Hi Sherin. Upstairs bath I would change the entries so not off retreat but off hall. No point having a separate toilet unless you include a basin with it.
Why does the stair at ground floor need a landing and quarter turn? Why the double front door?
Cut the island so it aligns with hallway from pantry.
I’m not keen on 2 way en-suite in ground floor particularly sliding doors onto a living space? Perhaps you need a powder room. Sliding doors can be hard to lock for elderly and have poorer sound control than a swing door.

Flip stair case. On ground floor flip bedroom and en-suite and fit in powder room under stair next to smaller front door.

do you expect to have other two story houses on all sides, describe your local climate, can you include the dimensions of the garage and, if you plan on having an outdoor clothesline in the back yard, you may find yourself carrying basket of clothes in and out through the living areas and if so, do you need the external laundry door? when grandparents are staying it would be better not to have to walk through their bedroom to use the downstairs bathroom and i would also reverse the stairs and rearrange the family bathroom, i think there are too many big east and west windows and glass doors that can overheat and be challenging to shade and expensive to fly and security screen and could be a problem for BASIX when you come to submit plans..and how do you expect to use the spare room?

Hi Oklouise, Thx for the feedback. Majority of neighbors currently have double story houses. South side 3 town houses, north side first half of the property currently constructing 2 new town houses, bottom half the part that impacts my house is a single story older property. East side a large double story house. Looking at the over all street its mostly older properties with some, subdivided with town houses.

Garage - double garage 5990x5800.

Good point about the clothes line, I haven't been told where it will go. Will inquire about this and reconsider the laundry door. I'm not too sure what a BASIX is.. is it applicable in Victoria? I wasn't able to find anything online confirming its needed in Vic. We are planning on using the spare room as a kids play room or quite reading space.

Will discuss with architect about stairs and family bathroom.

cheers Sherin

Thanks Kate for your feedback, family bathroom, reversing the stairs and adding a powder is on the list of discussion point. Appreciate your time :)

Oklouise plan is an incredible improvement. Always wonder why architects don't get it right. And that you have to visit a forum to improve a professionals plans.
I'm glad in oklouise design that the stairs have been reversed. I had visions of a toddler rolling down the stairs in the middle of the night as they came out of their bedroom to visit mum and dad or go to the toilet.

The upstairs layout appears to have a lot of wasted space and what worries me especially with small children is the current stairs arriving next to the entrance to the bedroom, think of sleepy children visiting the bathroom at night

The entrance could be made private with either double sliders opening into the living space or a single door at the side, This could also act to give privacy to the parents room fro the living room

I suggest moving the open stairs onto the exterior wall with highlight windows above to flood the stairs with natural light.

Personally I would prefer the office/study downstairs with a separate powder room accessed via it

The WIP pantry takes up too much space and I would consider a wall of pantry cabinets next to the fridge instead

Well done Siriusky a lot better design than the architect. Agree, that the wall of pantry cupboards is a better use of the space.

Sherin, you don't have to have a butlers pantry to achieve the same result of extra sink and hiding dishes. A simple enclosed space accessible easily with in the kitchen, will do the same thing.
You don't have a lot of square meters available, so you need to think of a better way to use that space.

3D view showing how kitchen and stairs would look, upstairs would need redesigning but no point doing that unless you are interested

love the playpen!

helps keep mummy sane although I did know a girl who put all the valued things in the play pen to protect them from the little ones

The 3d view is great helps to image the space. have gone through these concepts with hubby and we are just turning them over in our heads.

oklouise question about your upstairs layout; is there a particular reason for placing the family bathroom next to the master?

Also the 30° roof was to get the best angel for solar panels and we will be having double glased windows for both floors

i put the bathroom next to the master to have the bathroom door off the short hallway rather than opening into the retreat and if you draw a line across the floor in your original plans to make a path where you will walk and leave space for furniture you will see that despite the size of the retreat it was just like a big hallway with no where for comfortable furniture arrangements and i would double check with the Solar panel supplier to confirm the ideal roof angle... double glazed windows (or thermal break double glazed are better but much more expensive) but windows can't exclude the worst of the summer heat without external window coverings and big areas of east and west glass will impact your compulsory BASIX ratings and playpens and baby gates across the top and bottom of the stairs makes everyone safer and also useful to keep small kids out of open plan kitchens

the following simplifies the upstairs space. The staircase would work better with the little ones if there were floor to ceiling timber Battens instead of a railing or hip wall I can't draw that for you

this looks good and allows the northern light into the retreat and office as well as down the stairs

Another reason for moving the upstairs bathroom to above kitchen, or at least into that area, is the plumbing.
It is a lot more cost effective to have the plumbing in one area, with the pipes, hot water system etc all in one space.
Your original plan has the plumbing required in all parts of the home.

this latest plan has the family bathroom closer to the downstairs bathroom and a much better arrangement for the retreat and living areas and in a new build the cost of a few extra metres of pipe is negligible compared to a much more comfortable floorplan

Hi HU-15134623887 we really like your upstairs floor plan. And appreciate the 3d model but not sold on the location of the staircase on ground floor.

Hi Sherin. With Hu- plan the kitchen seems a bit like an apartment kitchen feel to me. Would rotating the kitchen island back to the original orientation make it feel better. I know you were questioning the original staircase location and Hu-s plan has some benefits upstairs. But it is all a juggle and compromise and you have to go with your gut on how you live.

The following might help you visualize the stairs, my timber battons are large to save me time but you could do two smaller per step etc the timber battons would continue up the stair well to the ceiling above always being mindful of the size of the spaces for the safety of children and small pets