one) or a new entrance in front.

If you put the kitchen in the garage it will still be cramped. I think it's best to keep the kitchen next to the main living spaces and keep the utility and teaching studio separate (on the other side of the hall). Plus you're keeping all the plumbing in roughly the same place so the work will be cheaper.

The dining room (which at the moment is empty) is a gorgeous room and opens out into the living room with double doors. I’m definately not knocking through into the kitchen.

The plumbing is already there in the garage. (My parents run a heating/pipe work company). We are having the gas rerouted up to the meter which is in the garage as whoever installed it didn’t do it to regs.

I don't see the point in having a utility that's the opposite site of the house from the kitchen so I wouldn't put a utility at the back of the garage. Presumably if you were to locate appliances in there they couldn't be used while your husband was working anyway as they would be noisy?

I would make the garage a kitchen / diner and stick your husband's work area in the current kitchen.

Any chance you could extend the current garage sideways into the current car port to give room for a utility? Or just more room generally for the kitchen/diner?

Photos. We’ve ripped the sink out of the garage along with the very old units and shelves in readiness for plastering.

The photos don’t seem to be uploading.

Try again

And

I’d wondered that nanoo. But it would require planning permission I think not just building regs.

You don't need to demolish the conservatory. If it's new you can get a good price for it and the buyers would remove and take away.

Could you make the front half/third of the garage your utility room and downstairs loo (with a door from the left hand side of the hall into the loo) and make the rest of the back of the house (up to the current kitchen) a huge kitchen diner? Old kitchen becomes music area. You could then still retain the dining room and conservatory.

You could have lovely double doors opening onto the kitchen from your hallway (if you continued the line of the lounge wall along to where the current door is into the garage iyswim) and put a new door into the lounge on the right hand side near the front door

Actually it would be opposite the front door looking at the plan

I'd definitely make the garage into the teaching room. Keep that separate from the rest of the house as it will give you more privacy and pupils would have easy access to the loo.

If you have a grand piano in the dining room it'll be quite loud in the lounge. And I'm not sure it would fit well in the dining room given that that has doors in all four walls (though the extent to which it blocks the door to the conservatory partly depends on just how big the piano is of course).

Like this but forgive my terrible drawing

It’s a baby grand.

I know you said you wouldn't do this, but I would knock down or open up the wall between the kitchen and the dining room. The garage can then be divided like you originally intended.

If I did that I wouldn’t actually gain any kitchen unit space due to the doors into the lounge and conservatory. I’d lose the wall where the cooker & fridge is so the cooker would have to go go next to the sink.

Okay, I am still saying you won't gain anything converting the garage into the kitchen dining.

I basically have your entire garage area now for my kitchen alone. I have a separate dining room. So all my units run down one side and across the bottom overlooking the back garden. On the opposite wall I have a 40cm deep breakfast bar for 4 stools with horizontal wall cabinets above. I then have a small separate utility at the end so the washing machine and tumble dryer are in that.

So if you are to convert it do it entirely as a kitchen. Trust me, it is an incredible space. Keep the dining room as the dining room and then the old kitchen becomes the music room with the side door access.

With the garage being all kitchen you could have a utility bit at the top end and have it housed inside cupboards so you can close a door on the noise and reduce it. My friend has this in her kitchen, she just needs to prop the door open when she uses her tumble dryer.

Btw wouldn't you need planning permission to convert the garage anyway since it's change of use?

I'd put triple doors in garage door spot and make that the music room so pupils can come in through triple doors and nip to loo if needed, but not wander through the entire house. I'd open dining and kitchen in to one and maybe look at building extension to encompass conservatory and patio and make kitchen dining room into a big family area at a later date ?

Btw wouldn't you need planning permission to convert the garage anyway since it's change of use?

No, the local authority have told us we only need to apply for building regs which we have done. We have confirmation in writing that it is OK to start work.

I fancy making the current dining room a library.