Please give advice!!

[hippychickreno]

8 years in current house and is quite literally falling to pieces, we did basic reno when moved in but have been planning this utility/kitchen for years but still havent decided on layout! current layout attached for reference - our garage joins neighbours garage so no side access, wheelie bins at front of house so if we go with bigger kitchen we loose that access from garden to utility - to garage.

The old kitchen becomes a storage passageway and the family room is pokey.

I've scribbled a kitchen that looks out into the garden, with a breakfast bar on the house side, incorporating the family room on the other side of the bb, and a dining area where the patio is. I've flipped the orientation of loo and utility. Now you have a passageway through garage, utility and dining area to garden. You also have a passageway from front door, across end of family room, into kitchen. The alcove on your right as you move through family room into kitchen would be where you put your tall kitchen units.

I’d do the first picture with the U shaped kitchen but shift the kitchen 1m to the right to leave an open passage behind it. Also make the utility smaller by loosing the passage in there. That way you can keep the garden access. And the old kitchen in the middle will make great storage for coats and tools and all sorts.

Agree, a variant of the first pic. Move the back door from the garage and a passage from there to the back garden. Also make the loo off the hall and only the utility off the kitchen so scrap that 'corridor' for the loo and utility. Make the dining area a little less wide, not the kitchen space.

Are you set on doing the extension? I think with this layout I would be doing what @Aparecium has suggested but not sure I'd bother with the infill extension. I might also keep the kitchen in the middle of the house so I could enjoy the lovely garden from a family room space at the rear, so flip that in apareciums fab drawing so it's the other way up and sits in the family room. Then put a big window or french doors in the side wall of the sitting room out onto the patio.

thanks all, we have come to final layout decision. going to flip the loo and utility round but jst a question on doors would you keep both doors (red and yellow arrow) or jst one if so which one?

I'd just keep the red door and change the kitchen to a U shape, losing the peninsula.

We did an extension which resulted in a similar layout, but we have a U shaped kitchen behind the lounge. Then the entire back area is a snug at one end and dining at the other. There is one door into the utility area, then that has a door to the garage and another to the toilet.

agree with the post above. keep a clearer separation between the loo and the kitchen.

Personally, I do not like all my visitors walking through my utility room to go to the loo. I would lose the existing internal door and have all access via the kitchen, going past the toilet door to get to the utility. Alternatively, you could also swap the positions of loo and utility so that utility is accessed via the kitchen and loo is accessed via the internal door. It may depend on how you want to use the utility room (pantry or laundry) and the room after the stairs (passageway or family room).