Personally I think your dining is crying out for a bigger statement, something more luxe or at least larger, either single or many pendants hung together even. At different heights. And I disagree - you can make a different statement with the dining area that does not follow the lounge theme. Whilst they flow they are still separate areas. Just my opinion!

Thank you all. Oskuee - actually, you may think that I am the selfish one. Out of the whole house my hubby only got the games and theatre to do what he wanted, the rest of the place was mine :-) It would be a glorious concert in the theatre! hah! There is no room left though as where the murphy bed is, is now the built in entertainment cupboards, and the murphy bed has been switched to the front wall. In the games room, we have a pool table, Neo Geo gaming machine, a bar fridge and some other manly type things. It COULD go in here, yes, and we might go this way, but I would prefer elsewhere (not the garage) SueM it is too long (145cm) to fit between the dining and kitchen/stairs. Vy, there is no retreat upstairs, and it is too big for the landing. Yeah, at this stage, it is likely to go in the games (to the left on the wall behind study) or under the aircon in the lounge. I had this really awesome idea to frame some of my grandmothers piano music, songs that were special to her and I, and have them as artwork on the wall behind the piano. This would have been so awesome near the front door. Sigh, hopefully it will still look nice wherever the piano ends up going. Thank you all again. Sandra

my suggestion has access to the walk in pantry (and laundry) through the kitchen with an optional sliding glass door...the "extra pantry" on the right uses the space INSIDE the dividing wall for tall, shallow cabinets with multiple adjustable shelves, deep enough for most cans, bottles, glasses, sauces, oils, cups etc etc The walk in pantry could have counters, under bench drawers and wall storage.. re-arranging the kitchen allows space for microwave, mixer etc - be kind to each other in your very first home

because of the extra downstairs ceiling height requiring more risers and a longer run and, assuming there's nothing downstairs, to interfere with this idea my suggestion is a return stair in the north east corner of the living areas upstairs and down, in front of the window, with or without storage underneath..there should be no need to rearrange the kitchen but the island will now be too long and you could push the stove wall and counter back into the old stairwell space to accommodate a shorter island with a wip...there are numerous on line companies that will make a custom sized stair for DIY but imo this is the simplest location without compromising stair safety and comfort and an open railing shouldn't interfere with the views