Jim, Foodonastump : Will you two cut it out with the Mama grams. Talk to me in English and I'll push 1 for Spanish. Cookie: This was many years ago, on my Grandfathers farm in NJ. My Uncle found 2 Cast Iron Doors with a frame. They were from an old coal stove. One door had an Opening with a Butterfly to regulate air flow. I used the one with the air opening for the bottom fire chamber. The other was for the Oven above,were the Bread was baked. I didn't have any plans or instructions, just winged it. Actually, it was a large brick box, with another box inside, at the top. Picture a Brick Box with 2 doors,one above the other. You would build a wood fire in the bottom. It would go all around the upper box ( oven ) and out a flue pipe. This isn't an easy task, for someone inexperienced. You would start by digging a square hole about 2 feet deep. According to the local frost conditions. Less in Fla. More in northern states. Put in a Foundation or ( footing ) About 12 inches Deep. It can be poured Concrete, or if there is a lot of stone available, use that with mortar. Level that and lay one course of cement block to bring it to just below ground level. Then build the Oven as described. Are you tired yet ??? You just started.!!!!! I can draw some kind of a sketch of the oven part but not right now. There are other ways to biuld , that are easier. Some ovens are made to build the fire; for some time, right where you bake. Clean all the fire out and put the bread in. I don't like that too much. In the one I described , I used 4 Angle Irons to support the oven above. The oven floor was a steel plate, set in the angle irons, with firebrick set on top, the oven walls were then built on that. I never thought they would become popular again. They could have been made pre fabricated. Oh Well ! Talk at you later, Lou PS:Cookie, a few days after you build it make a small fire , to start drying it out. Don't build a big fire at first. It will crack. Did you build it yet ???

rhome410 - I will see what I can do about getting the graph paper plan to you asap- it's a bit faint, but that coupled with the cad should provide plenty of dimensions. Yes, both of the walls you mentioned are load-bearing (driving me crazy), but I guess I'm fortunate that's all I have to work around, right? I don't care if the kitchen is in the defined area. In fact I intend to take up that rectangular room toward the bathroom for sure. I suppose I should have mentioned that I view the round (10pp) dining table as leading into the living room adjacent to the stairs (and where the wine storage will be). In terms of my own (still very malleable) ideas, I thought the island with the range etc would look out toward the LR and the pasta/baking land would be parked on an island veering toward the bathroom. Main sink under existing kitchen window. I will have a second walk-in esque fridge in the garage (loud and commercial)so not worried about squeezing it in kitchen. In terms of oven, I really want a commercial combi oven, but am fast giving up on it because a. it's huge, b. it's wildly expensive, & c. it makes hooding that cooking island pretty ridiculous as I'd need a span of like 130" which is unsightly. Thus, for now, I'm going to content myself with the 48" and plan to supplement with the pizza oven and my dream-of-all-dreams tandoor. I'm actually not super oven-heavy anyway, what with doing a ton with sous vide and being very heavily pasta focused. YOu've already got me thinking- thanks for your input!! I hope I replied to you correctly, there doesn't seem to be a way to tag people directly in replies.

@rmaccrea We can actually already do something like a door opening for a specific delivery driver. IIRC some even inexpensive security systems and/or door locks have that feature. For me, the infrastructure adjustments are more vital to our personal spaces (e.g. in our homes) as well as to national interests in reducing infection spread. It seems as though even with new construction, the overall emphasis is on features and doodads like gas stove size and all that's required to make that happen (e.g. extra money spent on air quality and draft) rather than things like pipes and wires and whole-home air adjusters. Much as they're handy for sociability, features like peninsulas and islands where several people sit cheek-by-jowl in the kitchen breathing onto the food food prep area should become quite quickly a thing of the past. This is what I mean by an infrastructure feature that might be helpful: What might be useful is to have the exterior doors of the home set up so that a CERV kind of thing sanitizes the person right before they come in the door or in a foyer/enclosed porch/ante room. A kind of air wash. This would simply be a feature of a whole-home system. As you leave the home, you should be able to push a button that gives the home a "cleanser boost" while you're out. I can do this with my CERV right now (if there's an undue stink from the bathroom, I can boost the CERV for 30 seconds and it clears right out), but it would be handy to have it do a more thorough cleansing while I go get the groceries. The other thing I can see happening is more minimalism in internal architecture and an emphasis on construction materials for impervious surfaces. It would be way easier to keep the house clean.... The closed air in a bathroom will need to get re-thought. Bathrooms are small confined spaces that can get heavy usage. Right now, most people have fairly simple fans that are decades-old technology, and some people are putting in enclosed booths for the toilet. This seems like a recipe for germ-y air. These booths, while cozy, always seem to emanate someone else-s aroma (These were around when I was a child, so I've had a lot of experience!). IMO a toilet booth should not be built in a home where the homeowner's priority is to minimize contagion. So, I guess, @rmaccrea my most important message would be "What do prospective homeowners want to accomplish overall?" and not specifically in one spot or another. The whole house should come from a place of addressing their objectives, from the ground up, architecture, construction materials, overall philosophy. That's an infrastructure thing, and in a world where we need safer and cleaner interior spaces requires a conceptual shift, attitude, a different paradigm altogether.

They make great borders for flower beds if you have an English garden type landscaping , you can also seel them to people wanting to add brick or replace old damaged brick. Where did you remove them from maybe so pics of your house and lot would help .