ᐅ Floor plan for a 160 sqm urban villa – Requesting advice!
Created on: 28 Jan 2019 09:23
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Bauherrin92
Hello everyone,
we are planning to build an urban villa with 160 sqm (1720 sq ft) plus a basement in rural Bavaria. Since we are now in the crucial phase of floor plan design, we would really appreciate your opinions and suggestions for improvements.
The following issues concern us the most:
1. Arrangement of the house and garage on the plot: The garage has been deliberately placed on the west side to create distance from the neighbor. To catch the evening sun, the house has been set back. However, I wonder if this looks "good," as I have never seen such an arrangement before. We are also undecided whether the garage should be detached or attached to the house (possibly with access through the pantry?). On the plans, the garage is at the neighbor’s boundary. There is currently no house there.
2. The cloakroom and dressing room seem too small to comfortably place proper wardrobes and move around freely.
3. In general, I feel the overall design could still be improved, including the arrangement of windows.
Here is the questionnaire:
Development plan / restrictions
Plot size: 800 sqm (8,600 sq ft)
Slope: no
Floor area ratio: 0.35
Floor space index: 0.7
Building window, building line and boundary: 3 m (10 ft) to the street
Edge development: garage yes
Number of parking spaces: 2
Number of storeys: 2
Roof style: open construction
Homeowners’ requirements
Style, roof type, building type: urban villa, 2 full storeys, hipped roof
Basement, storeys: basement, ground floor, first floor
Number of people, age: two adults, schoolchild, expecting a baby
Space requirements ground floor, upper floor: three bedrooms, spacious living-dining area, separate cloakroom, shower toilet on the ground floor
Office: none
Guest bedrooms per year: none
Open or closed architecture: open
Conservative or modern construction: modern
Open kitchen, kitchen island: yes
Number of dining seats: 4–10 (when guests visit)
Fireplace: yes
Garage, carport: prefabricated double garage
Other wishes / special features / daily routine, also reasons why this or that should or should not be included:
- Cloakroom in a niche
- Shower toilet on the ground floor, later for the teenage daughter
- Large children’s rooms with floor-to-ceiling windows facing the garden
- Dressing room in the master bedroom
- Pantry for yellow bags (recycling waste bags), vacuum cleaner, cleaning supplies, pasta stock, etc.
House design
Who made the plan: planner from a construction company
What do you particularly like? Why?
- Basement: fine as is
- Ground floor: large pantry, L-shaped kitchen/living/dining area
- Upper floor: large children’s rooms
What don’t you like? Why?
- Ground floor: layout of toilet and cloakroom
- Upper floor: dressing room and bathroom possibly too small
- detached garage
Preferred heating technology: undecided so far
If you had to give up something, which details/upgrades would you skip?
- Could give up: access from garage into the house
- Could not do without: pantry, dressing room, cloakroom
Why has the design turned out as it is now? Our wishes were implemented by the planner
We look forward to your advice!!!
P.S.: The red circle is supposed to indicate north, sorry, it couldn’t be done otherwise!
we are planning to build an urban villa with 160 sqm (1720 sq ft) plus a basement in rural Bavaria. Since we are now in the crucial phase of floor plan design, we would really appreciate your opinions and suggestions for improvements.
The following issues concern us the most:
1. Arrangement of the house and garage on the plot: The garage has been deliberately placed on the west side to create distance from the neighbor. To catch the evening sun, the house has been set back. However, I wonder if this looks "good," as I have never seen such an arrangement before. We are also undecided whether the garage should be detached or attached to the house (possibly with access through the pantry?). On the plans, the garage is at the neighbor’s boundary. There is currently no house there.
2. The cloakroom and dressing room seem too small to comfortably place proper wardrobes and move around freely.
3. In general, I feel the overall design could still be improved, including the arrangement of windows.
Here is the questionnaire:
Development plan / restrictions
Plot size: 800 sqm (8,600 sq ft)
Slope: no
Floor area ratio: 0.35
Floor space index: 0.7
Building window, building line and boundary: 3 m (10 ft) to the street
Edge development: garage yes
Number of parking spaces: 2
Number of storeys: 2
Roof style: open construction
Homeowners’ requirements
Style, roof type, building type: urban villa, 2 full storeys, hipped roof
Basement, storeys: basement, ground floor, first floor
Number of people, age: two adults, schoolchild, expecting a baby
Space requirements ground floor, upper floor: three bedrooms, spacious living-dining area, separate cloakroom, shower toilet on the ground floor
Office: none
Guest bedrooms per year: none
Open or closed architecture: open
Conservative or modern construction: modern
Open kitchen, kitchen island: yes
Number of dining seats: 4–10 (when guests visit)
Fireplace: yes
Garage, carport: prefabricated double garage
Other wishes / special features / daily routine, also reasons why this or that should or should not be included:
- Cloakroom in a niche
- Shower toilet on the ground floor, later for the teenage daughter
- Large children’s rooms with floor-to-ceiling windows facing the garden
- Dressing room in the master bedroom
- Pantry for yellow bags (recycling waste bags), vacuum cleaner, cleaning supplies, pasta stock, etc.
House design
Who made the plan: planner from a construction company
What do you particularly like? Why?
- Basement: fine as is
- Ground floor: large pantry, L-shaped kitchen/living/dining area
- Upper floor: large children’s rooms
What don’t you like? Why?
- Ground floor: layout of toilet and cloakroom
- Upper floor: dressing room and bathroom possibly too small
- detached garage
Preferred heating technology: undecided so far
If you had to give up something, which details/upgrades would you skip?
- Could give up: access from garage into the house
- Could not do without: pantry, dressing room, cloakroom
Why has the design turned out as it is now? Our wishes were implemented by the planner
We look forward to your advice!!!
P.S.: The red circle is supposed to indicate north, sorry, it couldn’t be done otherwise!
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Bauherrin9227 Feb 2019 20:07Duran schrieb:
A different point – why should I care how the house looks from the outside?I think having an overall attractive appearance is quite important.
Curly schrieb:
You can arrange the children's bedroom windows symmetrically; I don't see any reason to accept such a poor exterior view. In the living room, you can shift the sliding window so that it aligns with the mullion of the upper window. Your guest WC window is very small, as are the windows in the corner of the living room.
Best regards,
SabineThe two floor-to-ceiling windows in the children's rooms are both 1.71 m (5 feet 7 inches) from the exterior wall on the left and right. We will make adjustments to shift the sliding window. The guest WC window will also be enlarged, from 76 cm (30 inches) to 101 cm (40 inches). Which living room corner do you mean? In the living room there is only the small floor-to-ceiling window facing south.
Duran schrieb:
A different point – why should I care how the house looks from the outside? How often do I stand in front of the house thinking it looks good, and how often am I inside needing to look outside and arrange the interior sensibly? Am I building the house for the neighbors to look at or for myself to live in?You come home several times a day yourself and you don’t want to stand in the driveway thinking, “What kind of ugly house did I build here?”
More like: “Wow, and this belongs to me...!” ...
I still feel that way after 5 years.
Is that really the case? Basically, there is always something that was planned incorrectly somewhere, which you get annoyed about when moving in or a week later – but after half a year, no one cares anymore.
I usually don't get home several times a day, and at the moment it is dark both in the morning and evening.
For me, something has to be practical and useable in a sensible way, not just look nice for the neighbor so I can say I have the cooler house; I actually find it pointless when floor-to-ceiling windows are everywhere but then covered up to prevent people from looking inside.
I usually don't get home several times a day, and at the moment it is dark both in the morning and evening.
For me, something has to be practical and useable in a sensible way, not just look nice for the neighbor so I can say I have the cooler house; I actually find it pointless when floor-to-ceiling windows are everywhere but then covered up to prevent people from looking inside.
Duran schrieb:
For me, something has to be practical and usable, not just look nice for the neighbors so I can say I have the cooler house; honestly, I find it pointless when there are floor-to-ceiling windows everywhere that are then covered up so no one can look insideFunctionality doesn’t exclude aesthetics.
When building your house, you don’t have to worry about what the neighbors think. Apparently, you always seem to consider what others might think when making decisions.
But it’s up to you: if you prefer, you can build an (ugly) house just for the neighbors.
Bauherrin92 schrieb:
The main point is not to build right on the neighbor's boundary line; shifting the house does not help in that case.The idea was: garage on the boundary; as far as I understand, it would be 680cm (270 inches) from the house to this boundary, hence the suggestion to shift the house linearly by 80cm (31 inches) to keep the garage on the boundary without increasing its size unusually, and consequently have the house 80cm (31 inches) further away from the other boundary.Bauherrin92 schrieb:
Again regarding ceiling height: If I increase it by, for example, half a brick, do I have to enlarge the windows as well, to keep the proportions right?By "half a brick," you probably mean half a brick course (?) – that corresponds to one course in double brick thickness (2DF). Two courses in single brick thickness (NF) would be closer to the height of a stair step. However, adjusting the window height is not necessary purely for aesthetic reasons. The relationship is more relevant to the distance between the lintel and the underside of the ceiling.Bauherrin92 schrieb:
The windows are really causing me headaches… if I design them according to the interior layout, the exterior looks awkward. But if I follow the exterior view and symmetry, the windows do not suit the rooms. :-(This can be balanced, but it requires a kind of "green thumb." For a general contractor, I find the elevations relatively acceptable. You can see with @RobsonMKK how asymmetry can also look good.Bauherrin92 schrieb:
The guest toilet window will also be enlarged from 76cm to 101cm.Which latecomer would want to climb out there? – Just kidding, 76cm (30 inches) is usually more than enough.https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/
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Bauherrin9212 Mar 2019 12:00Hello everyone,
The building application has been submitted, so the exterior dimensions and position of the house are fixed. It has now become clear that this is the only way to proceed. The 3m (10 feet) building setback line on the east side has a slight bend and is narrower at the front than at the back of the garden. We "touch" this setback line with a corner of the house (where the guest toilet is). So moving the house closer to the street is not possible without reducing the 9.60m (31.5 feet) width of the house. Also, the initial suggestions here to place the garage on the east side won’t work because then the house would also have to maintain a 3m (10 feet) distance from the neighbor on the west side — so the house would have to be reduced again.
Honestly, I’m actually relieved about these regulations now, so I don’t have to worry about what would be better or different.
So the discussions here in the forum will be about the interior of the house, once we finally get the new plans.
Another point: yesterday we received a letter from the survey office saying that new boundary markers were placed on the property, following a request by the municipality back in December! This means our plot will be reduced by a few square meters (about 5 sqm (54 sq ft)), apparently by a few centimeters on the east side due to the sidewalk. Allegedly, we were invited to a meeting about this but did not attend (according to the survey office). I am shocked! We were never informed or invited! Of course, no one answers the phone at the municipal building department...
We don’t know what to do. I don’t think it’s worth suing over these few square meters. We would presumably get reimbursed for the price per square meter. On the other hand, it really annoys me to just have to accept this without being informed beforehand.
Edit: The notary fees are calculated based on the purchase price. If this is reduced afterwards, we probably won’t get any refund for the notary costs, right? Could this be a point in a lawsuit? Would all the documents have to be changed as well? So additional costs for us…
The building application has been submitted, so the exterior dimensions and position of the house are fixed. It has now become clear that this is the only way to proceed. The 3m (10 feet) building setback line on the east side has a slight bend and is narrower at the front than at the back of the garden. We "touch" this setback line with a corner of the house (where the guest toilet is). So moving the house closer to the street is not possible without reducing the 9.60m (31.5 feet) width of the house. Also, the initial suggestions here to place the garage on the east side won’t work because then the house would also have to maintain a 3m (10 feet) distance from the neighbor on the west side — so the house would have to be reduced again.
Honestly, I’m actually relieved about these regulations now, so I don’t have to worry about what would be better or different.
So the discussions here in the forum will be about the interior of the house, once we finally get the new plans.
Another point: yesterday we received a letter from the survey office saying that new boundary markers were placed on the property, following a request by the municipality back in December! This means our plot will be reduced by a few square meters (about 5 sqm (54 sq ft)), apparently by a few centimeters on the east side due to the sidewalk. Allegedly, we were invited to a meeting about this but did not attend (according to the survey office). I am shocked! We were never informed or invited! Of course, no one answers the phone at the municipal building department...
We don’t know what to do. I don’t think it’s worth suing over these few square meters. We would presumably get reimbursed for the price per square meter. On the other hand, it really annoys me to just have to accept this without being informed beforehand.
Edit: The notary fees are calculated based on the purchase price. If this is reduced afterwards, we probably won’t get any refund for the notary costs, right? Could this be a point in a lawsuit? Would all the documents have to be changed as well? So additional costs for us…
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