Hi Ryan,

As you mention the biggest issue is that the current family room is basically an access way to the rumpus and also the bedrooms. This gives it the feeling of an unusable area. Whereas if you segregate the rear of the house for living and the front of the house for the study and/or bedrooms, the home becomes much more practical and flows.

I've attached a rough sketch for you to open up the rear areas and separate the front. This allows the 4th bedroom to be located in the current lounge but also links to the bedrooms and bathroom via the passageway. The occupant of his room will not feel they are walking through living areas to reach the bathroom.

A lovely set of glass doors can link the entry to the rear living area, the kitchen to the left and meals to the right. A feature breakfast bar could be designed in line with the glass doors (timber chunky top with waterfall edge and full-height fixed glass behind.

Just thoughts for you :). I look forward to hearing about your final outcome.

Best Regards

Julie

Hi Julie,

Thanks so much for taking the time to sketch that up! I really love that it fully utilises the existing spaces so well.

I thought about putting a bedroom in that front room but hadn't thought of doing it via a hallway connecting the other bedrooms, what a great idea.

My one reservation about that design is I think I'd have to move the windows at the front of the house to account for the walls, which would change the facade of the house. Also not sure how I feel about a bedroom right next to the entry of the house; but don't think there will be much of a workaround to avoid this.

Nonetheless, this is the best idea I have seen that utilises all of our space effectively. I will definitely give it more consideration!

Thanks again!

Hi Julie. With a slab it will keep costs down if sink stays in place. My version is similar to Ryan’s. But I have kept the wall on left of entry. Entry to B4 would be off this entry. I think there is enough room to put an island in kitchen allowing circulation. I’ve added a door to backyard at left end of kitchen. The family becomes dining.

Slight variation to give more storage and external door within existing window

If you are going to do it, then "do it" if you get what I'm saying and make the most of the opportunity. Moving kitchens are relatively straight forward exercises as the plumbing is minimal (in comparison to bathrooms). If you're taking out walls and re-installing cabinetry it will cost much of a muchness one way or the other whichever way you plan it, so think about zoning, function and lifestyle benefits. I'd be looking at options of moving the kitchen / dining out to the back, potentially integrating the laundry as a butlers pantry/laundry set-up. existing kitchen/dining/ family becomes a main living space, with direct access to rear yard as well with potentially with some freestanding dividing elements to break up the generous space and create either some extra flexibility & function with storage or discrete study or sitting areas. The issue you have is the flow from the entry to the rear space and that would need to be carefully resolved with appropriate room layout and planning.

Thanks for the ideas Kate! I think putting a door to outside from the dining space could be very useful.

Paul, I certainly hear your point and thanks for the input. If I could achieve a better space by moving Kitchen and Dining to the existing rumpus room then I am not against this at all. I suppose in this case I'd forgo the extra bedroom in order to maximise living space?

my suggestion includes direct access to an enlarged alfresco from the new kitchen and dining room (with optional pantry and/or direct access from the garage to the kitchen ) and retains the original living room as a Multi Purpose space that can be used as a bed 4 and/or combined media, study or guest room

Really like it oklouise, maximises MPR and dining space, and minimises modifications needed for walls and windows etc. Thanks for the suggestions guys

Ryan, Following from OK Louise' excellent idea of the MP room by the entry, here is another idea for you to think about. I would extend from the pantry back wall so the MP room is narrower than the dining but up to you, your furniture and your preferences. This shown with dining table space you may prefer to better put to TV and couches then it may need to be a little more generous.

Colouring the walking areas: ie in front door, right behind the couch, right to bedrooms or left to kitchen, will show the area remaining for furniture etc. This plan has advantages for the laundry too. Blocking the outside door, may have already happened with rumpus addition, leaving the CSD from family room gives a return, length of benching and return for a neat very practical laundry. With or without exterior door. I am not sure of exact dimensions of rumpus room where I have placed kitchen but feel fairly confident it will fit somehow like this!

Go well!

Cheers Margot

Hi Ryan,

I am not sure where you are located but if you are in Brisbane or the surrounds, we can assist. We are Khadye Design and Construction. My husband is a builder and I'm an Interior Designer. We can help you with this entire process. Feel free to call me on 0411 439 768.

Thank you,

Michelle Khadye

Khadye Design and Construction

www.khadye.com.au

My thoughts are you eliminate bedroom 3 entirely and turn 'rumpus' into bedrooms 3+4. You incorporate a WC/shower room next to laundry to serve bedrooms 3+4.

You have a corridor from entrance to bedroom 1 to entrance to old rumpus.

In my diagram I incorporate a small office next to bedroom one, designed to have linen storage accessible from hallway.

You extend the kitchen area across to the corridor described above, increasing prep space and size of pantry.

You are left with a 'new space' between the front door and the kitchen wall which you can decide what to do with. Playroom? TV room? Something else?

This requires a small extension to plumbing from laundry room to accommodate new WC/shower. Whether that fits your constraints I do not know, but it gives you something to think about anyway.

Regards

Rhys

My Suggestion is a little different. I would begin by getting rid of the the pantry and wall/door from the entry to the family room. this gives you a big open space incorporating the kitchen and family room. then, block off the door from the kitchen to the dining room and this now gives you an amazing space in which to create a new master suite with bedroom, bathroom and walk in robe. This gives you privacy and space from the other bedrooms. The kitchen/family area can then be redesigned as follows: put the kitchen cabinets around the walls in an L shape, extending along the wall with the rumpus room to the doorway. There's space on that wall to put cabinets to the ceiling, incorporating a fridge and pantry, and still leave you with plenty of bench space. you should be able to keep the sink where it is and centre the stove on the shorter wall that used to house the doorway to the dining room. This leaves you plenty of space in the family room for dining and you may even fit in a small island in the kitchen. I also suggest block the laundry from the new dining room, reinstating the original doorway from the laundry into the rumpus area and adding a new external door out the side of the laundry. This will only work if you suitable space at the side of the house. To give you more usable wall space in the new dining room, block off the linen cupboard and convert the space into an extended robe (or built in desk?) for Bed 2. You could do a similar thing with the linen closet in the laundry, giving you a longer wall space to build a bigger linen cupboard. Of course, if you have the money to move the plumbing for the kitchen, you could redesign that entire kitchen/dining space however you wanted, What I like about removing the pantry and the entry wall is that you can now see through to the back of the house as soon as you enter, and this gives a great feeling of space.

Michelle, we are located in Canberra. Otherwise would have been great to link up!

Rhys and Maun, really like the creativity. Much more can be done with my space that I first visualised, thanks a lot everyone for opening my eyes to that!

My concern with some of these plans is I think it would be easy for me to overcapitalise and if we were to move in a few years time we would have a hard time recouping our costs. For example, your idea sounds outstanding Maun, and I think I'd be taking this approach if I could guarantee that I'd be staying put for many years to come, but we already have to renovate our existing bathrooms at some point so not sure if it would make sense to also add a third bathroom in from a budget perspective?

For that reason, we are close to being set on the sort of approach oklouise took. Kitchen and dining spaces can be improved with minimal structural changes. We can also gain a sizable fourth bedroom / multipurpose room by essentially just adding a single wall...