Floor plan single-family house city villa approx. 240m² without basement

We are by no means "religiously fixed," whereas wood is ruled out (bad personal experiences) and I simply have not yet received an objectively sound recommendation for ETICS.

On the subject of "objectively sound recommendation," I recently said

The most important thing I can tell you as a professional (I gladly count myself among the pros, but never among the "experts") is: Professionals only have—of course, competence-dependent individually—a more well-founded idea, but their opinions are never more objective than those of ordinary people.

which for your wall construction means so far that my reserve towards ETICS does not come out of nowhere, but it has not yet been conclusively judged by God at the Last Judgment (or by the Kronen Zeitung or whatever someone considers the highest authority).

But what exactly would be your recommendation?

My concrete recommendation, in the absence of obstructive religious preconceptions, is always to have the general contractor (or, in the case of a genuine architectural planning, the architect) propose a wall construction as part of an all-inclusive planning. They have the business of stacking stones into houses down to a fine art. For the private planner, this means to reserve approximately four decimeters of material thickness for exterior walls all around.

As I already wrote, there was also a parallel draft from an architect. But what are we supposed to do if we don't like it? Still build it because it is probably "better" planned? If we are convinced that the current draft is not good, then we will probably go to another architect again. Currently, that is not the case.

The presumption of expertise compared to a trained architect is often justified—as I will still deal with your just-shown example in post #114. With architects, I always recommend the following approach: first go to an independent architect and work through "Module A" (service phases 1 and 2 according to HOAI; I have not yet dealt with an Austrian equivalent). These are the basic evaluation and the preliminary design phase. After that, I generally recommend a phase of letting things rest, after which one decides whether to continue with this architect also for the design phase (service phase 3) or the entire "Module B," or to go to another architect. I do not recommend plowing through the entire architectural guild until the eureka draft. After this resting phase, my recommendation is first to decide whether the implementation should be with a "prefabricated house" provider (then only service phase 3 with the architect) or with site-built construction (then the architect does the whole Module B). Where you found my stone mantra is stated in "A House-Building Roadmap, also for you: the HOAI phase model!".

I almost always have to go somewhere under the slab/basement. I see no problem if it is done cleanly.

Cleverly, one does not cover the pipes with more than the exterior wall and runs the branch pipes on the shortest straight path (coming around the house "from the back in" practically always means creating a need for avoidable inspection openings along this path).

I fear this won't get us any further but okay, see attached draft. Unfortunately, I don't have it directly digital.

Yes, it is exactly as "digital" as your other drawings shown here; it would be helpful not to cut off the dimension chains. The floor plans are again roughly oriented, i.e. north roughly to the left (?). The draft is clearly more professional (which unfortunately never automatically means "more pleasing" - but you can work with the professional on that). The connecting room is also wrong here, I would allocate the space of the garbage bin box in the intermediate building to the room "floor plan," and install the house entries there. I would omit the setbacks of the upper floor and use the gained width to insert the dressing room or the utility room between the parents' and children's area. The pointless facade setback of the stairwell is at least more discreet than your dominant risalit. The kitchen is too spacious, the dining area gets in the way, and a corner bench request is evidently not implemented. Perhaps you pressured the architect too much toward "modern" - a farmhouse parlor doesn't quite fit into a hipped roof pseudo-Bauhaus. The loopholes of the entrance facade look buttoned up, I find the terrace exit in the living room positive (though the lift-and-slide door is then redundant). My views on corner windows and Smokey Eyes I consider well known. A shifted shed roof "would have belonged" on the floor plan as it is. What kind of architects were those: first one architect, and then (because he didn't meet your taste) "architects" from construction contractors?

Yes, it is just as "digital" as your other drawings shown here; not cutting off the dimension chains would be helpful. The floor plans are again approximately oriented, i.e. north roughly to the left (?)

yes correct, the house is positioned as in the other plan

The design is clearly more professional (which unfortunately never automatically means "more pleasing" - but you can work on that with the professional). The connecting room is also wrong here, I would allocate the space of the garbage bin box in the intermediate building to the room "floor plan," and place the house entries there. I would omit the recesses on the upper floor and use the gained width to insert the dressing room or utility room between the parents' and children's areas. The senseless facade setback of the staircase is at least more discreet than your dominant risalit. The kitchen is too spacious, the dining area is in the way, and a corner bench request is clearly not implemented. Maybe you have tuned the architect too much to "modern" - a rustic lounge doesn't quite fit into a pseudo Bauhaus hipped roof. The arrow-slit windows of the entrance facade look buttoned-up; I find the terrace exit in the living room positive (although the lift-and-slide door is then redundant). My views on corner windows and smoky eyes I assume are well known. The floor plan as it is should have had an offset shed roof.

What kind of architects were those: first one architect, and then (because he didn’t meet your taste) "architects" from construction contractors?

thank you very much for the comprehensive feedback but does it help us now? No. Everyone just has their own views, for example, we really like corner windows. And no, we did not tune him to modern and no, we do not want a rustic lounge - corner benches can certainly be modern too. A shed roof is not possible, hipped or gable roof and our preference is clearly the hipped roof.

I don’t know what kind of architects those are, but personally I think meeting the "taste" is important.

Thank you very much for the comprehensive feedback, but does it help us now? No. Everyone has their own views, for example, we really like corner windows. And no, we did not steer it towards modern, and no, we do not want a farmhouse-style living room - a corner bench can certainly be modern too. A shed roof is not possible, hip roof or gable roof, and our clear preference is the hip roof.
[...], but I personally think it is important to meet the "taste".

Well, somehow you must have talked past your architect, he would not deviate from your path just by chance. He understood you just as little (could) as we did, because when I look around here in the group, we are all pretty clueless about what a "helpful" feedback should look like :-(

I don’t know what kind of architects these are

Architects are not stray cats, they don’t just show up. You have to know where you got him from (???)

Well, somehow you must have talked past your architect, he doesn't just deviate from your path by chance. He must have understood you just as little as we could, because when I look around here in the group, we are all quite clueless about what a "helpful" feedback should look like :-(

Architects are not stray cats, they don't just come running up to you. You have to know where you got him from (???)

But who says we don't feel understood? There are sometimes different perspectives on one and the same thing, and then it either fits together or it doesn't. As written, we are very satisfied with the one design and I specifically asked about the two points:

- Dining table with corner bench against the wall (instead of freestanding) in combination with the stove, but we can't come up with a good idea for that
- Generally the position of the stove/fireplace - it is currently still somewhat inconveniently located in a child's room on the first floor

The general feedback was mixed, ok, understood. But as written, nothing yet that makes us think the design is no longer good.
As for the specific questions, especially how it could be combined with a stove, there was nothing - I also understand that this is difficult. But no idea at all?

Nothing came regarding the concrete questions, especially how one could combine that with a stove – I understand that this is difficult. But no idea at all?

What do you want to combine with a stove? The bench? That can’t be it, because it gets way too hot to sit there. So what do you mean? I would try to move the chimney to the hallway upstairs and downstairs into the corner of the office. However, you can only plan something like that exactly if you have the upper and lower floors aligned and ideally plan it yourself. The whole thing must not intersect with the roof beams, and you can’t just estimate that by eye. There was hardly any response to the rest of my feedback. That doesn’t exactly promote enthusiasm.