ᐅ Floor Plan Review: Single-Family House with Three Children's Bedrooms

Hello everyone,
We are quite far along in our floor plan design, so I now dare to "throw it to the pros for feedback."

Thank you in advance for your tips and suggestions!

Development Plan / Restrictions
Plot size: 843 sqm (9065 sq ft)
Slope: no
Floor area ratio
Gross floor area ratio
Building window, building line, and boundary
Edge development
Number of parking spaces: 6
Number of floors: 2
Roof type: gable roof
Architectural style: modern
Orientation: North/South
Maximum height / limits: 18 m (59 ft)
Other requirements: no geothermal probe, 3 m (10 ft) setback from boundary

Homeowners’ Requirements
Style, roof type, building type: gable roof, minimum 23 degrees
Basement, floors: yes, 2 floors
Number of people, ages: 5 (> 35, > 35, 13, 9, 2)
Room requirements on ground floor and upper floor: guest bathroom, office, kitchen, living room, dining area, utility room
Office: family use or home office? Home office and guest room
Number of overnight guests per year:
Open or closed architecture: open
Conservative or modern building style: modern
Open kitchen, cooking island: yes
Number of dining seats: 1
Fireplace: yes
Music / stereo wall: no
Balcony, roof terrace: possibly later on canopy/garage
Garage, carport: yes
Utility garden, greenhouse: raised garden beds
Other wishes / special features / daily routine, including reasons why certain options are preferred or not

House Design
Planning by: combination of DIY and architect
What do you particularly like? Why? Large children’s rooms, orientation towards the garden
What do you not like? Why? Kitchen not very large, dining area borderline too tight, but both not serious; no open space (void); stair design not ideal (straight or with landing would be better but difficult); facade facing north (street) currently doesn’t feel very harmonious
Price estimate by architect/planner: n/a
Personal budget limit for the house including fittings: n/a
Preferred heating technology: trench collector, alternatively air-to-water heat pump (groundwater protection area)

If you have to give up something, which details / expansions
- can you give up: garage could be a bit narrower
- cannot give up: children’s rooms

Why did the design turn out as it is now? For example:
Standard design from planner? Basic considerations regarding orientation towards the garden, design of children’s rooms, and experience with open living in our current home
Which wishes were implemented by the architect? Everything possible
What makes it, in your opinion, particularly good or bad? Economical reduction of walking distances, large children’s rooms

What is the most important/basic question about the floor plan in 130 characters?
Are we overlooking an important detail in the planning?

I find the size a bit lacking in terms of space for technical equipment and storage.

The washer and dryer are shown in a designated area, but for a new build, I would allow for more space there. You really can’t turn around with a laundry basket if all the meters, vacuum cleaner, and so on are stored in that room.

Since there are already five of you, I would suggest furnishing the dining area to scale with furniture to see if the space is sufficient. Maybe consider planning with a larger table?

How long is your current wardrobe? The planned wall isn’t very wide.

Poor kid, having to tidy up 20 m2 (215 sq ft).

Osnabruecker schrieb:

I feel like there could be a bit more space allocated for building services and storage.

We still have a basement for building services and storage space. I’ll attach the floor plan later, but it’s nothing special.

Osnabruecker schrieb:

The washer and dryer are shown in a single space; for a new build, I would allow more room there. You can’t really turn around with a laundry basket if all the meters, vacuum cleaners, etc. are stored in that room.

The room will contain shelves, cordless vacuum cleaners, a freezer, and a washer/dryer stack. Do you think it’s too small to turn around with a laundry basket? Hmm, I’m not sure where else I could find the space. Otherwise, the office would be too small.

Osnabruecker schrieb:

Since there are already five of you, I’d recommend placing furniture to scale in the dining area to see if the space is sufficient. Maybe plan for a larger table?

We currently have the same size and layout in our apartment. It’s not very spacious but just about works. It couldn’t be any narrower.

Osnabruecker schrieb:

How long is your current wardrobe? The planned wall isn’t very wide.

It’s currently 2.5m (8 feet) long — 2 sections of 1m (3 feet) plus 1 section of 0.5m (1.5 feet).

Osnabruecker schrieb:

Poor kid, having to tidy a 20 m² (215 sq ft) room

Our oldest gets that room, and he is very tidy and organized. I’m more concerned about my daughter’s room on the west side.

Thanks for your comments!

Basement floor plan, nothing special:

I like the floor plan overall, although the kitchen seems a bit small to me; a lot of kitchen stuff will probably end up in the basement. Also, one might consider combining the office and guest room into the flexible space.

If it were my house, I would swap the kitchen with the living area to gain more storage and workspace in the kitchen.

Nice-Nofret schrieb:

I like the layout overall, although the kitchen seems a bit small; I guess a lot of kitchen stuff will end up in the basement. Also, I wonder if it wouldn’t make sense to combine the office and guest room into the extra space.

What do you mean? One large room for everything?

Nice-Nofret schrieb:

If it were my house, I would swap the kitchen and living area to get more storage and workspace in the kitchen.

That’s also my wife’s preference, but I see a problem with the current stair layout. The living room wall would become quite short and narrow, which wouldn’t work well with the fireplace. If we moved the kitchen back, we’d have to rearrange and change a lot upstairs as well.

Our kitchen today is roughly the same size as on this plan. That’s usually enough. Large items like a fondue set, raclette grill, or rarely used appliances we would store in the extra room. It’s not far away anyway.

My thought was: in the living room, you either have reading light in the evening or the TV is on. So it’s either bright or you have mood lighting. At home, it’s the opposite: my wife almost always has the light on above the dining table because it’s too dark for working otherwise. So during the day and morning, I prefer a bright dining area and a “darker” living room.
I would like to reverse it as well (water connections closer to the heating system in the basement, shorter routes from the entrance/car to the kitchen). But I haven’t been able to arrange it so that everything really fits well.