Remove chimney breast and add pony wall/cupboards to improve dining space?

[radiatordrama]

Edit: cross posted to AIBU

Our dining room is way too small and I'm terrified someone will fall down the stairs between it and the living room.

I am considering removing the chimney breast and removing some of the stairs / adding a row of cabinets to the living room where the stairs are removed.

Imperfect ChatGPT rendition of this plan below, along with the living room as is.

Would love thoughts on this plan!

Excellent cat.

Yes I think that will work. In the meantime can you put some kind of anti-slip treatment on the wooden steps? (I speak from bitter painful experience!)

Thank you 🐱

This work could be done within a matter of months, so hopefully no need to put in anti-slip treatment!

good idea but removing a chimney breast can be a LOT of work. is there also a chimney breast in the room above? and a real chimney outside? are you going to remove everything (building work in 2 rooms + scaffolding) or just the downstairs room (you will need steel beams to support the upstairs chimney). And if you are semi-detached sharing a chimney stack with the neighbour, it is even more complex.

a cheaper solution would be to to the pony wall and build cupboards in the niches beside the chimney, then lose the wall of cupboards opposite the dining table.

How will those cupboards look in the living room? (My brain can't picture it from the other side.) Will your children be tempted to try and jump over them?

I'd agree with @parietal . Much simpler to move the cupboards on the left over to niches on either side of chimney and move table to where the cupboards are now.

I wouldn't get rid of the fireplace, far too much work for not that much gain really IMO of course!

There is no chimney breast in the floor above and no party wall issues 😊

Your idea is a good one, but the apparent RSJ in the living room means that a table can't be moved much farther towards the wall on the left without obstructing the path.

This would just be a pony wall on the other side. No small children to worry about in that regard - though I constantly worry that visitors will tumble down the stairs!

Oops. New one without identifying info 🤦‍♀️

Well I’ve learned a new term today - never heard of a pony wall before - how brilliant!

I think the ultimate layout works, OP - we had a Victorian house and the morning room stepped down into the kitchen.

in our case, we had cabinets either side of room and stepped down via the middle. I like symmetry so preferred this.
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I think the middle room has no window and would be better as a TV room study space perhaps ?
Move dining area to other reception on garden side and maybe make a hatch?
Seems a lot of work to remove the nice fireplace niche when the dining is now in the wrong place in absence of original window. (I have same layout, except I kept the window and no infill in alley)
I use that room as a playroom, study, even with thr window.

With the utility blocking the view from both kitchen and dining I feel there are bigger problems to solve than the steps.

Could you move kitchen into the back reception, get rid of utility and put utility in the old kitchen space.

Then you would have a very nice room down the steps with a window into a light well you could use as an extra dining space but a table in the bigger new kitchen too.

Pretty sure you need Building Control involvement when removing a chimney breast

Internal stairs- what ever you do please
factor in a rail bolted to the wall. You can get modern wood ones ( can be cut to any size with hangers and ends) can get lovely bespoke ones if you search hard enough.
You’d be surprised how you get used to where a rail/ bar is if it is dark, maybe had a few, you will reach for where it is.

My mother in law (80) has recently tripped down and fallen down something similar at her daughter’s house, that only had a flat wall as support…. her daughter would not entertain anything / rail against advice ( her mother was a frequent visitor)…..

The current kitchen is way too small and will become a utility. The current second reception will be the kitchen. Ideally we would do a new dining room extension, but we haven't the budget! So this is the best solution I can think of.

There is a window in this room, but unfortunately it goes into a weird utility space.

We will definitely be adding a banister. I live in terror that someone will fall down here.

Getting rid of the utility would be £££ but yes, that's our plan otherwise!

I would also prefer symmetry, but I just think it doesn't work here 😭

Just wait until you can fund the kitchen in reception2, then you have that with the conservatory as an ivory kitchen and dining space.

you are proposing and Elastoplast on a broken leg. It will cost time and money and be pointless.

whats the big picture OP? Work to that.

I am doing the kitchen imminently and the chimney breast removal etc would just be an add-on. The conservatory is not big enough to be a proper dining room.

Keep the fireplace and chimney breast. They are attractive features and give the room some character

Ask your builder if that chimney is supporting joists, walls, upstairs. Steel RSJ will be painfully expensive.

I agree, also the steps.

It would definitely look better but in many houses removing a chimney breast is way more costly and hasslesome than you expect as,the chimney is often structurally vital not only to your house but also to your next door neighbour. If there's another house in that direction you'll need a party wall agreement which will include you paying for any further remedial work needed if their property is affected. It may be ok in newbuild houses if the chimbey breast is just a decorative surround and a bit of plasterboarding built around a gas flue rather than a proper chimney

Hasslesome, brilliant word!