Floor plan and house design - opinions & criticism

Hello everyone,

our plans have become a bit more concrete by now and we have the first draft from our builder. The draft is based on our drawings which we have further refined together with the builder.

Plot
945m²
slight slope at the driveway, rest flat
neighbor’s garage/house to the west and south

Development plan
Knee wall: 75cm
Roof pitch: 42°
Floors: 1 + attic
Gable roof

Requirements/wishes on our part
Number of people: 4 (us + 2 planned children)
Basement
Garage with 2 parking spaces
Central controlled residential ventilation
Heating with district heating (biogas)
Ground floor
Office on the ground floor
WC with shower on the ground floor
Wardrobe
Open living/dining area
Kitchen with cooking island and pantry
Space to seat up to 10 people at the dining table
Fireplace in the living/dining area
Possible separation living/dining area
Terrace
Attic
2 children’s rooms
Parents’ bedroom with dressing room
Bathroom with walk-in, open shower
Access to garage room (possibly expandable later)

We are currently considering the topics
- is the smaller children’s room big enough
- how big should a pantry be

and still have the question whether the planning works as it is, since we lack experience here. Maybe you can help us with your experience or perhaps other points will come to your mind that you think are missing/inappropriate.

We already thank you for any help! :)

The utility room on the ground floor is, by the way, intended to be the office.

The draft is based on our drawings, which we refined together with the contractor.
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Unfortunately, that can be seen.

I find some good approaches there, but unfortunately the rooms are not coordinated with each other at all in terms of size and their use.
That could have been improved in a rough sketch already.
The contractor just copied it.

I will gladly go into the details this evening when I am at the computer. However, I think others will speak up in the meantime.

Hello

I would streamline the floor plan a bit, in my opinion there are quite a few corners that make the rooms difficult to use. I would also completely remove the pantry on the ground floor. Drinks and potatoes in the basement, other groceries in the kitchen cabinet.

Olli

17 m² living room niche that you want to separate with a sliding door - from what exactly? An undefined open space without furniture that is larger than the living room. By the way, I am not sure if the living room with the window will ever really be friendly... on its own it barely reaches the 12.5%. You also have a children's room with 25 m² and one with 11 m² - as child 2 I would develop complexes. In general, you have far too much hallway space - by the way, this comes from the staircase, which was planned so carelessly at the edge - the hallways certainly don't even feel inviting... I find it too messed up to fix quickly. I would set it aside and start over.

The comment from reminds me that I wanted to write a justification. Mine looks similar.

For one, the site plan is missing (not just for me). Elevations wouldn’t be bad either.
A separate draft, which was approved by the BU:
a way too large living area (you want it spacious and a sliding door would be nice).
The dining area is half an oversized empty open space, then also with a bay window (must have), but the kitchen is useless for that: A kitchen unit about 3.40m long... two tall cabinets left and right plus a pantry cabinet ;) as was typical in the 90s. Between them no countertop space for fruit, open beverage bottles, and coffee machine. Spaciousness looks different than this kitchen planning. And next to the unit a door to the obligatory pantry, which could be placed elsewhere. But here it has been pushed into the office because it wasn’t planned. As a result, the office is no longer furnishable. (Pantry, that also has to go somewhere.)
You can clearly recognize your wishes, but they were executed in an amateurish way.

It continues on the upper floor: the staircase positioned in the front makes room arrangement quite difficult. (Staircase in front, in case you want to separate the ground and upper floors later.) Instead of planning differently, a long narrow corridor is drawn which then leads into the actual upper floor. One cannot say much about the different sized children’s rooms... 2-3 sqm differences certainly wouldn’t stand out if you don’t measure, but almost 14 sqm... wow... that’s a basis for an inferiority complex for the second child. 14 -16 sqm each for both children is more than enough.
The dressing room is very small; unfortunately, I can’t read the sqm. However, only an estimated 40cm cabinet depth is drawn in; 60cm would be normal. Then you would also see that the dressing room is very small.
Bathroom: with 75cm knee wall height at 42 degrees roof pitch, the toilet does not fit at all where it is. A 2-meter line would be an advantage. Roughly speaking, you have about 1.75m height at one meter on the roof sides...
Window sizes have not been thought about at all. Currently, these are small openings, so the light incidence in the rooms will not be sufficient. I also don’t see any scheme that takes the elevations into account.
How is the transition from the garage to the house supposed to be built on the upper floor? Is there supposed to be a box/cube in the upper floor as a bridge?

If you want to build so large, I would consider integrating the bedroom with shower bathroom downstairs, then the office upstairs. During the first years of the children, one could initially sleep upstairs.
Otherwise, I would suggest deleting 10 sqm of floor area and investing some of the savings into more knee wall height and window area, and paying the rest as a fee to an external architect.

What did the BU name as the cost estimate?

Regards, Yvonne