Floor plan design single-family house approx. 170 m² + attic as a modern clinker house

Good evening,

as previously silent readers, we (young family with 2 children) are now slowly in the situation ourselves to ask here for help, criticism, or ideas. We want to build a single-family house at the beginning of 2023 and have been planning with an architect for some time (so far commissioned performance phases 1-4).

Here is the forum questionnaire completed to the best of our knowledge

Development plan/restrictions
Plot size: 560m², dead-end cul-de-sac location, there will be parking spaces on the west side, a wide footpath on the east side, then a field (which will probably become building land in 10-15 years)
Slope: no
Floor area ratio: 0.4
Floor space index: 0.8
Building window, building line and boundary: 3m all around
Edge development: no
Number of parking spaces: 2
Number of floors: 2 full floors + attic
Roof shape: gable roof
Style: modern clinker construction with a simple building body, no roof overhangs
Orientation: east-west
Maximum heights/limits: TH 6.5m, FH 10m
Further requirements: hedge on the left side limited to 1m height, distance from the first parking space to the street at least 5m
Rooms:
Ground floor: living/dining area with open kitchen, work "corner", technical/storage room, guest WC
Upper floor: 2 children's rooms, master bedroom (preferably with a separate closet area, the orientation of the room should be on the east side of the house!), master bathroom with shower and bathtub, children's bathroom with shower, small utility room for washing machine and drying rack.
Attic: 3rd children's room, storage room, hobby/work room

Client requirements
Style, roof shape, building type: single-family house with gable roof
Basement, floors: no basement, two full floors, attic to be used as living space
Number of persons, age: 2 adults, 2 children (2 & 4 years old, another child planned)
Space requirements on ground and upper floors
Office: family use or home office? home office space on the ground floor "near the action", another more secluded space in the attic
Overnight guests per year: not planned
Open or closed architecture: open living/dining area
Conservative or modern construction: modern construction
Open kitchen, kitchen island: open kitchen, kitchen island optional
Number of dining seats: 6-8
Fireplace: no
Music/stereo wall: space for a large TV (we expect about 1.9m wide, no other equipment such as speakers planned)
Balcony, roof terrace: no
Garage, carport: garage with one parking space as well as storage possibilities for garden tools/tools in the garage
Utility garden, greenhouse: ornamental garden
Other wishes/special features/daily routine, gerne also reasons why this or that should or should not be: we currently have very small windows (half-timbered house) and especially want more light in the house and nice sight lines into our garden

House design
Who planned it:
- Architect
What do you like particularly? Why?
Arrangement of the southern rooms on the ground floor as well as the small study, which can feel more connected to the living area when the door is open. We also like that the staircase on the ground floor points towards the living rooms and not the front door.

What do you dislike? Why?
We want to see as much of our garden as possible, so our basic wish was to build a narrow but long house. In this concept, however, the currently chosen platform staircase is very massive and certainly overwhelming in the hallway area. Of course, it is practical that this staircase also directly allows access to the attic with the same staircase run.

Price estimate according to architect/planner: 500,000€
Personal price limit for the house, including equipment: 550,000€
Preferred heating technology: geothermal heat pump

If you had to renounce, on which details/extensions
- can you do without:
- cannot do without:

Why is the design as it is now? For example
Which wishes were implemented by the architect: room plan discussed with the architect
A mixture of many examples from various magazines...

What makes it particularly good or bad in your eyes?
We are concerned about overlooking a good idea; we partly lack creative input to find solutions that are sometimes out of the box.

What is the most important/fundamental question about the floor plan summarized in 130 characters?
The arrangement of the staircase and the spatial feeling when entering the house currently bother us. The staircase makes or breaks every concept on the upper floor.
I have attached an alternative ground floor plan where we want to reach the upper floor with an L-shaped staircase. However, this leads to a second staircase run being necessary to access the attic, which of course also takes up space...

We look forward to your criticism and suggestions!

Best regards
Stefan

Hmm.. at the beginning: I wonder which view the side view belongs to. The windows do not match. now at the start: I have problems with missing dimensions. Basically, a lot is consistent, but some things are not. And dimensions are very important because it could lead to a redesign. Can you provide something on that? I like the ground floor quite well, also the concept itself. I also like the style. But I miss - for 5 people a proper cloakroom with enough space for bags, shoes, and jackets. One calculates at least 60 running cm per person. It will happen to you that the dining chairs have to serve and the dining table anyway. There is otherwise nothing. The technical room is too far away. - in the bedroom: a proper closet area. There is barely space for 2.40? length. Where will the bed linen, towels, etc. be stored? The space in front of the bed is surplus and therefore initially unusable. One could rotate the shower so that it does not take up space in the bedroom. But that does not solve the problem that there is a lot of space in front of the bed which is missing elsewhere. - tension in the facade: it is not just symmetry, but always the same windows all the time... one should experiment a bit with one window on each side, for example the utility room window horizontal instead of vertical or with a railing. The same applies on the other facade side and the eaves side. If you see it similarly, I would speak to the architect to see if he can add some subtle flair. I think nothing of your own idea: the upper floor is nothing.

Thank you for your response. The side view is a slightly outdated version (which I forgot to mention), here I mainly want to show the general architectural style we have in mind. Ultimately, in this view, the large window would be at the bottom left, and the seating window facing the garden on the right. We share your concern regarding the facade and the effect of the windows, but we currently see this more as a subsequent issue. Regarding the wardrobe, we are thinking about not recessing the entrance area, which would make the hallway and thus the wardrobe cabinet significantly wider (see attachment with the ground floor and measurements, where I had implemented this once). Less frequently used jackets and shoes will be stored in another closet in the storage/utility room. Further forward at the entrance, a utility room is certainly better suited for this, but I lack the imagination as to how this could be sensibly accommodated :) The bedroom is indeed rather suboptimally used in terms of closet arrangement. Best regards

Addendum, since unfortunately I can no longer edit my post: I unfortunately have no good options to set dimensions in my rudimentary planning tool (I apparently can only create dimensions at one point, but then cannot move them...), I think most of the relevant dimensions should now be there.

Don’t you share our concerns regarding the staircase in the architect’s design on the ground floor? I am really worried that you will almost always trip over the bottom step when walking from the front door into the living area. By the way, attached is a picture of how we would envision this staircase. We would basically approach this staircase from the side coming in from the entrance (I have roughly represented the situation in 3D).

Thank you for your sobering and honest assessment regarding the own upper floor design. Is your assessment for the ground floor the same (viewed on its own), or do you simply see the overall package as insufficient.

Best regards

I would have shelves built into the staircase stringer. Not completely, but a larger one or two or three individual ones to break up the surface. And then place a nice bowl, sculpture, or a fossil or something like that in it. That way, there is a reason to look.

Don’t you share our concerns regarding the staircase in the architect’s design on the ground floor?

Personally, I don’t. I also don’t fall into a bathtub just because it’s in the bathroom. And children can learn to overcome obstacles and not always run. If you see a problem with that, then change the direction of movement. That would be an option, also for the use under the stairs. As already says: cabinets. Personally, I don’t like the bulky space under a staircase that much. I also don’t know how to combine that with the step design.

Is your assessment for the ground floor the same (considered on its own), or do you simply see the overall package as insufficient?

As a whole. Direct line of sight from toilet to dining area, kitchen that isn’t one anymore…

Just cover half of the entrance, and take the upper corner in the plan, over 1.50 or so, and integrate it into the house as a wardrobe cabinet.