First off, you desere applause for your hilarious writing on the blog!

Okay, if that were my house here's what I'd do. Fix the kitchen which is a no-brainer, and put most of your money into that.

Keep the bathroom, but turn the new room into a glorious looking dining/sitting room. Informal or formal, it all depends on if you already have a DR. I'm also assuming you have another living room.

Change the paint, buy furniture you like, nice and airy because of the windows.

I wouldn't mind a bathroom near the kitchen if it's just me or the family. You can always tell guests to use a more private one. :)

I'm iffy with the brick and concrete patio. I like the angle, but I think it needs to be a lot bigger.

I also wouldn't move the double doors. They're nice.

The former peninsula was a hoot!

Honestly, nothing about this addition screams "tear me down" to me. Could it have been planned better...absolutely, but I think a good paint color to unify it with the rest of your kitchen and the addition of some comfortable furniture, draperies and art will make it a nice family room or a combination eating/lounging space. I like having a powder room near the kitchen and at least they had the sense to set the door so that it didn't face the kitchen. As for the patio, I would stain the concrete to reduce the contrast and consider building a wooden pergola over the whole thing. Make the stairway wall a feature by adding some taller potted plants next to it or by hanging baskets or planters on it.

I didn't read your whole story, but from what I did read, I think you've already changed the worst part of the room which was unneeded brick chimney.

That blog, omg, I laughed sooo hard.

The only way I can see to soften the look of those steps would be to take off the rails and add teired planing beds on each side of it right up agains the house and steps going all the way down to the bottom of the steps. Put a highish(i know made up word;))focal plant like a abervity in the inside corner of each side of the bed and really fill in those beds so the stairs appear nestled in them. Inside the house I think the least expensive and labor intensive thing to do would be to paint it all in a more muted neutral color and paint the ceiling the same color as the walls. If your willing to go a little farther than that you could but up a mock beam or dropped down ceiling that would visually hide the end of that wall stating at the powder room wall and going accross.

I would absolutely get rid of the powder room and square off the addition, making it a heaven of tall windows.

I am convinced here is a special circle of you-know-where that Dante forgot to mention, probably because he never bought a house that had a PO with really bad taste.

I would either wall it off somehow to make a separate mudroom/back entrance and leave the powder room - or remove the powder room and incorporate that space into the kitchen. The idea of a powder room off of the kitchen is pretty unappealing -

Bring that entire powder room wall the rest of the way over to the center of the peak(it would even work taking it a little further over, then keep just the upper portion straight across to meet the wall on the other side.That would leave a fairly wide entance way that the would have the french doors as a focal point. The new wall end would have a more tradional square shaped entryway with just the ceiling being peaked and the muliple ceiling lines would be hidden by it and seen only in the newly created foyier. I,m talking about actually making a wall where your diagram has a line and reads 9'1 I hope I decribed it okay. Its much eaier to visulize something that to try to explain it.

I am 100% with kswl here.. I'd remove the PR, add big bright windows and make a glorious, sun-filled gathering/dining area. That is exactly what I want to add to my home-- and it's what I picture in yours.

The big assumption here is that you do not NEED the PR but I think that's a safe bet given that's the direction you have tried to head.

I don't have much to add about the outside-- but I do think you could keep it as is and charm it up!

No advice here but I agree with a previous poster that your blog is hysterical. I am sure you obviously are not amused but thanks for the laugh!

Since posting above, I have gone and looked through your fabulous blog. After seeing some of your other improvements, there is absolutely no question in my mind that you can't just gloss over this area. You have done such a beautiful, quality job on your other renovations that to not do the same in one of the most important areas of the home would be a mistake. At the very least, you must remove those awful railings that look like they were stolen from an elementary school. Might be worth inviting an architect over to dinner. :)

Thank you ALL so much for your ideas…getting a fresh opinion on something we’ve been staring at so long is beyond helpful.

We do have two full baths upstairs… and my husband wants to take out the one in the kitchen. I’m still not sure. Not because I think it looks nice… but you know, just undecided about what’s the best plan. The overwhelming majority of people I’ve asked feel strongly we should keep it… and yes, it’s our house, but we won’t live here forever, and I hate to remove something the next owner might really wish we’d kept.

Also, part of the indecision is wanting to feel like we have an entire plan for the space. To feel like the whole thing has been laid out, how it fits together… my husband is ready to get started and would like to just start ripping into things, but I’ve finally learned that I do better with more structure. I don’t want to do anything until it’s part of a larger plan. A FINALIZED plan… so that I am not the one holding him up while I waffle over every little detail.

Anyway… Like above said, Paul thinks the patio should be bigger, too… and if we were to take it out/redesign the perfect one, we wouldn’t elevate it, we would have it flat on the ground, so it didn’t chop the yard up… but, that’s kind of outside the scope of the project.

And like Oakley said, our kitchen has to be the focus, and budget-wise, the patio could really eat into that. Of course, at the same time, we don’t want to make the kitchen so great, and the other half still crummy.

Staining the concrete is an interesting idea… I hadn’t considered that at all. And yes, planter boxes would be fantastic. Even just a tall plant on either side... greenery does make a huge difference in what the focus is.

Paul called a concrete guy who is going to come out this weekend and tell us what our options with the stairs are, as far as resurfacing them, or covering whatever mark they would leave if we moved them…if that’s even possible.

Hopefully this will help us decide what we’re forced into with the stairs… they really are terrible. They’re even worse in person… and as tempting as it is to leave them, we need to find another solution.

Those lovely railings are copper pipe… our PO had also built a sculpture??? Thing?? Over the driveway entrance about halfway down the house out of the same pipe… it was LARGE. So large, you could drive a car through it! And so incredibly ugly, that the first day we moved in, Paul went out with his grinder and started disassembling it, and the owner came by to get something he’d left in the garage. We felt pretty awkward. Obviously, he made it and thought it was “nice” and we felt like we’d been caught ruining his art.

Anyway… thanks so much for reading my blog, and this very lengthy post...saying I made you laugh really made my day!!

p.s.- kswl - if you’d seen the pinkish-red paint that ran up all three stairwells, you’d be pretty sure Dante rented a room here while writing…

This post was edited by VictoriaElizabeth on Thu, Mar 21, 13 at 21:39

I'd definitely keep the powder room. Especially for families with kids, it would be great to have them use that one when they come in from playing rather than have them traipse upstairs, dragging dirt and grass with them. I would not buy a house without a first floor P.R. I do think it adds value.

If you hang a pretty mirror on that wall, it would reflect the light from the left window, and give the illusion of another window.

If you do keep the bathroom, then paint the ceiling the same color as the walls and the angled wall won't be as noticeable. I would never give up a bathroom on the main floor even if only the family ever uses it.

This post was edited by yayagal on Fri, Mar 22, 13 at 0:42

I think I would add a fixed window/door panel to the left of the french doors, making them like a 3 door panel. It would get rid of that awkward smaller window and kind of have the larger windows wrap around that whole end.

This may be more expensive than gutting it, but I wonder how a curved wall instead of that angled one on the pr would look? Not sure if it's possible, with the door and roof angle. I don't know how to configure the door in a curved wall, if it's big enough to do something like this...

I suggest a few options.

Keep the powder room and back exterior in current position. Add a division (wall/archway/3/4 wall with book case on on both sides) to create a mudroom/powder room, and then living area.

Pros-not too invasive. Keeps bathroom.

(I would go on the record that as a visitor I would be so creeped out to be sent upstairs to the Private area of the home to use the facilities.
And as a host I don't like visitors in my upstairs. Now I have to clean my entire house party perfect and worry about you snooping everywhere. No thanks.)

Cons-reduces light into living area. Does not maximize available square footage for living area. Does not fix problematic stairway on exterior.

Idea--can the entire space have 1 ceiling height? By drywalling up the addition ceiling, or at least making it horizontal, the busyiness of the space would be greatly reduced.

Bigger Option. Start with the exterior elevation and figure out the entrance and stairs you would like. Will you want a deck, covered porch, or patio in the long run? Start there and work your way in. Create a mudroom/powder room, and transition better into the living space. I will say that I am not a huge fan of the angled doors, but not sure that it is a $X0,000 problem.

Since you may sell it in the future, I think keeping the PW is a good idea. Children, illness,...it's needed. I bet that's why the PO's added it on.

I do think the whole area has the potential to be beautiful. A can of paint will work wonders!

Keep writing! lol

You seem to be overlooking one of the biggest sore thumbs in the addition--the transition from the kitchen. The kitchen walls and ceiling just stop. The addition envelope just starts. It is very jarring and focuses your attention on the bathroom because there is nothing stopping your vision until the back wall.

Add stub walls where the posts are, and create an opening cased on three sides--top, left, right--as the entry to the addition. The opening can still be very large and admit all the light it does now, but it will at least make the kitchen and addition look like actual rooms. It will also visually contain all the angles of the addition ceiling when viewed from the kitchen, making them look less crazed.

You can adapt other things as you wish, but the lack of a cased opening is just a flat-out mistake that needs to be fixed.

All I keep thinking is how happy your neighbors must have been when they saw your husband outside removing some of that pipe.

"Honestly, nothing about this addition screams "tear me down" to me. Could it have been planned better...absolutely"

Agree.

I like the idea of a half wall to separate the bathroom area from the rest of the room. Place a small bench where the plants are and you have a nice "mudroom" type area. You can also add plants to the top of the half wall to further block off the space it you wish.

As for the patio, it looks like you are in a freeze-thaw area, so adding an overlay to the concrete probably won't work, but you can look into it. Overlays can be stamped, stenciled, stained, etc. You can also stain the existing patio for a new look. Or you can even lay stone over concrete. You have a lot of options to get rid of the bunker look.

Yes -- a full wall or a half-wall to create a small mudroom would be the first option ... right now the powder room is the whole visual focal point of the space! And yes -- a BIG vote for a fresh paint color ....

Honestly -- in the future -- I would want to gut the entire space -- and switch the kitchen/work area to the far end of the addition -- overlooking the back yard and along the left-hand wall. I would remove the current angled doorway -- and switch to French doors to the right-hand wall. At that point -- I would move the powder room to the "entrance" of the new rooms ...

Well… if nothing else, you all can understand why I’ve struggled to find a solution that is aesthetically pleasing, and practical, and doesn’t require committing to a massive, expensive project…

The ceiling is a lot of things… and yes, the angles are wild. Right now it has beaded wood (like beadboard, but larger)… which looks crazy, and separates at the seams in the winter months. We’re planning to sheet rock the ceiling, but not flatten it off. I DO think flattening it would be calmer, but I really like a higher ceiling no matter what, even if it means strange angles.

I actually really like that half wall idea, or curving it so is less stark… both are something I never thought of. Even just looking at it with the photoshopped half wall makes me look at the room differently. I should say my husband is dead set against keeping the bath… and does not care at all about long-term value. I haven’t decided whether that’s a battle I feel so strongly about that I decide to take it on. I guess part of me is tempted by the challenge of “cute-ning” it up. Which I do think could be done, but also think it will never be as clean, as if we took it out.

As far as the idea of swapping spaces… we considered some version of that, and also considered moving the bathroom to where the refrigerator is now… but that would require building a whole other wall that would still butt out into the room, plus, the dining room entrance is cut on an angle, so the wall would need to accommodate that… we had laid tape out on the floor, looking at other layout options, and none of seemed much better than what we have now!

Thank you all so much for taking the time to think about ways this can be better... I REALLY appreciate it!!

p.s.- Jen, we kind of hoped our neighbors might start chipping in for the repairs… since it benefitted them, as much as us!

Actually I would switch the location of the powder room to the corner of the present kitchen space -- which would allow the use of current walls/window/plumbing.

Take that corner (where the first window on the long left-hand wall is located) and create a thin rectanglar bathroom space that runs the length of the current dining room wall. The new powder room door would be located at the end of that dining room wall.

Then the kitchen work area would be switched to the left-hand wall and run the length of the addition.

Basically creating a "greenhouse-style" kitchen/great room ...

Remove the current doorway -- and switch it to the right-hand wall -- leading out to a much enlarged covered patio space or outdoor kitchen.

Wow, that is quite the dilemma. I can see keeping the PR, just as Oakley says, but is sure isn't adding to the charm of the room as is. Do like the suggestions of the mud room if it could be incorporated and if you decide to keep the PR.

As for the outside, I usually love brick stairs, but those really honk at you, don't they? One thing is their proportion to the size of the patio, and the other might be the industrial looking rails. Have you given a thought to enlarging the patio and adding some soft-scaping with shrubs to take the emphasis away from the steps? You have already done your best with the pretty stone planters but you need some permanence and structure away from the house to counter-balance those stairs. Also maybe take a look at cast aluminum handrails (powder coated, and cheaper than wrought iron). If you still have the brick from tearing out that chimney you could use it to edge the patio addition.

Your blog was hilarious!

I was thinking half wall too but in my mind it was on the other side but I really like geokid's pic. The bathroom then is really in another room without much effort.

I should have said that the dining room wall is inaccessible for any kind of door… That really would be the best solution, but it’s a load-bearing wall with more studs than usual because of the way it backs up to the stairwell… it’s not visible in the floorplan.

Paul’s feeling is that I am looking to complicate a fairly straightforward, if not ideal, situation. Sad, that he does not appreciate my ability in this area…

He wants to take out the bathroom, replace it with windows, and be done with it… although he is in agreement that the stairs/railings are insane and need a solution.

I definitely like the idea of planting around the border. It will need to be hostas, pachysandra, and such, since it’s essentially total shade there.