Design Ideas for new renovation project

6 years ago

Hello all,

Please need help with design ideas to make this house a home!

We’ve just bought a 3 bed semi-detached and currently looking to remodel and renovate to make suitable for our family of 4. The options we’re considering is knocking off the kitchen and lounge to create an open plan Kitchen/Dining/Lounge and a separate closed off living room considering Living/Dining room is quite long. Our main challenge is creating something functional and also spacious without building an extension. Here’s the current floor plan.

Thanks all!

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Lydia Houston Interior Design

6 years ago

Hello!

What a fantastic opportunity and a great floor plan to work with. I would advise a kitchen diner at the rear of the house, with a utility and WC between the kitchen and the stairs, this should work well with the plumbing for the bathroom upstairs as I would imagine the drainage/soil stack would run straight down and you could connect straight into this.

Then you could link through into the separate lounge at the front of the house, making the most of the lovely feature bay window. It might be nice to be able to have this open or closed however, to make it feel snug and cosy in the evenings, or open if you are entertaining. I would look to put in a double door opening, perhaps with doors that slide back along the walls to make the maximum space.

Would love to see what you do with the place!

Lydia Houston Interiors

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Comments (6)

A S
6 years ago
Hi,

Do you have any dimensions of the room?
Downstairs, you could have a WC under the stairs, kitchen diner at the back with the living room at the front. These two spaces could be separated by internal folding doors/double doors to create private or open spaces as and when required.

Alternatively, you could have a utility/ bootroom which would be extremely useful to house the washing machine, an extra fridge freezer or even the dishwasher if you can.

Good Luck
Jonathan
6 years ago
I wouldn’t be surprised it the outside wall of the upstairs is over the red line and so there will be steel beam holding it up. This means that you can’t just knock out what is below the steel as it may be supported by these walls.
You need a structural engineer or a great builder to let you know what is possible and at what price point.
You said that you don’t want to build an extension- Is that because of the budget? Do you have budget to remodel?
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Jonathan
6 years ago
Red line picture
A B
6 years ago
Have you thought about what you need from the downstairs save? Looks like there is already a hall, we, kitchen diner and lounge. It might be worth working with a concept planner to go into how you use the space, where the light is, and what would be most cost effective. I like your idea of a separate lounge, but would also consider a utility, second shower and or study. Good luck
Kayode Afolabi
Original Author
6 years ago
Thanks all for the really great comments. We’re not considering extension because of budget so a remodel will work better for us as it’s relatively spacious downstairs if we can make use of the space. Ideally we want a cozy front room (still debating whether to use brick or have double doors in there), open plan kitchen/breakfast and lounge. Also spaces in hallway and under the stairs for storage, WC and mini utility for washing machine. There’s a small WC just under the stairs.
Do we get a structural engineer first or get the plan drawn up first. Also Will it suffice to use an interior designer with architecture experience or we need an architect to draw up all the plans, we’ll prefer the former because of cost and the fact we don’t need planning permission just structural engineer and building regulations approval.
We’ve had a couple of builders say we’ll need a steel beam when we knock out the kitchen wall so agree with the comments above.

Also is there anything that can be done upstairs to make the 3rd room bigger or that will not be cost effective and we should just renovate and get good furniture/beds that makes them a bit more spacious.

Thanks again for your help!

Design Ideas for new renovation project

Lydia Houston Interior Design

Comments (6)

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Jonathan

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Kayode Afolabi
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Design Ideas for new renovation project

Lydia Houston Interior Design

Comments (6)

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Jonathan

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Kayode AfolabiOriginal Author

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Kayode Afolabi
Original Author