.......why not leave your windows the way they are? It looks good and balanced. I am not sure what additional privacy you gain with a higher sill. Another issue with changing the size is it could affect your 5.7 sqft of exiting code reqirements depending on your width.
I would leave them as is. If you are concerned about privacy, use blinds. 4' wont hide much more then 3' will...

I think it would look really bad to make the bedroom windows shorter than the living room window. It would throw the whole house out of balance and look like somebody "goofed" even though it might not be immediately obvious what was wrong.

I also definitely would not advise making the living room window smaller because IMHO, unless you have more windows in the living room at the back of the house, it is already somewhat short-changed on glazing.

Bedroom windows are usually curtained anyway. As far as privacy is concerned, what difference will it make if the bottom of the window is 2 ft from the floor or 3 ft from the floor? (I'm assuming a 7 ft header height.) With the curtains open, a viewer outside would see everything above knee level with a 2 ft spacing and everything above thigh level with a 3 foot spacing.

I suspect your builder is actually thinking about whether you might want to put some furniture (desk? chest of drawers?) under the window. With the sill 3 ft from the floor, you could put a desk under the window or the headboard of your bed. With only 2 ft clear, you really can't without blocking part of the window.

As long as I had plenty of wall space elsewhere in the room for the furniture I planned to put in each bedroom, I'd leave the windows the way the architect designed them.

But, I used Paint to revise your elevation drawing so that both bedroom windows are shortened by approximately 1/5th and filled the space with stucco. You can decide for yourself what you think about the change....

OT: Won't landscaping hide that stonework? Also, I really dislike the unsupported stonework over the entry door. The mind sees there's something 'heavy' up there with no support and thinks "Oh-oh! I'm not going in that door!"

More OT: There are more attractive entry doors. Do you want a half-glass entry door?

Consider keeping the 5ft high windows and make them a pair of 3-0 double-hungs instead of sliders. That would provide an emergency escape opening and allow the installation of pleated shades that rise from the bottom of the window for privacy. The double-hung windows can be easily lowered from the top for ventilation without disturbing the shades.

Also you should consider modifying the entry gable to be better integrated into the house design and raise the garage roof to avoid the eave overhang conflict at the LR window. That might also allow a taller garage door height or avoid the cost of a low clearance overhead door system.

The attic vents could be round or eliminated.

The entry roof overhang brackets could be a strong design feature but the wall should should be understated so it ties the two sides of the house together instead of separating them.

You could pay for the double-hung windows and shades by eliminating the decorative stone cladding. Perhaps one part or the other of the house could be all stone but changing materials part way up a wall has become synonymous with large subdivision developments IMHO.

Raising the sills a foot would probably put the step over height of the bedroom windows right at 44" which would be the code limit for an emergency escape and rescue opening if the IRC applies in your jurisdiction.

Whatever you do, you will have some difficult kick-out flashing details to design and construct where roof eaves meet walls above windows.

I assume there will be gutters but the roof drainage over windows will be a challenge especially at the entry gable so that element might need to be redesigned.

chisue - We have already asked for the stone over the entry door to be removed. Why do you think half-glass entry door isnt a good idea?

bevangel - Yes, you are right - bigger windows affect furniture placement more than privacy. Since these are almost 12' wide bedrooms, there should be plenty space to place desks etc elsewhere. Just that with 4' windows we have that flexibility. Do you think landscaping might make the difference in window heights unnoticeable in your revised picture?

I suggest you remove the stone wainscotting look and just pick the bumped out section on the right to completely clad in stone. The half and half looks like an old man with high waisted pants under his elbows, and yes, your landscaping will hide most of it anyway so why waste the money. Make a bigger bang with it on the single feature than diluting it and hiding it.

I agree, stone should be all or nothing but please don't put it above the garage door. There's nothing wrong with using it only on the street facade of the garage.

Your biggest problem is the path of rain water. Is the house already framed? Are there trusses? If not, I would just continue the rakes of the right side of the entry gable and the left side of the bedroom gable until they intersected. That would give the house more architectural substance and solve the drainage issue.

I have a half-glass door from my back hallway to the back yard. I installed it to get more light into that area, and so that I can check on our Westie. Most *entry* doors are designed to be more formal and secure.

If you want light in that area you could have glass higher in the door or over it. A peephole would let you see who is at the door. Would a visitor see directly into the house? (We don't know the view from that door.)

Good point about gutters (or overhangs). I'm sorry I don't have double-hung windows a few places in our house. My roof overhangs are too shallow to let me open a casement or French door when it is raining.

That little top hat over the entry looks ridiculous. Renovator8's version is much more pleasing. Also, I'm in agreement with the "pants under the armpits" comment about the stone. Do it over one of the gable ends entirely or leave it off entirely.

Do I have the space for this?

[traditional exterior design[(https://www.houzz.com/photos/traditional-exterior-home-ideas-phbr1-bp~t_736~s_2107) by minneapolis general contractor Minnetonka Custom Homes, Inc

You don't have a two story house or room for a portico.

Show us a photo of the current house. I don't want to be redesigning a house that is already framed.

A good hamburger is a great meal. But don't try to turn it into a 5 star restaurant's steak with chimichurri sauce.

I think the stone on your inspiration pic looks inappropriate on it as well, and it's an inappropriate home to choose for styling cues for a single story basic modified ranch. Go with the strength and integrity of the home style you've picked. Strong horizontal roof lines and linear bands of windows with horizontal wood siding. Get rid of the stone and make those windows triples instead of doubles.

renovator8 - framing is all done according to the plan in my first post. Based on everyone's feedback, I have decided to keep the windows 5' tall as per plan. Builder said we can't have two 3' wide windows in the bedrooms because of exiting code. I am now figuring out if I should do the stone and pillars. I would love to have some stone around the entry door and on the entry gable, but there doesn't seem to be enough space. Also, I would love to have those pillars on the porch, but the porch is only 8'4" wide and 1' 8" deep while the entry is 4'6" wide. DH says it wouldn't be good to have pillars in front of the living room window, while I am still trying to convince myself it can't be done.

Going back to your first post, I see the garage door opens off your front courtyard. I don't think you have room to have pillars very far out from the entry door. There are other ways to dress up the entry with trim. Do you need shelter over the porch?

Where are you building? I haven't seen sliding windows on a build in a long time. Maybe they've improved a lot, but I'd be concerned about heating/cooling expenses.

Not trying to hijack andydad's thread, but I'm curious about the issue of partial stone walls on a ranch style home. Can you elaborate on why this is such a big no-no? We are planning on adding stone to our exterior. If it would be more appropriate, I can start a new thread, but thought it might be helpful for andydad and I to read your comments.

There shouldn't be any problem meeting the "emergency escape and rescue opening" requirement with a 3 ft X 5 ft. R.O. Double-Hung even if its vinyl. That size typically meets the minimum height and width and the 5.7 s.f. net area requirements of upper floor bedroom windows so it should easily meet the 5.0 s.f. ground floor bedroom window net area requirement.

The manufacturer will only tell you if it meets the 5.7 s.f. upper floor requirement so you might have to call to be sure. Most manufacturers publish a sheet that gives the clear width and height opening dimensions.

My information is based on the IRC. Even if your code is different it probably contains the same requirement.

I can try to answer the question about half height brick/stone veneer on wood frame buildings. Brick and stone are very old traditional residential materials and that tradition began with solid double and triple wythe layers of brick with occasional bricks laid perpendicular to tie the layers together or vertically to denote floor lines or arched over an opening. Stone walls were built in a similar manner.

Wood framing was sometimes placed on top of a brick/stone wall but the change had to occur at a floor where the floor braced the wall because if the change occurred elsewhere the wall would have little resistance to lateral forces (wind, earthquake) due to the discontinuity of the wall structure between floors (walls transfer lateral loads upward and downward to the floors of a building). Changing the structural material at a floor level also permitted one wall to be thicker than the other without creating an awkward shelf on the inside or the outside of the wall.

With the advent of modern "brick-veneer cavity-wall" construction (one wythe of brick set an inch in front of a wood framed wall and tied back with metal ties every 24" in each direction) a brick wall could simulate a traditional solid wall for a fraction of the price and it was easier and cheaper to add insulation and wiring, etc. Stone could also be installed this way.

But this system also allowed brick to stop mid-way between floors because it was only a cladding with the actual wall structure hidden behind it. Of course, the change created an awkward setback that was difficult or expensive to flash properly but it was a way to introduce a token amount of stone or masonry on a wood framed building for short money - a developer's dream.

So, suburban developers latched onto this idea and used it in subdivisions all over America to the point that it became the most common developer cliche after repetitive gables and giant hipped roofs. Apparently they did not see the irony in the fact that the wall was supposed to look like a traditional structural brick wall but if it were it would not be be built in that manner. What the half height wall does is tell the world that although the wall might look like a structural brick wall, it's actually only a cladding.

Ok, so we all know it isn't a structural brick wall but I believe that a designer should either copy the real thing as faithfully as possible or create something that is enough different that it has it's own design integrity and style. Unfortunately, the residential design world seems too often to be stuck somewhere in between these goals.

Okay, that makes sense to me. But given that new construction techniques allow the use of stone as a cladding rather than as a structural element is there a way to utilize it appropriately as part of a contemporary facade without trying to recreate the look of a traditional house built from stone?

For example:

Trying to go against the tradition of centuries seems foolish to me. If you want a new expression why not use a new material?

Chisue - You said there are other ways to dress up the entry with trim. Can you suggest some please? Shelter over the porch is a nice-to-have for us.

We are building in SF bay area. We do see sliding windows and single hungs around here. Are they different in terms of energy efficiency? Which kind would you recommend?

In my experience, no window type is as energy inefficient and prone to leaking as a slider. The best would be a casement or awning. A double-hung allows more flexibility for ventilation (can open top and bottom).

You need something over the entry to resolve the awkward meeting of the two roof slopes and allow water to drain properly. I would need a 3D drawing to work it out. Its unfortunate the roofs have already been framed. The roofs should have been designed to take water away from this area instead of directly into it.

The reason you don't do stone on the bottom half of any wall is that it looks stupid. That's the short answer. If you want the long answer, look at Renovator8's comments. You wear your pants at waist level, not your armpits or halfway down your butt (no matter how "fashionable" it may be, it still looks stupid). Waist level is natural and right. Stone above the actual foundation height where it would occur naturally or less than full story height where it would be used naturally screams fake, cheap, and poor design aesthetics. Just like that pretentious inspiration house screams fake and poor design aesthetics with all of it's overwrought corbels and ridiculous overhangs so high that they do nothing to protect any entrance from weather. It's bad design.

Putting the Crown Jewels on a construction worker doesn't make them Queen Elizabeth. It just makes them look comical. Pay whatever change order you have to to get rid of that top hat. It's a BIG problem aesthetically, but it's even worse functionality wise.