Semi detached knock through

[DiyNewbie]

Hi all,
I'm about to exchange on a 1950's semi. It's currently knocked through from the front room to the dining room. It's unlikely we're going to be able to afford an extension so we're going to knock through from the dining room into the kitchen. Has anyone else done this and would be prepared to share photos. I've seen so many online but they're all so "staged" and not real life iykwim!!

@CellophaneFlower

Is there a particular reason you want to keep it semi open (with doors)? I think the front room wall is crying out to be reinstated. Think of the extra wall space you'll gain in each room. If the new kitchen diner has space for a small sofa, you'll really appreciate the separate rooms with a teenager I think.

It's purely down to cost, if we manage to get it in the budget we will!

@evouk

Our's is a three bed semi with the majority of the wall separating the kitchen and the back room knocked through. We bought the house like this

It's very light and airy but always very cold in the winter. Big slate tiles for the kitchen floor don't help

We would probably rather have the front and back rooms open plan instead and not the way it is as it would be better with DD two years old

It's a must on our next house. Take heating into account if you do it, large area to heat. French doors very good idea

Yes good point. I'm nervous about the heating bills already as it's a significantly bigger house than we're in now.

Check building regs as I thought you had to be able to shut off the kitchen from the stairs to prevent fire spread ?

Other than that I think it would look great. We had an open plan but in a flat, kitchen, dinner, lounge was fine, but we put washing machine in the boiler cupboard as too noisey to watch tv in the same area.

I don’t think reinstating the lounge wall would be particularly expensive if you want to do that. It’s just bricks and plaster.
You mentioned a utility room - where would that be?

@highwoodwitch

Yes go ahead and create a kitchen diner but to get the best of both worlds consider some doors, possibly glass, between the diner and lounge.

This.

I wouldn’t put doors there as then hardly any wall space to put furniture against. I would block it in completely and have a separate lounge.

We've done this. Our original plan was to knock between the kitchen and dining room but now we have a separate hall then an L shaped room. Our back garden gets all the sun so our living room used to be very dark.
The only issue I have with it is washing machine noise - we don't have a utility room.
We considered keeping part of the wall between the living and dining rooms, with a sort of internal window to let light through, or a smaller opening with sliding doors.
We had to get steel beams put in to support the ceilings.
I agree with nowhere to hide your mess but we dont regret it. When I pop into neighbours' houses I am struck by how poky the rooms seem.

I would block off the wall to the front room, knock down the wall between kitchen and back room and block off the door way to the kitchen. This will give you extra wall space in the kitchen, especially after losing the wall. Put the sink under the kitchen window and the hob on the left hand wall and arrange the kitchen cupboards/ worktop like a u-shape. Not sure about the washing machine. It would probably have to find space in the kitchen unless there is elsewhere in the house, like an airing cupboard or in the bathroom.
Have a look on Rightmove for similar houses that had this done. It's a very common alteration. I wouldn't look on Instagram as you usually only find the super fancy ones/ extensions on there.

We are about to exchange on our first house this week, was built in the 70s and all the houses in this area have open front room/diner. The house we're buying has the kitchen knocked through too, but we are going to block up the wall to make the front room separate so we can put a sofa against that wall and maybe a kitchen dresser on the other side. It's a small room so the owners have one of the sofas under the front room window, in front of a radiator which I'm not keen on doing, but I want to have a decent amount of seating in there!

@AppleStars

We are about to exchange on our first house this week, was built in the 70s and all the houses in this area have open front room/diner. The house we're buying has the kitchen knocked through too, but we are going to block up the wall to make the front room separate so we can put a sofa against that wall and maybe a kitchen dresser on the other side. It's a small room so the owners have one of the sofas under the front room window, in front of a radiator which I'm not keen on doing, but I want to have a decent amount of seating in there!

Stunning!!! I hope we can reinstate the wall. It'll stop the front room becoming a bit of a corridor too. It's so hard to envisage these things when we can't walk around the space, and the pictures we have obviously have the vendors furniture in. Can't wait for the day we get the keys!!

Thank you OP. So many of us have 50's semi and great to share experiences! Has anyone knocking through between kitchen and dining room had to deal with a chimney breast on the wall to be demolished? Steels are needed of course, but how big a job did it seem and did you take chimney out in the room above and loft as well?

It's so hard to envisage these things when we can't walk around the space, and the pictures we have obviously have the vendors furniture in. Can't wait for the day we get the keys!!

I know the feeling, I'm so excited. We have a tentative completion date in three weeks so hope it all goes smoothly, we've been renting for so long my head is in a complete spin with all the little things we'll be allowed to choose, even hanging up pictures will be a novelty!

@bladdybla

It's so hard to envisage these things when we can't walk around the space, and the pictures we have obviously have the vendors furniture in. Can't wait for the day we get the keys!!

I know the feeling, I'm so excited. We have a tentative completion date in three weeks so hope it all goes smoothly, we've been renting for so long my head is in a complete spin with all the little things we'll be allowed to choose, even hanging up pictures will be a novelty!

Omg I know the feeling. It's quite overwhelming and I find I keep changing my mind every time I see something different or I hear someone's opinion!

We had this exact layout and changed to what you're thinking of doing. The wall came out between the kitchen and dining room and we put a wall up between the living room and dining room, with doors. This lasted 6 years. At the beginning of last year, we knocked down the wall between the living room and dining room and it is so much better!

We never used to shut the doors and we now have much more room without the wall, as the living room as a separate room always felt quite small. It's nice being able to see into the living room from the kitchen and when we have had people round (prior to lockdown) it was so much nicer than having separate areas for people. We don't find heating or smells from the kitchen a problem either.

@mayaswellgiveitago

We had this exact layout and changed to what you're thinking of doing. The wall came out between the kitchen and dining room and we put a wall up between the living room and dining room, with doors. This lasted 6 years. At the beginning of last year, we knocked down the wall between the living room and dining room and it is so much better!

We never used to shut the doors and we now have much more room without the wall, as the living room as a separate room always felt quite small. It's nice being able to see into the living room from the kitchen and when we have had people round (prior to lockdown) it was so much nicer than having separate areas for people. We don't find heating or smells from the kitchen a problem either.

Oooo this is really interesting and reassuring!!! Thank you!

We had this layout in our semi too. It worked really well for us. Also no problem with smells or noise. Was lovely having the open space with the children and the sun came in the south facing French doors in the dining section and kitchen windows to light up all the way to the north facing living area making it all feel light and warm even in winter. We considered putting doors in between the dining room and living room plenty of times but ultimately never did as it just worked for us.

We wanted to build a big kitchen extension but then decided against it as it's so expensive. We did consider the layout you are proposing as it would have given us a similar open feel as an extension. In the end we decided only to knock through between kitchen and dining area in order to keep a separate living space. Our front room is a decent size though. So I suppose it depends on the overall size of the rooms if it makes sense to open them all up.

Thanks pfb12345 and Puff. That's encouraging! We've got a good sized front room, so I'm thinking the knock through will be absolutely fine for what we need. And the nightmare stories of builders etc makes me nervous to stretch ourselves too far.
Puff, could I ask roughly how much your knock through cost and how long it took?

@DiyNewbie

Thanks pfb12345 and Puff. That's encouraging! We've got a good sized front room, so I'm thinking the knock through will be absolutely fine for what we need. And the nightmare stories of builders etc makes me nervous to stretch ourselves too far. Puff, could I ask roughly how much your knock through cost and how long it took?

It's tricky to say exactly as the quote we went for was an overall price and also included bricking up windows and door ways, plumbing and kitchen fitting. But I just had a look at one of the quotes we received, which was itemised and they quoted for the knock through individually. The structural work in itself including making good was quoted at £5000. Add to that electrics, plumbing, removal of old kitchen, kitchen installation, flooring, cost of new kitchen and appliances, potentially new windows/ doors, building control, painting.. in our case plumbing and electrics came to several thousand. We needed a lot of stuff done including a new boiler and repositioning pretty much every single appliance. This is in London.

We are in the middle of the works, but generally as long as the tradesmen are available the work can be done very quickly. Ie the first week they did all the structural work (removal of kitchen etc, then removal of wall, bricking up windows), the second week was plumbing and electrics, third week is plastering and so on.

I viewed a 1930s semi recently that had done this it felt really small to us and really impractical with young kids! I would pick a wall and just knock that one down not both!

Thanks Puff that's really helpful! And seems a quick turnaround...just hope I can find builders!!

We have a 1960's semi which had a through lounge/diner and separate kitchen with a door to the garage. We always struggled with the kitchen layout as there were doors and windows everywhere!
We invested my pension lump sum early last year in knocking through between kitchen and dining room and blocking off the lounge - we decided against doors to create wall space - and managed to fit a utility and cloakroom at the back of the garage. It works so much better for us and I love having a separate lounge.