In the two places I've lived with such an arrangement, some investigation into the original floorplan has revealed that there's been either an addition or some remodeling going on. And people just took the easy way out and slapped a new room on right next to an existing room, without bothering to add a hallway or the like.

In my grandparents' house, you had to go through their bedroom to get to the upstairs bathroom, which was, for a time, the only bathroom in the house, other than a toilet in the basement. The house was built in 1865 and the bathroom was originally a closet. It was the only space for a bathroom.

That is, until my grandparents had 7 kids and took the smallest bedroom and made it into a bathroom. They also made a pantry off the kitchen into a powder room, to get a downstairs bathroom.

My brother and SIL have a child with disabilities. They needed to either buy a wheelchair accessible house or modify the one they owned. They looked at many houses that had been remodeled for handicap access--SIL was appalled, really, at some of the remodeling. She said it was clear they just added a ramp where it was easiest and threw on extra rooms where it was easiest to expand the house, without any consideration of the flow of traffic through the house or how the rooms would open up to each other, or even trying to match the style/ finishes of the original home with what was going on in the addition.

She mentioned bedrooms opening directly off the kitchen, or off the master bedroom, or just a section of the family room walled off to create a room. In one house, they punched through the dining room wall and added a bedroom/bath right off the dining room. And another where they enclosed a porch off the kitchen to make the accessible bedroom, so everyone entering the house walked through the accessible room into the kitchen, unless they used the front door. Which no one does in farm country.

They ended up hiring an architect to add on a wing to their house--you can't tell where the old house ends and the new wing begins. They did end up with a dining room with no windows, but it has two sets of french doors opening into rooms with tons of windows and sunlight and you really don't notice. They paid extra to get the addition done right, but I think in the long run they have a house that doesn't *look* handicapped accessible and hasn't lost any resale value.

I'm glad for them that they had the time and money to get their addition done right. Not everyone with a disabled family member has that luxury. Maybe next to the kitchen would be a good place for someone who needs almost 24 hr care. A friend of mine has a house like that, bedrooms were added as needed.
Now that retirement age is here, sure it takes a ding on the resale value. But do you choose resale value over doing what you need to do for your family at the time?

I used to spend the occasional weekend with friends and their (teenage at the time) daughter in their 5 BR home. One bedroom was accessible only from another bedroom. This was a new home. One of my visits they put me in the BR leading to the secluded BR. The daughter's room was the secluded BR. What? The other two bedrooms were not in use. I was not comfortable.

There was a tradition of boudoirs in upper-class European residences. Boudoir typically adjoined a lady's bedroom and served as her private study/dressing room/parlor.

To walk to the lady's bedroom you had to pass through the boudoir. In Moscow and St. Petersburg some large 19th century apartments formerly inhabited by aristocratic families have this kind of boudoir/bedroom layout.

Last year I went to an estate sale in a huge old house (almost a palace) circa 1900 in Portland, OR. There was a suite of a bedroom, bathroom and boudoir on the second floor. The bedroom and bathroom opened into the boudoir, and the boudoir opened into the hallway with doors to other bedrooms. The boudoir was furnished like a home office/library with a vintage desk, small couch and several tall bookshelves.

Here is a link that might be useful: Boudoir

We looked at one old house where there was just one bathroom upstairs that you reached through the master bedroom - and there was a third bedroom you reached by going through the bathroom. So you could be stuck in that third bedroom while someone was using the bathroom.

Here's the plan, kinda-sorta (gleaned from the real estate photos and satellite views).

The "rectangle" across the top has the kitchen on the left and the dining/living space on the right. The "square" below that is the funny bit, (forget the appendage on the bottom left, which is a much more recent master bath/closet addition). Assume "up" is north. The NE room is a "den", accessed from the kitchen. The SE room is the MBR. The SW room is the second bedroom, accessible only from the MBR. The NW room is the main bath, accessible only from the 2nd bedroom. (It's like an adobe nautilus shell). The strip at the top of the main bath is a utility room, accessible only from the outside.

What's up with this craziness? I think the age of it all led me to assume it was all original. But I think you all are right about additions. The more I look at it, the more I think that the 2nd BR and the main bath (and utility room) are additions -- albeit very old ones. If the original house were just the "L" shape, ca. 1890s, then the second BR and bath could have been added in the 1920s-30s (consistent with tub style). There is a built-in book shelf in the "den" that would have originally been a door to the outside, and could possibly be opened up to the main bath now if things line up better than on my drawing. That means the door between the MBR and 2nd BR would have originally been an exterior door, too, which makes sense because of the thickness of the adobe in that wall and the level change.

If only the "L" were original, it would also fit the general plan of other vintage homes I've seen in NM. I'm similarly obsessed with another one on the other side of town that has the same basic 4-room L-shaped plan.

Anyway, it's charming as all get out. It can have it's bedrooms wherever it wants.

Here is a link that might be useful: Here's the listing.

I see the listing agent has discovered Photomatix. Pity.

To whoever it was who asked a while back what I meant by over-the-top HDR in real estate photos, go look at that listing.

Yeah, the stretchy realtor lens and the additional tweaking of the photos are a bit much. Unfortunately, I see it more and more. Heck, I can't complain too much. I just finished getting my mom's house ready to sell and the realtor's photog used the stretchy lens, too.