What would you do with this layout?

[stillsleeptraining]

Particularly the kitchen (where would you put a table for instance?). It's a bit too narrow so conscious we don't want to be squeezing through.

We have a 4 and 6 year old.

Actual picture!

Is this your house or one you're thinking of buying?

You need a refractory table which is 90 or even 80 centimetres wide, and as long as you like. It’s an awkward layout as you don’t seem to be able to get into the kitchen without walking through the dining room? And that’s also your only access to the garden?

If you are buying it , unless you love this house , I would seriously re consider it, this layout could be really annoying. if you had the money, I would think about making the family room into a kitchen diner, you have the water along the wall from the utility so it should be possible.

Depends whether the room has to serve any other purpose or if it's just dining?

You could get soft banquet seating built in down the external wall of the dining room at the window end (or buy freestanding versions if you don't want anything fixed) then it doubles as a bit of a sofa/comfy seating to look out at the garden and leaves a clear corridor to allow people to get in and out of the garden. You may need to replace your dining table though as you need one with a central leg so that people can slide in easily on the seating.

The bottom darker end you could add an armchair, side table and lamp as a cosy reading area and zone it with a big round rug underneath to contrast the narrow rectangle shape of the room

I would be knocking down the wall between the kitchen and utility to open up the back of the house and reconfiguring from there. I'd have a small utility off the kitchen, and then the kitchen opening into the diner.

I'd have the door into that room opposite the front door (at right angles to where it is now).

I'd make the family room smaller (shorter) by moving that wall back. I'm not that clear how you'd use a 'family room' when there's already a living room and a big kitchen diner. If it is some kind of play room, realistically that will only be used for a couple more years (assuming that the kids' rooms are big enough to play in), so I'd be future proofing that as a potential office/spare room/multi-functional space. I definitely wouldn't want the only access to the downstairs loo/utility being through that room.

I think the issues with the layout are much bigger than 'where shall I put the table?'

If you have to keep the loo there, I'd turn it into a loo/laundry room. Knock down the walls, move kitchen to dining room, and leave the middle of the room for a big table.

But personally I'd also want to move the loo so it's accessed off the hallway, rather than from the kitchen diner.

I quite like the layout as it is (call me crazy!)

I would put the table by the garden but have it be an extendable one so most of the time have it set up as a four seater but extend when we had guests

I would put in some cupboards at the other end of the dining room for storage as the kitchen is quite small

We have a similar kitchen / dining room set up tho our dining room isn’t as long and I think is a bit wider. It’s a great, social space and we don’t have any issues with it being the only way into the garden etc.

the thing I would say is that this set up only works for us because we have a massive original cupboard built into one of the dining room alcoves which houses the boiler, booze, ‘best’ crockery, all our baking stuff etc etc. we also have a peninsula between the kitchen and dining room that has loads of cupboards in the bottom.

if we didn’t have all the extra storage I think i would have moved the kitchen into the dining room and properly knocked through / added a steel so that the table could go horizontal to French doors. Tho that will be ££££

How about banquette seating and a round table like this in Matilda Goad’s house, sofas at the other end? Article in Homes and Gardens well worth a look.

I find it so odd that the utility room comes off the family room and not the kitchen? Are you planning actual work or just working with what you have as much as you can? X

Are you also considering upstairs? There's a load of floor space for bathrooms with a very small bedroom four. It'd be a bit of an arse moving plumbing, but if you're really going for it for the long term, I would be looking to knock the two bathrooms together to make a bigger bedroom 4 and either:

• make bedroom 4 the family bathroom and carve out a smaller dressing and bathroom area off bedroom 1

Or

• flip bedroom 4 and then en-suite with new access doors and square off the dressing area, which would still give a larger bedroom 4

It depends on your needs, I guess as I also liked the upstairs layout - a small fourth bedroom is perfect for a home office which is why we want a fourth.

But I guess if you have a lot of people to stay, or you plan a third child, even sized rooms might be more important

A lot depends on which walls can be knocked down. I'm of one mind with Kirsty Alsopp knock down rather than adapt.
I love a utility room.