Do you want to give up having an eat-in kitchen? Do you want to keep those double swing doors from the foyer?

How very exciting to be building, congratulations!

Some questions... is this a spec plan? I cannot figure out how anyone could include a great room and large dining room in a plan, with a 10x12 kitchen, and am wondering if you are able to change exterior walls, easily.

First thought is ditch the dining room and rework the combined space into pantry, kitchen, eating area. We did this and overall have been quite pleased (and we do entertain large groups of people). Alternately, can you change external walls and capture the space below the dining room/to the right of the kitchen, for a walk-through pantry?

How important is the dining room to you? Do you have spectacular views out these windows? Said differently, is the view worth the loss in functionality/space caused by not extending the kitchen walls right and making it bigger? Looking forward to hearing more about your plan!

Where is the family entrance to the house? Through the front door, or...? If it were the front door, I might keep the entrance to the kitchen there, but otherwise, no. At the very least I'd move the entrance to the kitchen down to the great room end, but I'd really try to do much of what oldbat2be suggests. I'd make the kitchen where the dining room is shown and dining area where the kitchen is shown and somehow better link the space, changing up that right angle between them in some way, potentially.

ETA: I missed the part about the family room. I might even put the kitchen there and dining where dining is and have front room as study/office-type family area.

How are you envisioning using the great room and family room at this time?

This post was edited by cal_quail on Mon, Oct 20, 14 at 7:52

Oh, thanks for the suggestions!

Cal _quail: The house has no garage so the entrance is only through the front door. The family room has a fireplace and I don't want to loose that if we converted it to become a kitchen.

Right now I live in a place with "only" one "great room" which is also the living room and play room (no basement). I have no idea how it will work out having two spaces like this, but I am thinking one will become truly the family room and the other will be a little more tidy at all times, no tv, etc. But still useable by the family in our day to day life. Not a formal LR by any meansâ¦

Benjesbride - I think we need to keep the door or at least the door frame otherwise once you get inside the house it will feel too claustrophobic since it would be a long and narrow hallway.

If the dining area is right off the kitchen I would mind loosing the "eat-in." In fact, as it is right now I can't imagine how it is used to eat there since the space is so smallâ¦

Oldbat2be - the house is not under construction - it was built in 83 I think. We are under contract and if everything works out I would like to do a kitchen renovation before moving in.
Since this house have the optional family room, the DR is closer to the front - I wouldn't want to touch that wall to make a walk in pantry. Besides, I love light! Right now we live in a somewhat dark place and one of the things we wanted in our new home was lots of natural light!

I was also thinking about ditching the "formal DR" and break that wall that separates the refrigerator from the DR and use half of the DR as kitchen. The remaining half with a big table for eating in. There are no door between the DR and FR, so, from kitchen I could see the dining table and family room.

Would that work? If I do that, what should I do about the wall that separates the kitchen from the "great room?" Remember, right now there is an opening above the sink with view of the great roomâ¦. should I close it? Leave as is?

I would flip the kitchen and dining room and put the same L-shaped kitchen along the longer walls in what is now the dining room that way the new kitchen/old dining room would open onto the great room, living room and dining room and have foot traffic through about a quarter of the room as opposed to the kitchen's current location where foot traffic is through the center of the room (and that fridge opens directly into the doorway, a permanent drawback, not unlivable but not ideal). If I did this I would make the current window from current kitchen to the living room a doorway

I'm confused - What do you mean when you say "Since this house have the optional family room" -- the house was built 31 years ago, does it have a family room or doesn't it?

Oh I am sorry for the confusion sjhockeyfan. What I meant is that the floor plan above shows the option without the family room and on the side, the "optional" family room. The family we are buying the house from chose to add the family room, so you should look at the floor plan keeping that in mind.

Does it make sense?

I looked at your floor plan again. There are enough issues here, that I'd live with it for a year and see how you use all these spaces in real life.

I think that cramped front door/ foyer area would really bother me. It looks too small, the open door blocks the staircase, and I don't see a coat closet or even enough room for hooks for guest jackets.

We've had homes with duplicate spaces-- living/family, dining/breakfast-- and they just don't fit our lifestyle, so when I look at this floor plan, my mind is going down the path of turning the family into the dining, turning the dining into kitchen and reworking the existing kitchen into a larger great room and better foyer area. Like maybe even moving the front door to where the breakfast nook window is. It seems to me an existing "great" room measuring 12 x17 with all of those door ways isn't so great.

Can you tell I'm in the middle of a gut renovation that includes completely redefining each room and moving the kitchen? My mind tends to go that direction :-)

I want to chime in to say I agree with benjesbride. We're about to embark on our second time of renovating a kitchen. In both houses we had to live in them with the existing kitchen first.

I know it's easier to renovate before you move in, however, I know for a fact that we've made soooo much better decisions after being in the house and getting used to how we actually use the space as opposed to how we thought we'd use it. Although it's no fun to live the reno, it's a temporary inconvenience that really can make a huge difference in how happy you are with the final result.