Future Houzz: Where did you want to live when you were growing up?

8 years ago

Much of Houzz consists of aspirational design, homes we'd love to one day live in or styles we can aspire to! But it's interesting to think now the styles and the places we look for versus perhaps what we yearned for and believed we would eventually have when we were younger.

From tiny seaside cottages to the opulent mansions of the Hollywood Hills, where did you want to live when you were growing up? Has that changed and has it happened? Share below!

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Featured Answer

carole_fordham1

8 years ago

when I was a child I would always draw a house with the door in the middle and windows either side. I still would love to live in that double fronted house, just haven't found it so far.

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Comments (20)

Andrew Millar
8 years ago
For as long as I can remember, not much these days, I've always looked at shells of buildings, commercial and residential, and dreamed of ways in which I would renovate them.although now my creaking bones would scream at any heavy work.. but I can still dream.
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queen495
8 years ago
I would want to live in a house that is beautifully built of course but also a house that would be perfect for my family and I
embzop
8 years ago
I used to pass a derelict railway workers cottage on my way to school. I always wanted to live there, it had so much character and was surrounded by fields.

I don't live anywhere like that now. The reality is that house would have been far too isolated for me. I like living near other people and shops. My home doesn't look so nice from the outside but it is a much better location.
Tom Flanagan
Original Author
8 years ago
It's funny how are ideas of where we'd want to live change so drastically. I used to envision a chalet in the Alps as the perfect hideaway, and whilst I don't think I'd mind that still, I much prefer something a little more cosmopolitan for the time being - a townhouse in the city sounds about right :)
Juliet Docherty
8 years ago
My Grandma lived in a council flat on the 11th floor overlooking a very industrialised Northern town. From above people looked like ants, it was fascinating. I found the whole concept of using a lift and looking down at the world truly amazing. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
Jan Johnson
8 years ago
I lived in 18 different houses, wanted NOT to live in a housing estate or a Mill Town like i used to. I like where i am now although the front door is not to my liking but if i changed it I would not have a sea and hilly landscape to look at.
ali270
8 years ago
Having been brought up in a Victorian terrace with no front garden and only a yard at the back I always wanted a house with a wrap around garden . Not quite achieved it , but I have the next best thing ....countryside on my doorstep .
jak4250
8 years ago
I have lived in the house i drew as a child for 20 years which has been fantastic. Unfortunatly now with children gone its far too big . So its onthe market, its double frounted wrap round garden and in a lovley north yorkshire village.... Will be so sad whn its sold...but i have a fabulous Barn in france to look forward to :-)
Olena Tkach
8 years ago
When I was a child I dreamt of living in the highest tower of a medieval castle made of huge dark stone blocks, placed on a huge rock near the seashore somewhere in Wales (I've never been there, but it seemed kind of magic place to me for some reason). I wanted my room to be dark, with narrow windows, heavy velvet curtains, fluffy carpets and high bed with lots of blankets and pillows.

It's funny, but now I prefer light rooms with huge clear windows, extra-low beds, no carpetry at all and no or extra-lightweight curtains which are always open.
cowley10
8 years ago
I dreamt of a red brick Victorian mansion with the absolute must of a circular spire topped tower, high ceilings and a sweeping staircase to flounce down.. Funny, our rooms are only just over 6ft high and the stairs would fit into a cupboard! But just think of the saving on heating!
catkins007
8 years ago
I always wanted to live in a traditional Gypsy caravan. That or a houseboat, which I actually achieved many years later. Now I live in a 17th C cottage, so I'm very lucky.
belsize
8 years ago
I never had an idea of what the place would be and still don't. It could be a loft, cottage, townhouse, castle or modern flat. But what I always wanted, living with parents who came from the make do and mend generation and zero taste, was to have a chance to do somewhere up and make it look beautiful. This I have only partially achieved but it's why I love Houzz. The reality is that if I ever move again I will spend less on the property and earmark more for refurbishment. I never realised how much it costs to get everything right! And in my experience it isn't right unless you can begin with a clean canvas - i.e. good flooring, fully decorated walls and windows and furniture and art selected to go together. And a good layout. And windows that face the right way. And a partner who likes the same things and isn't immediately drawn to the twee-est, naff-est bits and bobs. But I'm not trading him in so poring over Houzz porn is the next best thing!
hortonhearsawho2013
8 years ago
A castle, like a real princess!
amellee
8 years ago
Large spacy castle...
Gerry Rust
8 years ago
As a child I was obsessed with the Tudors (thanks to the BBC's Six Wives of Henry VIII and Elizabeth R) and always wanted to live in a Tudor house. I finally achieved my dream when we bought Tudor Cottage in Buckingham. Not the moated manor house of my imaginings perhaps but I vividly recall hanging washing in the back garden some months after we moved in and looking up at the huge chimney and thinking WOW! this is a dream come true. It was quirky and sometimes inconvenient (the stairs were so wonky it was easier to manage them drunk than sober ;) but I loved it. My current home is also 'full of character' as the estate agents would have it but to be honest I'm done with dark rooms and difficult spaces. My next house doesn't need to be large but it does need to have a layout that can be made to work for me, maybe it's my failing eyesight and lack of balance that has brought about this change of heart (or maybe it's all the wine) :D
TwoHearts
8 years ago
We are pretty much in our dream house but if you're with someone you love, then that's all you need.
robertofsherwoodengland
8 years ago
I'd say we all want to live in that lovely house we passed whilst on the way to go brambling with a jam jar in our hand and high hopes of a good day. Maybe it was the gates, or the gravel driveway that appealed, and it even had stone pillers and Georgian windows . And I'd wait and stare, and wait and stare curious about who lived there and hoping they'd drive out allowing me a quick glimpse of another world. Them. Then I'd feel ashamed stood there in my jumble-sale-new clothes, bothered that perhaps someone might come out and ask me what was I doing. I learnt it was a very rich person home, a shipbuilder who owned a shipping fleet and I wanted to copy him, if he could do it- then so could I. So that man and that lovely house blighted my life for the best, and it still does. I love this house and stop outside it whenever I pass by. I'm heart broken, and I'm a big strong man and big strong men are not allowed to cry. That adopted house is my comfort blanket, my home, and I go to sleep and it becomes mine.This is my lounge, this my garden, this gate is mine, and please come in when you go brambling. Don't walk on by, share it with me, you can adopt upstairs or the fireplaces, or ceiling coving and florals, I won't mind.
Kittihawke
8 years ago
A lighthouse over a stormy sea
Sherbert Barnes
8 years ago
A beautiful old double fronted house with a huge porch and a lovely stable light hanging from the rafters... with lovely old stone lintels.... boxes of apples stored in the porch and I would go out and collect holly, ivy and berries and make a huge wreath for the front door at Christmas!.... When you come in, you won't need to take your boots off as it will have a stone floor that just needs a sweep! And then that's when it will hit you!.... The smell of home baking, fresh cakes and mulled wine!!..... Is this a competition question? Have I won my dream home?!!!! :-)

Future Houzz: Where did you want to live when you were growing up?

carole_fordham1

Comments (20)

Andrew Millar

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queen495

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hortonhearsawho2013

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TwoHearts

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Future Houzz: Where did you want to live when you were growing up?

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Tom FlanaganOriginal Author

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