ᐅ Floor Plan Single-Family Home 165 sqm First Draft – Architect Dissatisfied
Created on: 27 Oct 2024 14:06
K
KirschsaftladyK
Kirschsaftlady27 Oct 2024 14:06Hello everyone,
since we are not completely satisfied with the first draft from our architect and find it difficult to translate our wishes into a design ourselves, or because some things might even be incompatible, we would appreciate suggestions and tips.
Development Plan / Restrictions
Plot size: 954 sqm (10,270 sq ft)
Slope: approximately 1 m (3.3 ft) downward from the street along the entire length
Floor-space index (FSI): 0.4
Building envelope, building line, and boundary: see architect’s plan
There is a development plan, but all exceptions we want have been approved without issues or have already been permitted for our street.
Client Requirements
Style, roof shape, building type: gable roof, single-family house, possibly with a bay window
Basement, floors: slab-on-grade, 2 full stories with a sufficiently high knee wall, small storage space under the roof
Number of occupants, age: currently 2 adults and one toddler, planning for an additional child
Space requirements on ground floor (GF) and upper floor (UF):
GF: combined utility and technical room, entrance area, cloakroom niche, guest bathroom with shower, office, open living-dining-kitchen area. Pantry, storage under the stairs
UF: 2 children’s rooms at least 15 sqm (160 sq ft) each, master bedroom with walk-in closet, family bathroom with walk-in shower and double sinks, hallway with daylight and preferably space for a chair or a small table for a sewing machine
Office: family use or home office? Home office nearly daily
Guests per year: hardly any
Open or closed layout: semi-open
Conservative or modern construction: modern
Open kitchen, cooking island: semi-open (visually screened) with attached island
Number of dining seats: 6
Fireplace: no
Music/speaker wall: no
Balcony, roof terrace: no
Garage, carport: either a double garage or a garage with carport
Additional wishes:
Stairs either straight or with a landing, not spiral
Living-dining-kitchen area should not be arranged in a single line without privacy screens, all areas with a view into the garden
Prefer an additional access from the garage/carport through the utility room
Master bedroom oriented top left on the plan, bed with a view out of a floor-to-ceiling window into the garden. Preferred access to the bedroom through the dressing room or the dressing room behind the wall behind the bed (headboard).
Prefer children’s rooms not adjoining the master bedroom wall-to-wall
I will link a plan of a kitchen we really liked in a show house
Prefer the stairs to be naturally lit
Living room at least as large as in the current plan
House Design
Designed by: architect
What do you particularly like? Why? The ground floor, except kitchen and dining area, especially the living room, is well separated and without direct view into the kitchen. The dining area feels somewhat cramped; the kitchen should be wider rather than longer, as currently the attached island looks lost.
What do you dislike? Why? Kitchen and dining area, walk-in closet cramped in a niche, bathroom too large, upper floor hallway without windows. Window areas in the master bedroom and also in the dining-kitchen area too large, cloakroom niche too small.
Price estimate according to architect/planner: none yet, a discussion about the design is still pending.
Personal budget limit for the house including fittings: excluding the plot, with all additional costs, survey, and soil report, we still have a budget of 600,000. It will be a prefabricated house, possibly painting and partial flooring done by ourselves, landscaping also mainly DIY and not immediately.
Preferred heating system: air-to-water heat pump with photovoltaic system
If you have to give up on certain details/extensions:
-can you do without: children’s room next to the master bedroom, storage and office could move upstairs if necessary, utility and technical rooms separated, second access not mandatory, pantry access directly from kitchen as well as from utility room not mandatory, bay window not essential as long as it doesn’t make the layout too open
-can’t you do without: stair shape, room layout, bedroom location, “semi-open” living-dining-kitchen area, cloakroom integrated into a niche
Why is the design the way it is?
There was an on-site meeting where brainstorming on paper followed. The current draft more or less resulted from this, but it was not yet final with dimensions and sizes, so for example, the problem with the kitchen and dining area was not visible. We communicated the negative points about the upper floor on site and actually expected a new alternative afterward.
I think all relevant information is included above; I’m happy to provide more if needed.
The dining table does not have to be directly in front of the kitchen; the focus is solely on the kitchen layout itself.
Thanks in advance for all your tips!
since we are not completely satisfied with the first draft from our architect and find it difficult to translate our wishes into a design ourselves, or because some things might even be incompatible, we would appreciate suggestions and tips.
Development Plan / Restrictions
Plot size: 954 sqm (10,270 sq ft)
Slope: approximately 1 m (3.3 ft) downward from the street along the entire length
Floor-space index (FSI): 0.4
Building envelope, building line, and boundary: see architect’s plan
There is a development plan, but all exceptions we want have been approved without issues or have already been permitted for our street.
Client Requirements
Style, roof shape, building type: gable roof, single-family house, possibly with a bay window
Basement, floors: slab-on-grade, 2 full stories with a sufficiently high knee wall, small storage space under the roof
Number of occupants, age: currently 2 adults and one toddler, planning for an additional child
Space requirements on ground floor (GF) and upper floor (UF):
GF: combined utility and technical room, entrance area, cloakroom niche, guest bathroom with shower, office, open living-dining-kitchen area. Pantry, storage under the stairs
UF: 2 children’s rooms at least 15 sqm (160 sq ft) each, master bedroom with walk-in closet, family bathroom with walk-in shower and double sinks, hallway with daylight and preferably space for a chair or a small table for a sewing machine
Office: family use or home office? Home office nearly daily
Guests per year: hardly any
Open or closed layout: semi-open
Conservative or modern construction: modern
Open kitchen, cooking island: semi-open (visually screened) with attached island
Number of dining seats: 6
Fireplace: no
Music/speaker wall: no
Balcony, roof terrace: no
Garage, carport: either a double garage or a garage with carport
Additional wishes:
Stairs either straight or with a landing, not spiral
Living-dining-kitchen area should not be arranged in a single line without privacy screens, all areas with a view into the garden
Prefer an additional access from the garage/carport through the utility room
Master bedroom oriented top left on the plan, bed with a view out of a floor-to-ceiling window into the garden. Preferred access to the bedroom through the dressing room or the dressing room behind the wall behind the bed (headboard).
Prefer children’s rooms not adjoining the master bedroom wall-to-wall
I will link a plan of a kitchen we really liked in a show house
Prefer the stairs to be naturally lit
Living room at least as large as in the current plan
House Design
Designed by: architect
What do you particularly like? Why? The ground floor, except kitchen and dining area, especially the living room, is well separated and without direct view into the kitchen. The dining area feels somewhat cramped; the kitchen should be wider rather than longer, as currently the attached island looks lost.
What do you dislike? Why? Kitchen and dining area, walk-in closet cramped in a niche, bathroom too large, upper floor hallway without windows. Window areas in the master bedroom and also in the dining-kitchen area too large, cloakroom niche too small.
Price estimate according to architect/planner: none yet, a discussion about the design is still pending.
Personal budget limit for the house including fittings: excluding the plot, with all additional costs, survey, and soil report, we still have a budget of 600,000. It will be a prefabricated house, possibly painting and partial flooring done by ourselves, landscaping also mainly DIY and not immediately.
Preferred heating system: air-to-water heat pump with photovoltaic system
If you have to give up on certain details/extensions:
-can you do without: children’s room next to the master bedroom, storage and office could move upstairs if necessary, utility and technical rooms separated, second access not mandatory, pantry access directly from kitchen as well as from utility room not mandatory, bay window not essential as long as it doesn’t make the layout too open
-can’t you do without: stair shape, room layout, bedroom location, “semi-open” living-dining-kitchen area, cloakroom integrated into a niche
Why is the design the way it is?
There was an on-site meeting where brainstorming on paper followed. The current draft more or less resulted from this, but it was not yet final with dimensions and sizes, so for example, the problem with the kitchen and dining area was not visible. We communicated the negative points about the upper floor on site and actually expected a new alternative afterward.
I think all relevant information is included above; I’m happy to provide more if needed.
The dining table does not have to be directly in front of the kitchen; the focus is solely on the kitchen layout itself.
Thanks in advance for all your tips!
K
Kirschsaftlady27 Oct 2024 16:38Thank you for the tip! Here is the ground floor plan. The north arrow is unfortunately not that simple, as it is exactly over the architect’s logo, which I obviously do not want to show. I have uploaded the site plan again with the arrow, but unfortunately it is cropped at the bottom.
As additional information, there is currently no neighboring development.
As additional information, there is currently no neighboring development.
Oh wow!
May I ask what idea this design is based on? I don’t see your requests being considered, and there are also fundamental planning issues that seem completely off here. Were there any other specific requirements?
Is the budget so low that it is insufficient for proper planning?
How do you turn a nice utility/technical room into a passageway with no added value? Give it three doors and position them in a way that a wall becomes unusable.
And how do you squeeze sanitary fixtures into the bathroom that you actually want to use?
Phew!
May I ask what idea this design is based on? I don’t see your requests being considered, and there are also fundamental planning issues that seem completely off here. Were there any other specific requirements?
Is the budget so low that it is insufficient for proper planning?
How do you turn a nice utility/technical room into a passageway with no added value? Give it three doors and position them in a way that a wall becomes unusable.
And how do you squeeze sanitary fixtures into the bathroom that you actually want to use?
Phew!
K
Kirschsaftlady27 Oct 2024 18:27Thanks in advance for your feedback! We hadn’t really considered the utility/technical room, but you’re right—because of the walkways and the window, you really can’t place anything there.
As mentioned, the draft was developed after the site visit as a brainstorming session between the architect and us. Based on our room program with approximate size specifications in square meters that we provided beforehand, he prepared an initial sketch. We then shared what we liked and disliked, and from there he started drawing while we continuously intervened if something didn’t fit at all or if we had our own suggestions. That’s how the ground floor was created, which we actually liked quite a bit in the rough draft; the upper floor, however, we already criticized at that stage. We assumed he would significantly revise the entire plan, check it for feasibility, and possibly rethink everything again based on all the wishes and dislikes he learned during the meeting (also noted by his secretary) if the overall design didn’t work out.
The fixed requirements are basically just the room program, the budget, the roof ridge direction parallel to the street, stair design either straight-run or with a landing, the location of the master bedroom, the living-dining-kitchen area facing the garden, and at least the living room somewhat separated or without a direct view into the kitchen, with the kitchen featuring an attached island that allows a view into the garden.
We have seen many things in show homes or catalogs that we liked, but some of these were also incompatible or we didn’t know the pricing implications, so we found it difficult to express more concrete wishes.
Do you mean a plan according to HOAI? We agreed on a design plan with two revisions at a fixed price. We wanted to avoid doing one according to HOAI—or found it too unclear—though maybe that was a mistake.
As mentioned, the draft was developed after the site visit as a brainstorming session between the architect and us. Based on our room program with approximate size specifications in square meters that we provided beforehand, he prepared an initial sketch. We then shared what we liked and disliked, and from there he started drawing while we continuously intervened if something didn’t fit at all or if we had our own suggestions. That’s how the ground floor was created, which we actually liked quite a bit in the rough draft; the upper floor, however, we already criticized at that stage. We assumed he would significantly revise the entire plan, check it for feasibility, and possibly rethink everything again based on all the wishes and dislikes he learned during the meeting (also noted by his secretary) if the overall design didn’t work out.
The fixed requirements are basically just the room program, the budget, the roof ridge direction parallel to the street, stair design either straight-run or with a landing, the location of the master bedroom, the living-dining-kitchen area facing the garden, and at least the living room somewhat separated or without a direct view into the kitchen, with the kitchen featuring an attached island that allows a view into the garden.
We have seen many things in show homes or catalogs that we liked, but some of these were also incompatible or we didn’t know the pricing implications, so we found it difficult to express more concrete wishes.
Do you mean a plan according to HOAI? We agreed on a design plan with two revisions at a fixed price. We wanted to avoid doing one according to HOAI—or found it too unclear—though maybe that was a mistake.
I can only agree with @ypg.
You can definitely make much better use of the available space.
For me personally, there are too many corners (both inside and outside). If you remove the recessed wall in the living room and make the house rectangular, you gain several square meters (square feet) and the layout becomes simpler as well.
You can definitely make much better use of the available space.
For me personally, there are too many corners (both inside and outside). If you remove the recessed wall in the living room and make the house rectangular, you gain several square meters (square feet) and the layout becomes simpler as well.
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