It seems like a warren of rooms without much connection. That living room will be difficult to furnish being so long and narrow. You say you don't entertain much yet you have a formal dining room. How often will that get used? I'm thinking at "our age", you'd be better off having less spaces that are larger and work better for you both. The question is, do you really need 3 and possibly 4 bedrooms, an office/den, kitchen, dining room, living room and sun room? And would you really want your guests pitter pattering around upstairs nearby your bedroom? Would you be better off with spaces that work double duty instead and work more to how you live? For example, I don't entertain much either but when I do (in my FL home) it will be a casual indoor/outdoor thing. No sit down dinners. So I eliminated the dining room but incorporated the dining room table into the kitchen area. So I have seating at the island for 3 and the dining table in my kitchen/dining room. And that space opens to my outdoor seating/eating area. Have a large living room off the kitchen/dining room that also opens to the outside for entertaining and for watching tv with DH. DH has his study downstairs, with a half bath and our master is downstairs along with our laundry room. And our master also opens to our backyard area. Upstairs is my studio which can double as a guest room with the queen size pull out couch, a full bath and our official guest room with murphy bed. When it's not being used as a guest room, which is most of the time, it will be our gym. Hence the murphy bed. So in total we have 6 rooms in 2870 square feet but every room has a purpose and/or double duty vs your 8 or if you make the attic area a master suite 9 rooms. It's not the number of rooms, but how they're laid out and how we intend to live in them.

Hi all, thank you for your comments. Hi all, Thanks for your comments. I have a more accurate layout of the kitchen (the house layout is incomplete) now - hopefully it is clearer - and I have taken into account some of the comments. More details: It is a 2-person and 2-cat household and likely to be this way in this home. We cook/grill mostly on the weekends. Function: We do lots of Asian cooking so lots of prep work. Occasionally we host dinner for friends and family, or have dinner parties. Then, usually I will be cooking and some friends will loiter or hang out in the kitchen. It would be nice to have a couple of seats for them or for me to sit when doing prep work. I would also like to maximize storage. Placement of appliances: Since this is almost a gut job, we are willing to move things around. Except (a) the range top needs to be on the right wall as there is a cooker hood there now and (b) we can't put the fridge near the dining room because there is an old hvac exhaust running on that wall and we are not sure if we can remove it. aloha2009, from the fridge, we would use the sink by the window not the prep sink, so just a couple of feet (I have removed the prep sink in the new layout). House layout: The kitchen opens to the dining room, which opens to the living room. There is actually a wall with a door between the kitchen and dining right now and we plan to remove the wall. We do not use the dining room much except when we have house guests or host meals. In the layout, there is one wide window. This overlooks the backyard. There are 2 old windows there now that need to be replaced, so we can replace them with windows that go with the design. Ideally, we will have a deck and the windows will open to an outdoor dining set (and grill). Visually, I thought its nice to be able to look outside even from the dining room. There is also a door that leads out to the backyard - we can change the placement of this door. 1. I would like to have at least 2 seats but the width of the island (45") is 3 inches short of the ideal width for 2 seats. I will forego the prep sink at the island for more storage and seats. 2. I think I can empty the dishwater to a drawer in the island if the drawer faces the wall oven instead of the sink. 3. I have provided for 42 inches between the island and cabinets. We have taped the floor in the kitchen and think that should be ok for us. 4. We would like the utility cabinet to store vacuum, broom etc. so counter depth is ideal. Push come to shove we may have to figure out to put this somewhere else in the house. 5. We plan to continue building wall cabinets into the dining room for more storage for the home. Do you think the layout has other issues? Thank you - this has been really helpful so far.

Here is a plan that could work. You could keep the same basic kitchen layout (the appliances work where they are, IMO), just remove some walls to open it up, essentially transforming it into a galley kitchen. Some of my measurements are off and the cabinetry could likely extend a little more to the left as you have it in your plan. On the right of the kitchen, bring in the peninsula and cabinetry so that they end at the wall (otherwise the passageway between the kitchen and pantry becomes too narrow). I would skip the overhang for benches, and fully use the space for storage and extra counter space. Remove the uppers above the peninsula. Remove the pantry around the fridge and add uppers and more counter space on that wall between the fridge and range. I would consider mounting a small TV in the kitchen somewhere, on a full motion/swivel wall mount so that you can push it against the wall when not in use. Or use a tablet computer, and get a stand/mount for it. Removing the hall in front of the bedrooms and bathroom, and the overhang for the peninsula, gives you enough space and clearance to add a pantry and more cabinetry, or just a wider pantry and no cabinetry. Alternatively, you could also place a desk, wine bar or message center against this wall. Moving the entrance closet by the front door provides separation, no more "walking into a big room" feeling, and improves the flow between the living room and kitchen. It also give you a wall for your tv, making it easier to lay out your living room. I would replace the wall unit and purchase one that is less substantial. Consider mounting the TV on the wall and having a unit underneath, and maybe shelves on each side. Do you currently use your living room or your family room more often? I would suggest making the larger one the family room, and the smaller one with the fireplace into the more formal living room or sitting room. Mounting the TV above the fireplace (or removing it altogether) also makes that room much easier to lay out. The master bedroom door is in a awkward location in terms of natural flow. Even in an open space, it would make more sense to have it accessible through the "hall" passing from the entrance between the kitchen and family room.

Glad you think so. I like the idea of swivel chairs making it easier to take in your beautiful view at non-TV times. Adding 2 chairs on casters for the window area would give you even more flexibility if the table is easy enough to move. For example, 2 same-height narrow tables against the window, that could be moved together to make a square table for card games etc. A combination of swivel and caster chairs would let you put 4 chairs around a square table. Here are my rough ideas - I'm not too good on drawing to scale so the sizes might be off. You'd have to measure carefully. I recommend Susan Susanka's book The Not So Big Remodeling. She has lots of little tweaks for making an existing house more multi-functional. An idea for the smaller caster chairs by the window.https://www.kingrattan.com/store/p265/Swivel_Caster_Dining_Chair_Cushion.html#/