Adding third door to living room/reconfiguring

last month

I have the attached ground floor configuration in my home. The living room is odd in that, to access the snug/family room, one must first go through the study. The study/family room are an extension added on by the previous owners.
I am considering adding a door from the living room directly to the snug/family room, however I'm concerned this too might look/feel odd to have three doorways in the room and the french windows leading out to the garden. I also thought if I do add this doorway, would it make sense to then block off the doorway between the family room and study?
Any suggestions would be helpful.
Regards,
Dickie

Featured Answer

Isla Cherry

last month

You should go ahead then with adding the door between sitting and family room. I would also block off the doorway btw the study and family room which will give you a long wall in the study for book storage or however you choose to use it. I did have the exact same thought as Minnie101 about the kitchen/dining but as you were asking about the study and sitting room I didn't add it in to my reply..

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Comments (19)

Mark Brown
Original Author
last month
Attached floorplan
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Isla Cherry
last month
It's a really good idea. It depends on how you use your study. I really think your floorplan is a bit limiting in that some rooms are more of a thoroughfare to another room. Do you have enough room in your sitting room to allow for through traffic or do you feel it is compromised by all the doors?
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Thank you Minnie .. I have just seen your comment. I was thinking storage units across the nook opposite the kitchen. Hence why no rad there. The positioning of the utility has been a constant battle. Originally this space was going out 10x5 metres and was approved as such .. but now adding a second extension which has improved the balance. This position is at the back of the garden - which goes right around the house. We need an outside door to the utility and this causes the least interference. We have made the utility smaller so we can fit a sky light in to light the kitchen. I’ve blocked the current doors as you’ve described and it’s ok considering it’s quite a dark house .. plus there will be more light once extension complete ...thanks for that tip.
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Thanks for your advice both of you. We live in England to answer your question Gabby. Is there a rule in Scotland that the aisles have to be 120cm and if so why ? Jonathan, I was kind of thinking we would want to use the island for eating meals on like we do now with our current kitchen table, but I guess if the DR is open to the kitchen then it wouldn't be a problem to take a few steps more to the dining room table (because we use it so infrequently at the moment I am finding that hard to visualise). I am going to post a better plan of our current kitchen and dining room (with the pantry taken out) and I am also going to post a photo looking out from the window in our dining room. I am wondering if we did turn the DR into our kitchen could we make the window ledge higher and put the units in an L-shape so we could put the sink in the window? (and still have space for an island) I know this goes against some of my earlier points, especially about being worried people would be able to look in at us/and would create a more goldfish bowl feeling but I am just playing around with ideas.
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Mark Brown
Original Author
last month
Isla, the living room is big enough I think. I don't think the study is used enough that it would feel like there's a lot of traffic. I think at the moment it's worse because the only access to the family room is through the living room and study. The other thing I considered is putting a stud wall in the living room and making a corridor to the family room, but this comes at the cost of space and might look a bit odd.
minnie101
last month
Painting the doors in the wall colours helps minimise the look of the doors. i definitely think you need an entrance to the family room though. Have you lived there long? Very expensive but I’d be tempted to open up kitchen, dining and the sitting room with the bottom half of the kitchen as utility/boots and leave the study and family room. It may not suit you though and obviously not a cheap option!
Mark Brown
Original Author
last month
Minnie/Isla

Thank you both so much for your input on this, it's been helpful.

I shall proceed with getting the door knocked through then and filling in the study.

I agree it's a strange sort of layout, but I'm sure I can make it work!

@Minnie, we've been here about five months, so not long, still feeling the place out a bit! The long term plan is to get an L-shaped extension around 1.8m around the right-hand side of the kitchen and back of kitchen and dining room and make this open plan. We thought the same with the bottom of the kitchen being a boot/utility room. I did also consider what you propose with also making the living room accessible from the kitchen/diner, but that would result in four doorways plus the french windows at the back. Would this not be irregular?
siobhanmcgee90
last month
I think punching a door between the living and family is a good move provided you close the study to family door. Otherwise the whole left side becomes a hallway. I’m more interested in how the right hand side of the house is working. It looks ripe for an open plan kitchen/diner/ casual sitting area but looks like a lot of transitional space ATM.
Mark Brown
Original Author
last month
@Siobhan thank you for your input, it seems like this solution is something everyone is agreed on!

On the kitchen/living room, at the moment the hall is just used as an entry way. We've been discussing the best way to utilise the space and have also discussed potentially extending around the right hand side of the kitchen and rear of both the kitchen and dining room.

@Oraanj -Thank you for your input, I think that we likely will need to involve a designer for the plans with the kitchen etc. as visualising the way things could/will look is a skill that unfortunately it seems neither of us has been gifted with.
siobhanmcgee90
last month
Mark, I did a bit of research into Oraanj and I think they may be a scam. They suddenly appeared on Houzz and immediately have lots of positive reviews which I suspect are fake. Be careful
Ann Jones
last month
Hi Mark, do you actually need a door, would it work just having access into the family room. If you wanted to shut it off for odd occasions would curtains work for you?
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Sonia
last month
I agree with everyone else, put in a door to the family room and block off the door between it and the study. You have some amazing space there and when you are ready get in an architect to help redesign the inside by removing some walls to create a lovely big kitchen/diner/garden room. Do you ever watch George Clarke’s Ugly House programmes whereby he reconfigure the inside of a house and rarely extends it? It is full of great ideas, although they rarely stick to the budget! You can watch it on channel 4 catch up if you so wish.
Isla Cherry
last month
last modified: last month
@Siobhan, I also looked into our "new" contributor. I share your impression. Not sure why a large company with in excess of 38 employees (not verified) would feel the need to completely dominate an amateurs forum?
Sonia
last month
I’ve noticed a lot of their reviews are from employees saying what a great company they are to work for! Totally bizarre.
juliet291
last month
I find their comments very irritating as they are just a (long) summary of the obvious - they never come up with an original contribution - so bad could even be a bot…
Isla Cherry
last month
last modified: last month
Funny Juliet I've thought that too.....AI perhaps....cut and paste....I have a current design dilemma but can't face that kind of feedback...
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juliet291
last month
@Isla - now we all want to know what your dilemma is! go on, share - any scams or bots have picked the wrong forum 😡
Betty Boo
last month
My thoughts too, ask away Isla! I just scroll past any unhelpful comments.
Isla Cherry
last month
I'll do it this week, just need to gather some pics together first. Thanks for the encouragement...:)). I shudder to think what helpful advice they will come up with...
Little Jem
last month
When we were house-hunting, it soon became obvious which properties had benefitted from professional advice on reconfiguration/extension, and which had been done on an ad-hoc basis. Some were so bad that you'd have had to knock them down and start again.

I agree that having a long run of unbroken wall in the family room would be a good idea, especially in view of the 2 large windows on adjacenet walls. Which leads me to wonder whether both are necessary ? Could you block off the 'left hand' side one without causing the room to become too dark ? You might enlarge the remaining window, if so. Or even add a French Window onto a little patio (which would be far enopugh away from the main route into the house, I think ?) If you do this, you could also do something no-one else has yet mentioned: leave the door between the family room and study, and close off the one between the study and the main sitting room. I don't think you need 2 entrances into the study, and that would give a cosier feel to the end of the living room, with both doors (existing and proposed) almost opposite one another, and therefore giving the 'feel' of a corridor, but without compromising the sitting area.

Adding third door to living room/reconfiguring

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