Fori,

Yes, I *do* think we can modify the opening between the dining room and kitchen. It is currently wide, and off center. We could remove some of the depth on the one side, and add 24" on the other. This would provide a more standard transition between the dining room and the kitchen.

The weirdness of moving from the kitchen to the back patio would remain. What I am not sure about, is how bizarre my layout would seem from that side. I think I am OK with it. However, I've been living with it for three years, so I am worried I don't see how "bad" it is ... or isn't.

The fact I cannot find photos with similar layouts worries me a little bit.

Can you please post a sketch of the whole floor this is in on? And please draw it on graph paper where 1 square = 1 square foot?

In the meantime,

1) If there were a door added to the side of this space, could you use the alley as a walkway to the back patio?

2) This whole space is 8 feet wide?

3) Would you rather that the washer and dryer were on the second floor (assuming that is where all the bedrooms are)? If so, please also post a layout of that floor on graph paper. We'll try to find a place for the washer and dryer there. They are buiky, and it doesn't make sense for them to take up precious space in the kitchen if they are significantly more convenient somewhere else. (Just a preemptive note, a lot of people say there is no space upstairs, and then we find a way. There are lot of creative minds here -- no harm in letting us try, even if you are extremely dubious.)

4) Are there any windows on the sides of this row house? Could windows be added facing the alley? What about the other side?

5) Are your walls brick?

I really don't think the back door is a big deal. My last kitchen was a galley with a door to the garage on the end and it wasn't centered--it was squished in a corner of the back wall. Never occurred to me to fix it!

Reconfiguring the laundry might help, somehow. I could see putting the W/D in lower cabinets, just smack dab IN the kitchen. It's sort of a small house/European/old house thing to do and it can make sense, sometimes.

And remember, you're in an old row house. You get to do all sorts of things other people can't get away with doing!

I agree, the back door really isn't an issue. Most houses don't have doorways, windows etc. lined up.

With more information you will probably get some really creative solutions to your problem. Also do you have a basement you can move the W/D to make more room in the kitchen?

My suggestion is to remove the doorway between kitchen and dining room - make it open. Run your cabinets along the wall where they currently are - both lowers and uppers to the ceiling if possible if you need the extra storage. Run cabinets along the opposite wall but only lowers. On this side add some open shelves to store more decorative items and things you use often. The open shelves will allow the light from the back door (I'm assuming the door has a window) to filter through the kitchen to the dining room and give the space a more open feeling. I'd keep the shelves to a minimum and leave an open space where you can prep your meals with perhaps a nice mirror are art work. If you still want a separation with walls between the two rooms, center the opening between the two spaces.

You can't avoid the "tunnel" in this space, but I think having uppers and lowers on one side, and open shelving with lowers on the other will help it feel less of a tunnel.

Keep the downstairs powder room - I'm sure it is good for resale and you never know when you will find it handy - even during your kitchen remodel you will probably use the sink to wash dishes etc. And if you ever have to use crutches, you will be thrilled that PR is on the main level.

"We live in an old Baltimore rowhouse."

Have you considered looking for a set of vintage cabinets (salvage dealers/craigslist/flea markets). These cabinets are often more shallow than modern cabinets--I have some that are only 18" deep bases, with 9" deep uppers. Or you can have new ones built to any depth you need, but in the older style.

I like the idea of opening up the kitchen to the DR. To provide some separation, the dividing walls could be cut back to the depth of the upper cabinets, and the countertop material could extend over the wall next to the base cabinet. I recently posted this pic to illustrate the same idea, on another thread. Left side of pic:

We have a galley kitchen with one end being a converted mudroom to the outdoor (now houses refrigerator & wine fridge) and the other side being an eat-in kitchen (we have a dining room off to the right). These might help with ideas? I'm not sure if it was always (house built in 1939) like this or if the room to the eat-in kitchen was opened-up. The rounded cabinetry has storage space on both sides (the side you can't see is a small hutch with glass doors). The converted mudroom has a counter on top of wine fridge and is our 'landing space' for work bags. It keeps the kitchen counters wide open. You might consider moving the laundry room upstairs and put the fridge there, making some room for counter space?

Also thinking about where everything will go can be helpful. We put our coffee grinder and toaster in a pantry to keep our limited counter space open and free for use. Our knife magnetic and hanging paper towel rack also keeps the limited counter space free for use. I've also found that the big single deep sink is awesome for keeping the counters free for use. With a lot of thought you can really maximize the use of your storage and modify it for improved use. Lazy susans can help dark corners (see pantry - since photo I've added another) and when we did our refresh we put in pull out drawers below the counters which makes more of the space accessible.

Our Updated 1950s Kitchen with French Inspiration · More Info

Our Updated 1950s Kitchen with French Inspiration · More Info

Our Updated 1950s Kitchen with French Inspiration · More Info

Do you want to use standard size range and/or DW?

Thank you so, so much for the feedback and photos!

This isn't on graph paper, and I am not sure if my measurements are dead-on or take into account wall thickness. However, I used an online program to create a representation of the first floor layout. I've labeled some of the dimensions.

In addition, here are some photos of how current space looks:

(I apologize for not knowing how to flip the first photo - GW really wants to display it sideways)

This is the most awkward angle of approach in the current layout- moving straight forward from the back patio door:

In answer to some of the questions above:

-The walls are brick
(but the brick is covered up), going back to where the powder
room begins and the addition widens slightly. From there, I think we've
got drywall. The ceiling also changes heights at that location.

-The side of the kitchen that currently
has all the appliances has no windows. No windows can be added. We share this wall with a
neighbor's house, for the entire depth of the house + addition.

-The opposite
side of the kitchen + corner of the dining room run along an alley that is inside our property line. If I can afford it, what I would really like
to do is replace the tall window into this alley that we currently have in the
kitchen. I would like to replace it with a long window that would fit over a long food preparation
table + cooktop. This would let in a tremendous amount of light.

-The alley is wide enough to walk along, but it is definitely narrow.

-The
washer / dryer could move to our partially finished basement. This would free up needed space, but adds yet another staircase to laundry days.
(We currently run up and down two; the basement makes three.) The W/D
could *maybe* move to the second floor, if we get creative and don't
mind destroying some closets. The main reason to keep the W/D in the
kitchen is that we cannot get a large capacity W/D up or down our, twisty
stairs. If I admit defeat, and replace our big units with a compact
W/D, we could potentially move it off the first floor ... or fit them beneath a kitchen counter.

-The kitchen is 8' wide,
continuing toward the back of the house; but this space widens slightly
for the final 62". There are some structural obstacles - some
piping sitting behind the W/D, and behind the refrigerator, that
prevents them being pushed as far back as I want. I will have to meet
with someone who understands plumbing to find out how much I can modify
that set-up. Ignorance is bliss: I'm optimistically assuming we can
minimize the space the
plumbing occupies. If it can't be modified very much, the W/D is prob as
good a disguise as any, and maybe we need a narrower fridge (not a bad
idea, in any case).

-Standard range size and DW?: Ideally, we'd retain four burners for cooking and the DW.

What are the measurements of the window on the alley wall? How far is it off the DR wall?

Do you have a large window on the second floor? You can send your washer and dryer through that. We had our drywall delivered by crane through our balcony (our condo is on the second floor) because they couldn't get the big pieces up the stairs. It was a surprisingly simple thing to do.

Definitely post a floor plan of the second floor so we can help you find a place for your laundry.

Does the alley run along the dining room and living rooms too?

Seeing the whole floor plan, my immediate thoughts are:

1) With row houses, every possible window opportunity should be seized, and it is a real shame to have a powder room and washer/dryer blocking the precious light and outdoor views possible at the back of the house.

2) For both that reason (capitalizing the natural light) and the extremely improved convenience of having the laundry upstairs, I would move the laundry upstairs.

3) You may not agree, but I would also just lose the powder room on this floor. Row houses have different rules and expectations, so it's not a necessity. And the powder room shouldn't be at the end where it blocks light. And there isn't a great spot for the powder anywhere else on this floor where it wouldn't impede flow between rooms or function of rooms, let alone offer your bathroom-using guests some privacy. At least, for me, I'd rather walk up or down a flight of stairs and have privacy while I use the bathroom.

4) Losing the powder room and washer dryer from the kitchen area leaves you a really pretty large kitchen, more than you need for a kitchen, really. Is there anything else you really wish you could have on this floor? Closets, maybe? A desk area?

I agree with Jillius. I admit, I have zero experience with these narrow row houses. However, not having any natural light in a kitchen, that.... I get!

I would not hesitate to remove the powder room and hopefully to relocate the w/d. It would be worth it in order to have a larger, more functionable kitchen, with a nice window looking outdoors.

Here is just a quick example of a remodel that maximizes light.

The patio door is on the side now so you can have a sink that is below a window with the best view (assuming view of backyard > view of alley). I'd get the kind of sink where cutting boards fit right on top of it so you can also prep while looking out a window.

As I said, the space is really quite large, so you have room to do something extra. In this case, I gave you a bay window (again, to maximize light) with a window seat, like this:

You can have extra storage under the window seat bench, and having seating there means a couple people can sit in the kitchen with you and chat while you cook.

You could also swap the locations of the sink/dw run and the bay window seat, although the way I posted it above means your sink and range are on the same run, which is way better than having them on opposite sides of the aisle.

My kitchen is 7.5x12.5 and it's tight. You're a champ for making the most of what you have for three years. If budget and space allowed, and since you love to cook, I'd probably ditch the powder room and move the laundry upstairs as recommended above.

If you just want to rearrange what is there, here's an option. It narrows up the powder room against the neighbor side, moving the back door with it and freeing up 18" of width at the back of the kitchen. The washer and dryer are placed side-by-side in the 6" bump out so you can have windows above them on two sides. By keeping the fridge and the range/vent hood on the powder room side, the opposite side with the sink won't have any obstructions. Maybe a pantry could be built next to the AC ductwork for additional, shallow storage.

Another thought is if there is space, you could add a second exterior door to the dining room so people don't have to walk through your workspace to get to the back patio.

I like both ideas but, if it were my space, I'd move W/D upstairs and do Jillius's plan. If you have to go with a compact, doing laundry more often will be easier if you don't have to haul it all the way downstairs and through the house to that back laundry area.

The one thing I would change is making the fantastic bay window just a bit narrower so I could move the door over. I would want the wall from the DW to door to be deep enough to allow the DW to be left open without people opening the door and walking into it. I could see people wanting to go in and out while someone is loading/unloading and it being a real annoyance having to continuously close the DW door for outside access. But I also like to work with DW door open so I can directly load into it when working in the kitchen so YMMV.

You could compensate for the lost light by having that wall have a window in it. It could even be like a side light you often see at front doors running almost floor to ceiling.

Do you have children? How many bathrooms does the home have currently and for how many people? I have a small house with four people and I'd be loath to give up one of our two bathrooms, stairs not withstanding.

Wow, these are great suggestions. The key elements
in Jillian's and Benjesbride's recommendations – narrowing the powder room, or moving the patio door to the
side -- had not occurred to me as possibilities.

The powder room is already so small, that I never
realized it could pared down further! Even if we move the W/D, it would be nice
to narrow the powder room. It would integrate a little bit better into the
space, and allow us to shift the back door closer to center.

And anything that allows us to place more or better windows at the
back-side or alley-side of the kitchen area is a good, good thing. This is the
one area of the downstairs where we could let in so much light, but it currently doesn’t.

I’ll probably be sad to find out how much adding
windows and moving doors costs, but it’d be a very worthy cause.

I am going to take a serious look at whether it is
feasible to get the W/D onto the second floor. We have a window that might
barely be large enough. It is only a hair wider than the W/D is, so the fit
could be too tight. If the current units and their cousins are too big, we’d
have to think about whether going to smaller units is a reasonable trade-off. Also, the most promising 2nd Floor location requires us to take over a home office that is currently important to my work-from-home husband. So we'd have to discuss where to move him, or whether he's willing to work next to a giant W/D.

On the two layout suggestions – If we keep both
elements, I really like the idea of getting the PR and W/D to fit on the end of
the kitchen space! I’m going to look carefully at whether this can work.

I also really like the idea of removing both the W/D
and the powder room in order to expand the kitchen and bring in more light.
This raises an important question of whether it makes more sense (practically,
and in terms of investment) to keep the first floor toilet, or to maximize the
light coming in and view of the back patio. The extra toilet addresses a
deficiency in the house—a lack of bathroom space. On the flip side, one of the
real strengths our house has its possession of both front and back yards. It
would make sense to get the most mileage we can out of what the house has going
for it.

A second toilet is a nice amenity for family of three (we hope to make this four ...). I know a future buyer will want us to have it. It's possible that I am going to wish we had it down the line. At the same time, the powder room is not a second shower - and we queue up for showers, not so much the toilet. And we spend *a lot* of time in the living room/dining room/kitchen/backyard. They matter to us more than morning routine, if you pit one against the other. If we measure what we need by what annoys us the most, food prep and laundry have got bathrooms trumped by a country mile. It'd be fantastic to be able to see the backyard from the kitchen too ... because kids.

Regarding the “extra” room in a kitchen with no W/D
or powder room: I have no doubt that we could find uses for that space. In a
small house, storage is always a plus. But beyond that factor, if we moved the W/D to our current office, it might make sense to add a desk to the kitchen.
While a private office is a fantastic idea, in practice my husband spends more
than half his time working at our dining room table. He’d love having his own
spot in the kitchen, if there was space and light. He regards his retreat to his private office as a depressing exile from the rest of his life.

Thanks for the suggestions. This is giving us a lot
of think about!

I think you should try to get input from realtors about whether it's more beneficial to have the powder room or the extra, more wide open space.

Also, please post dimensions and layout of the second floor. I have seen some folks here come up with very creative ways to squeeze a W/D somewhere that doesn't mean taking up a whole room.

If I determine that it is physically possible to get the W/D to floor 2, I'll definitely mock up a layout of floor 2.

"The office" is not quite a room ... it's more like a shape that was left when someone bisected an old bedroom to create a bathroom. The previous owners used it as a long closet. It requires a diagram to explain.

If you look at images of some of the modern "laundry rooms", you'll find spaces I would love to claim as an office. :) Plus you can fold stuff on the desk!

Don't be without a second toilet, even if you have to stick one in the basement. Just one kid now? Trust me. You need a spare.

Indeed. I've concluded some people either really love laundry, or own very large houses. :)

I confess that I would not mind said room, nor typing reports in one. Esp. since the new front loaders are quiet (that surprised me, when I got ours home) and look rather nice.

You may be right about the toilet. The basement is perhaps a possibility here. I'm not sure if we could finish it or not. (I don't know if we'd be required by regulations to lower and underpin it, in order to "finish" it, and underpinning would be expensive.) But it is partially finished...

I guess one could also convert the 2nd floor office to a laundry + powder room.

Perhaps the real question is whether the first floor powder room is easily replaced by a second toilet that is up or down a set of stairs.

I assume your row house does not have a third floor? My friends used to live in a Baltimore row house years ago in Federal Hill. It was really narrow also, and did have a powder room about where yours is, but also had a cool little loft area in the third floor space, and a rooftop deck. I wish that I had pictures b/c they did renovate their kitchen and it turned out really well. I can almost picture it in my head, but it was easily more than 15 years ago, and I simply can't remember it well enough.

Given the small space and the fact that your husband works from home, I can't imagine taking his office space in order to have your W/D up there, since you apparently have space for it in your basement. People seem to think that is so awful, but I've lived in my house, with four children no less, with a basement laundry space. While it's certainly not ideal, I wouldn't give up what little precious space I have on my bedroom level for the w/d. Going up and down the stairs is good exercise. Personally, my preference would be to have it on my main level where I spend most of my time. I do laundry throughout the day, so if I had mine upstairs, I'd still have to constantly run up and down to change out the loads. But that's me...I do understand the rationale for having it close to where people are changing clothes.

I agree that talking with a realtor to find out what buyers prefer makes sense b/f you consider removing the powder room. And truthfully, I think I'd prefer having my powder room in the main floor than in the basement - I'd move the w/d to basement b/f moving a powder room down there. I'll ask my friend if she has any old pictures of her renovated kitchen. IIRC, it was L shaped, with the sink on the wall in b/w your kitchen and W/D, and then the long part of the L was on the wall you share with your neighbor. Her stove was on this wall. I think she may have had a small island in the middle but her kitchen might have been wider than yours - she did not have that little "bump in" that you have - hers would have been flush with the exterior walls of the dining/living room.

Have you googled Baltimore row house kitchen floor plan? I found several images that had some ideas. Here is just one that has the powder room moved to where your dining area is. It's hard to know if any of these would work depending on what the measurements are in your space compared to those in the drawings, but might give you something to consider. This particular floor plan seemed to have that same narrow space at the back that isn't flush with the front part of the house.

Thanks for the floorplans, I will take a look! I have looked at many photos, including pictures of houses for sale near us (some are sister houses to ours). It didn't occur to me to search for the actual floorplans.

Interesting idea to stick the kitchen between the living and dining areas...

Our house has three above-grade stories:

The first floor is mapped out above.

The second floor was originally two rooms with stairs and a landing between them; it is now a bedroom + bedroom that was divided to make a bath and small side room.

The third floor contains two bedrooms, with the same stairs and landing between them.

The second and third floor bedrooms are sitting on top of the first floor living and dining room areas. The stairs climbs up between them.

All four original 2nd and 3rd story rooms have those 2' plus some inch wide, deep closets that old houses are famous for. There are no hall closets.

If the upper floors turn out to be relevant to the kitchen, I'll create floorplans for them.

We have a basement that is partially finished, but I think the ceiling is below standard height.

Is the currently full bath on the second floor? If what you really need a second shower, it might make sense to add a full bath to basement one day (or to the third floor, if you have one). It would both make up for the loss of the powder room and provide the actual utility (a second shower) that you need most.

If your husband would prefer a desk space downstairs, you could do this where I had the window seat in my plan:

Yes, the (small) full bath is on the second floor. It has an old clawfoot tub with a shower ring / curtain, a toilet, and a single sink.

There are three ways I could imagine trying to compensate for the destruction of the powder room:

-One could improve the current full bath by removing the partition that separates it from the office, to find more room. (You would also find, currently partly obscured and made unusable by this partition and a slathering of plaster, a bay window alcove.) There'd still be one bath, but it could have a nice window and a separate shower.

-One could, I suppose, turn the office into a half bath or shower.

-We could put a full bathroom in the basement. It isn't clear to me whether we would have to dig the basement down a foot for this to meet code. The realtor and inspector said we couldn't finish the basement without doing this. I don't know if they meant "shouldn't" or literally "you may not do this in the state of Maryland."

There's no room on the third floor without sacrificing a bedroom.

If you had plenty of bathrooms on other floors, would you miss having a powder room on this floor?

If your husband had place to work on the main floor, would he prefer that to his current situation?

Can you post floor plans of the second and third floors, please?

We wouldn't miss the first floor powder room, esp. if we had a second full bath or a shower elsewhere. Whether the realtor or future buyers would mind us not having a toilet on the first floor, I don't know. (That is a minor question since we have no plans to sell the house. But you never know.)

My husband thinks he would prefer a first floor office, and that seems true to me - given how often he moves himself to the first floor dining room table, despite having an office on the second floor.

I can work on a floorplan for the upper floors. It will take me a while, because there's some funny shapes on floor two and I'd have to measure very carefully and then draw.

And in a perfect world, which floor would you prefer to have your laundry on? The second? The third?

From everything you've shared, I think it makes perfect sense to use his current office for W/D and create a workspace for him downstairs.

In a perfect world, the second or third floor would be my strong preference for the W/D. Second would be a little better.

In reality, if its impossible or very difficult to move the units on or off those floors, the idea might not be practicable.

I encourage you to check out the codes to see if a laundry room is even feasible in the basement so you'll be able to make a fully informed decision on that issue. Personally, I'd rather have it closer to the bedrooms but, as someone else noted, it's good exercise if it's in the basement. But I rather find an other way to get a workout in.

Does local code/setbacks allow you to expand the back of the house (I'm assuming there's no upper floors above the kitchen area?) If you squared the footprint up, maybe you could put the kitchen, dining and living room together. Our kitchen/dining/living is 29' x 16' and it's comfortable for us; we could probably lose a couple feet off the 16' and it would still be fine. Moving your powder to the present living room in an 'L' configuration + a small closet would take up at least 56" of the 12' 3" of the present living room's width, basically turning your living room into a foyer, but it could be a good place for your husband's desk so the washer and dryer could go upstairs.

You mention one kid and the possibility of more? I don't know how old your kid is. But in my experience as a mom of two, a bathroom on the level you and your kids spend the most time might be more important than you think.

My oldest cried his head off if I left him on the main floor so I could go upstairs to use the bathroom. I carried him up and down stairs every time I needed to pee for a solid year. Then we had potty training. It was impossible to get upstairs in the amount of time he gave as warning that he needed to use the bathroom. Then once he was potty trained, he spent a good year or more insisting he was afraid to go upstairs by himself so I had either go upstairs with him every time he needed to go to the bathroom or risk him peeing all over the floor while I tried to convince him to just go by himself.

Second kid, not so bad on me leaving her alone while she was a baby. But way worse on not giving me any notice that she needed to go during potty training. And also doesn't want to be alone in other rooms of the house at times. We now have all one floor and she is five and she still tries to get me to come to the bathroom with her sometimes, even though it is just a couple of feet down the hall.

Powder room on main level is a huge priority for me. We did not even consider a house without one. We aren't in a row house, but we do live in an old, small house and have lived in duplexes and townhouses before.

Crl, very good points! I have never lived in a two story, but can imagine what you describe during the baby and potty training years. It would be tough without a toilet fairly close, huh? They really do give only about a 3 second window of notice!

I like the idea of switching the kitchen and the dining room. That will give you a larger kitchen area. In what is now the kitchen, you can build a banquet along one wall and that way the dining table will be up almost against the wall. I would move the W/D to the second floor. Is it ideal having a powder room in your dining room or kitchen? Nope but it's better than having to continually run upstairs. In the kitchen you could do an L shaped kitchen against the stairs and then across next to the heater put in a small desk for DH.

Well, since this is a forever home, perhaps you can move the laundry and maybe add a second bathroom on one of the upstairs floors now and wait to do the major kitchen renovation for 5-7 years or so when the current child and the future child are past the baby/potty training stage. That way, you can have your main floor powder room for the relatively short period when you really need it, and then you can renovate the kitchen and remove the powder room and enjoy extra light/living space for the rest of your lives in your home.

I'm in MD, just outside DC, with a small SFH that had a galley kitchen with attached laundry - and still does, post reno. I spent a ton of time on GW mapping out the possibilities, since even though this isn't a rowhouse, it sort of defied most of the usual solutions for galley kitchen. in the end, we moved the gas and plumbing, opened up a wall (at the narrow end) and the difference is life-changing. So my advice is take your time, consider all the possibilities, and you can do something wonderful no matter what your structural and/or budget constraints may be.

I also wanted to pass along this link to a GW kitchen reveal (with hidden laundry) from a DC rowhouse. Not the same layout as yours, but it's a nice example of how to do something amazing in the context of a rowhouse.

Link to tashamh2's kitchen reveal

Hi from Baltimore! I saw this question above: the style of home you have with the narrowed back section is called a "daylight" rowhouse, and those generally started to be built around 1915 or so. They bring in more light/air to the middle part of the house. Otherwise, with both sides of the house being brick party walls/shared between neighbors, light only comes in from the front and back. If you have a three room deep house, that leaves the middle pretty dark all day.

If anyone is interested, I really recommend the Baltimore Rowhouse by Charles Belfoure and Mary Ellen Hayward, it's a really great way to think about our city's history.

Unfortunately I don't have any great ideas. I lurk here because I'm storing up ideas/plans for my rowhouse's someday kitchen renovation too. But I would say that as someone who knows the market here, unless you're in Fed Hill or maybe Canton, only having one bathroom would be a problem. I think if you're in Fed Hill or Canton, you could probably get away with it because the market is so strong in those neighborhoods.

My son has this exact Baltimore rowhouse. I hope your upstairs isn't as convoluted as his! Near him, there are gut renos with additions that change the stairs to against-the-wall, add an addition along the back, like 4kids shows, even put on a 3rd floor master suite. For someone who likes to cook and wants to keep that 2nd toilet, I like Benjesbride's layout shown in 3-D. I agree with keeping the powder room on the main floor, rather than putting it in the basement. Maybe you could even add a shower(wet room) a la Europe or an RV.

You'd really need to study what investment your particular neighborhood will bear. You may get your money back and then some by turning it into a 3-bed, 3.5 bath. Or you may just increase your own enjoyment by purchasing more space-efficient appliances and up-grading your under-window work counter.

Smallhouse: Thank you for the links to your friends new kitchen. I like it! And it is so helpful to see how some ideas have worked out in small space.

TBB123: Our upstairs is not too-too convoluted, but we do have a room that was divided in half. Both rooms are useful, but one is a weird shape. If your son ever puts info on his house online, I'd be very curious to snoop into what they've done with it. (I haven't gotten the chance yet, but I will map my other two floors and post the diagrams to this thread.)

Brewcat: Happy hunting for renovation ideas. I am going to order a copy of the book you mention. I have read a little bit on rowhouse history, since I live in one and am (barring a massive career shift) setting down roots here. But what I read was not super detailed. I bet the book would be very illuminating. Maybe I could even figure out when our house was built... I have a rough idea but its really rough.

Thanks for your observations re: the real estate market. My broad impressions are in line with yours on Fed Hill and Canton. I am uncertain what is true in my own market (Hampden). The market is not, I think, nearly as robust; at least, the home values are not as high as Canton. There has been a noticable uptick in buying and selling since I got here (I bought during the housing crash), and all the sudden people are gutting properties and doing the total overhaul inside that tbb123 and 4kids mentioned. Will the trend continue? It seems very recent, almost like it started last summer. I'm not sure I trust it yet. It does make me feel optimistic about the wisdom of smaller projects, esp if they improve aesthetics.

I did try to do a little survey of what was up for sale this spring. A lot of houses have 2 baths, and many of them - not even the totally overhauled homes - have those baths above or below first floor. A lot of people who could use a basement seem to have done so. But it's also not super hard to find places that do have the first floor bath. So if a buyer wants it, she will have a choice of houses, and some will offer it.

My suspicion is that, in terms of the market especially, there is wisdom in holding onto the powder room. One reason a person might consider Hampden over some other areas is that you can get a little more space for your money, you may be able to get a little yard, and the prices for the not-totally-overhauled houses is still reasonable. My observation is that this has attracted a lot of couples with babies and toddlers. And that, as some have pointed out, makes the first floor bath an asset.

Also, having looked over our house very hard this last weekend, I realize that it might be difficult to find (a lot) more bathroom space on the other floors. So if I have space for a powder room on floor 1, it might be a bad idea to erase it.

One advantage of the daylight rowhouse layout is that even if we keep the back partially blocked by the powder room, we could invest in nice windows all along the wall that is not shared with neighbors. It is mostly closed off right now, but it is south-facing and very bright. I suspect it that more windows would really open up and brighten the space.