These are the photos from the house listing.

Kitchen

From Kitchen into Laundry/Hall (1/2 bath door in middle of hall)

Living Room (Foyer on left, kitchen on right)

It seems likely that one of the two walls you want to remove is load bearing. Have you already consulted an architect and/or structural engineer about what is needed to span the more open space? Will there need to be structural columns?

Yes, the wall between the family room and the formal living room is presumed to be a load bearing wall. We have discussed it with our contractor and will be having a structural engineer determine if we need to put in an I-beam or not. I presume we will need one but the contractor thinks there might be other options. We will not be putting in any structural columns.

Which side of the house faces south? the front? Is the existing kitchen and nook dark?

Is the office needed for someone who works from home? dual aspect rooms are often the loveliest, so it seems a waste to me to put an office in that corner.

I think I would leave the bathroom alone and bedroom door too. Move fridge against office wall and just surround it by some floor to ceiling cabinets for a pantry. Moving the bathroom and water heaters not going to be cheap.

In the layout you have, you're going to end up doing too much prep work in the 2 feet space between the sink and the range, which is the most valuable space in the kitchen — wash veggies off in the sink, for example, and your natural inclination is going to be to put them down and chop them up right next to the sink rather than turn 180° and chop on island.

And your dishwasher is in exactly the same location, which is going to mean that you can't have dishwasher open while you prep.

I'd create a separate cleanup are on the left-hand wall by putting sink and dishwasher over there, which gets the dishwasher out of the prep area. This is also more convenient for DH, since upper cabinets where you are going to store dishes is now right next to dishwasher and clean-up sink.

Then I'd put a separate prep sink on either the exterior wall, or on the island.(My vote would be for exterior wall, since I like big uninterrupted islands. However, but if you put prep sink on the island, it lets you have more symmetry by centering range on island.)

This might be a non-starter, because the only good place for dishes is in drawers to the right of the sink, but it leaves the 1/2 bath intact, and gives you a full-depth fridge:

With shorter island, and cabinets on the left wall:

@Matt E. In moving the clean up sink over to the wall with the upper cabinets, would you have a sink under the cabinets or just no upper cabinets in that spot?

If no upper cabinets, does it look weird to do that where there isn't a window?

And if with upper cabinets, does it impact doing dishes in the sink? My main concern with be with tall DH being able to fully access the sink since he's the one that does all the dishes. I'd love to hear how that works since it's not something I have any experience with.

@mama goose_gw zn6OH I really like the dishwasher moved over to that side. I cook solo and DH cleans solo, so we rarely have issues with needing the dishwasher open at the same time prep/cooking is going on, but there is no reason to create a potential problem if you can avoid it. I had previously discussed moving it to that location with DH because I wanted to avoid having the dishwasher directly next to the range just for visual purposes. He prefers it to be on the right just because it's easier for him to load on that side, but has said he's open to moving it to the left if needed.

Hi, Anita

I'm following this thread with personal interest as I have almost the exact same floorplan as you, except my house faces north with the kitchen/garage/laundry along the west wall. So I can totally get wanting to bring light into a cave-like family room. I have been here 10 years but haven't addressed the darkness yet. It's great for TV viewing and that's about it. :)

A couple of things to consider: bringing down the wall between your foyer, formal living room and family room will bring alot of natural southern light into your TV viewing area. It will be more problematic in the winter when the sun is low in the southern sky. Think about what your hubby may be watching on Saturday and Sunday afternoons during the fall and winter. :) You may want to reposition the TV to the east wall. Also, when you knock down those walls, consider the view from the front door. What would you want to be visible versus hidden? I personally would not want my refrigerator visible from the front door. I suppose this wouldn't be an issue with a custom integrated, paneled refrigerator. Nonetheless, I modified MamaGoose's layout and moved the fridge and mirrored the island. This layout may not work for you if you are the kind of cook who wants the fridge closer to the range. If so, then your first layout makes more sense. You could leave the powder room, water heater as is if you compressed the pantry size a bit as illustrated below.

Edited to add: I meant to make the pantry 4'x4' so that you would have a 4' corridor to the home gym.

Anita D., zmith's flipping the plan works for aesthetics, but I just want to point out a couple of minor function considerations. The fridge is against a solid wall on the right, and the kitchen is more open on the left. If the fridge is switched to the left wall, it will close of the kitchen a little more, and might block some of the light from the back window. Also, that leaves less space for dish storage--maybe 30" base and a little more in the uppers. Since the DW is in the corner, you won't be able to load to the cabinets in the corner.

Another thing is that the seat on the end of the island is now in the traffic path from the garage. True, that the open fridge door is in the path if it's on the right side, but fridge doors are opened for only a short time (unless you're my grandson who likes to take his time perusing the choices), compared to someone sitting at the island.

I like the step-in pantry!

MamaGoose makes good points on the functionality of my modification. The island might be too long for it to work. Maybe 6' long island with 3 stools is more realistic. And a counterdepth fridge.

Based on how we have used similar seating in prior houses, I anticipate that we will have someone sitting at the end of the island for an hour or so every 2-3 months. We're not big entertainers and we won't need it for our family. Maybe we need to kick up the entertaining a notch!

@zmith It's a really common layout in our neighborhood. I have several good friends whose houses are almost exactly the same as ours. Sadly none of them have remodeled yet, so I get to the be the neighborhood guinea pig.

I agree with you about it being great for watching movies. Currently the TV is by the fireplace, but the plan is to move it to the east wall as soon as get a new TV. We discovered that in order to keep the same visual size as our current 36" TV, we'll have to get an 80" TV just because it's so much farther away from the seating. We are not big TV watchers (maybe 5 hours/week) so we're having a bit of a hard time buying a TV that large. But that is our plan.

Most of the remodeled houses that I've seen have removed the wall between the kitchen and family room. Very few have gone totally open concept. Here's one I found with a layout similar to yours:

@benjesbride Did you have any suggestions on how to implement a corner kitchen? I've tried to come up with some layouts, but I feel like what I come up with results in way too large of a kitchen. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

@zmith thanks for posting that picture. I've not come across any pictures that show such a similar layout after a remodel. I have to agree that the 8' ceiling looks a little weird right next to the vaulted ceiling. But then I wonder how you would do the closed in office if the ceilings were vaulted everywhere? I guess the walls would just go up to the vaulting. I have no idea what vaulting a ceiling would cost. I think the arrangement of the trusses in our attic might mean the entire attic/roof would need to be replaced to do that. Does anyone have any experience with doing that?

Hi, Anita

I would think the top of the office wall would follow the ceiling slope. I've seen pictures of roof trusses that were modified for a vaulted ceiling, and recall the roof was not touched. An engineer provided the truss details. It's a lot of work to reframe every single truss. Your contactor should be able to advise you on the cost.

I found another house listing with a similar layout where they went total open concept but with an office in the corner. Here is a link to the listing for more views of the room.

I don't really care for the kitchen but it does give me a nice sense of what it will feel like to completely open up the space.

In zmith's pic, a cantilevered ledge could be added, to display art or holiday decorations in the peak. Outlets could be added for Christmas lights, etc., although that might draw more attention to the difference in ceiling heights.

I like mama goose's 2nd layout dd 8/7, 9:07 p.m. Made a few changes to that layout to give you more pantry space.

Hi, Anita

In the listing you linked, the garage is on the side of the house, versus at the back of the house like yours and mine are. Also, the house faces north and is on a corner lot. That's why this kitchen is so bright; sunlight from the north and south.

What do you think of Sena's layout? Look at all that dish storage! I love it. However, in her layout, you could get a tighter work triangle by swapping the cleanup sink and dishwasher and the small coffee sink. Then the range could be more centered on the west wall.

Sorry I've been MIA from the thread. We had a whirlwind of family vacation, illness, and the first week of kindergarten all within the last two weeks, so I haven't been on Houzz.

sena01 Thanks for the rendering. I like the shallow bottom cabinets that you added. I'm trying to think if there is any reason that wouldn't work for us, but I don't think we have anything that would prevent that from being a feasible option. Also, what software did you use to create that image? It looks a lot better than the one I'm using.

zmith Our prior house was a corner lot and it's really amazing how much of a difference that makes in the interior light.

kaismom Thanks for bringing up some good issues. We are a family of three, with a 5yo boy. We will not be having any other children. There is no basement - they don't really exist in our part of the country due to the hard clay and rock and the ever-shifting ground. Although, I really wish they were an option here. My family is from the mid-west where they're very common and I love them.

We are not a TV family, with the TV generally only being on 3-4 hours per week, so we don't have too much to worry about with sound. But I agree that it's an issue in open floorplans and one that will come up eventually. The house has five bedrooms, with my son "owning" two of the rooms - one as a bedroom and one as a playroom that will be converted into a den/TV/gaming room for him and his friends (or will be converted to the gym so that the gym can become the "kid den".)

I agree with you about the ceiling height. It concerns me. I'm currently in negotiations with DH about vaulting the ceiling. So far, he's not on board due to the high cost, but I'm working on it. I just wish it wasn't such a big cost.

Vaulting the ceiling is very expensive and usually not easy to do well. You need a good architect/designer to figure out how to do it in such a way that it DOES NOT look like a bad after thought. Sometimes people spend a lot of money and still does not look good. I have done a lot of remodels over the years and I have a better sense of what to do and what not to do. I would NOT vault the ceiling.

Looking at the current pictures, your ducts are in the ceiling. I did not notice this before.. You now have a huge cost in moving the ducts as well if you were to vault the ceiling. If you are on a concrete slab, you really do not have any easy options.

zmith photo also shows the house with ducts in the ceiling. The partially vaulted ceiling looks like a bad after thought, IMHO....

I met with our contractor yesterday and she took me out to another house she is working on with a very similar remodel. She wanted to show me what standard ceiling height looks like after taking down the walls. I am happy with what we saw and am confident that the 8' ceilings will not be an issue.

And I think we worked out the weirdness with the gym entrance so that it's not in the laundry room. And that actually gives us more space for a pantry as well. We're going to cut down the size of our fireplace hearth to allow for a very short hall/entrance to the gym. I was never a fan of the extra long hearth and it won't be useful as seating or anything with our furniture arrangement. By removing it, we can leave the 1/2 bath as is and use the existing room entrance as our pantry. That means we now have space for wall ovens as well.

I didn't modify the "shallow pantry" that is on the drawing below, but our existing fridge is narrower than in the picture, so I think we could even put an 18" counter there for a coffee station instead of more pantry, if we want.

So I'm wondering if you'd be willing to combine the laundry and home gym into one room? This way you'd have more laundry space when using it and they don't take up that much room when not in use.

Then the old laundry could be a mudroom. This way people (guests) don't have to walk through your laundry to get to the 1/2 bath either.

For resale that would be a larger laundry that could have many different functions based on new owners use. I know lots of people who wouldn't mind a combined laundry sewing room or craft room etc.

BTW I like the new one better with the door switch.

lyfia I've thought about that myself as well. I'm not quite sure how to manage it and still have room for any workout equipment. The room is about 10.5' x 10'. We don't have a lot of equipment in it, but it does have a treadmill and a weight bench. I would welcome suggestions!

Where are the windows in that room and how are they placed? Which is the 10.5 vs 10 ft side. Also what is the size of your equipment. I know treadmills take up space, but you don't need as much around it, but you do need some space around a weight bench.

Pretend it is a kitchen and we need to place the equipment with appropriate aisles.

There is one large-ish window in the room. It's centered on the wall in the bottom of the sketch. I'm at work right now so I can't give exact details, but it's about 6 feet wide, centered on the wall. It's about 4' off the floor.

(I don't know why this is so big when I upload it.)

Just a quick swag at minimizing the space the WD take up and no windows in the way. You could put storage above for baskets or below if on pedestals. I think that gives you about the same size room you have to work with now. You could vent it down and over to the exterior through the crawl space or straight up through the roof.

Split the current laundry for pantry and mudroom. Along the wall pantry wastes less space than a step in as you don't need the extra step in part that takes up square footage.

If your treadmill folds up you could place it parallel to the bath area and old laundry room and then put the weight bench in the middle under the window. You could mount a TV over the washer and dryer to watch while on the treadmill too.

lyfia Thanks for the suggestions. you've definitely given me something to think about.

If we were to have a mudroom (which I would love), I'm not sure that 5' is enough space to be very usable. I'd be interested in hearing from people who have a similar, small space. So, I played around a little and moved the walls diving the kitchen and existing laundry a little bit and came up with this with a larger mudroom. I have a couple of concerns: (1) that the door to the gym/laundry would need to be closed all the time, otherwise you'll see right into the washer/dryer from the living room (esp since we have to leave the washer door open all the time since it's a front loader), (2) that moving the laundry into that room prevents us from ever changing the use of that room in the future (ie. if elderly parents need to move in or if we want to make it the kid den instead of the bedroom that is currently being used for kid den), and (3) that it's less than optimal to have the door swing that direction in the gym, but it need to be that way in order to access the laundry.

regarding W/D in the home gym....

If you do that, then you have forever relegated that room to a laundry room. It becomes a very large laundry that is used as a gym.

IMHO, I don't think a very large laundry will be a selling point. I would rather have a multipurpose room that can used for many different things. If you keep the home gym as a multipurpose generic room, then it can be used as a guest bedroom, kids playroom etc etc as your life changes.

However, if you are willing to give up the bedroom, it solves the issue of your powder room where the guest is not walking through the laundry area. In general, it is nice to be able to direct the guests to the powder room which is NOT a personal bathroom. If you direct the guests to the hall bath, that is in the private area. My guess is that you want a useful/nicer powder room for the guests to use.

When you remodel, you think you solved one problem, you notice another problem!

I would work the floor plan more so that you have a really nice inviting 1/2 bath with better doors in that hallway. You are already doing an enormous amount of work. This will not add that much to the work. At this point, it is just your time....

Can I just say that I HATE this half bath? It's awkwardly placed. I never use it. I think the only time it gets used is first thing in the mornings when my husband is reading the news and drinking his coffee before the rest of us wake up. And I can't get him to keep it clean. We almost never have our guests use it because they all use the hall, full bath, which is not used by any of our family because we all have en suite bathrooms. I would totally rip the 1/2 bath out if I didn't think that it would be a bad idea in the long term. And honestly, I'm thinking about calling our realtor to find out just how bad an idea it really is to remove it. sigh.

This is our currently super messy mudroom space that takes up 4 ft.

If pic looks off in dimensions click on it to see it properly. We have cabinets above the open areas too.

The realtor said removing our half bath would not affect our resale value, so I think I've got a more workable laundry area. This gives us (1) a "mudroom" space to drop backpacks/purses (which we're already doing in this spot, but currently it's on top of our laundry folding area), (2) opens up the walkway through the laundry by moving the W/D to other side where they can be recessed out of the walk space, (3) gives us a larger space to fold laundry and to hang things that need to hang dry (instead of IN the gym, which is what is currently happening), and (4) gives me a walk-in pantry.

I suggest adding a sink to the laundry area. Your walk in pantry is not wide enough to be walk in. I am only seeing 4 ft. All you will end up with are very deep shelves. You have to measure the useful linear feet, not square feet. My second home has a pantry that is a closet depth with a bunch of shelves. I can store an enormous amount of stuff in there.

I would let that the pantry go, and put a pull out pantry in the mudroom, and a sink in the mudroom.

Will the mud room area be large enough with the new layout?

The walk-in pantry is (approx 4' wide and 5' deep) which is a similar size to one we had a previous house and is sufficient for our needs: narrow shelves along one side wall and deeper shelves along the back wall. We'll use it just for food, not for appliances, so we don't need tons of space.

rantontoo - Lyfia posted her 4' wide mudroom a couple of posts above, so it's possible to work something into that size. However, our "mudroom" won't really be a mudroom. Basically, I'm just using that term to indicate that it's dedicated space to drop my purse and DS's backpack so they don't migrate into the kitchen counters. We're in Texas, so we don't need a space to keep jackets/hats/gloves, because it's only cold enough to need them about 2 weeks out of the year. So they stay in the coat closet. And we don't get snow/ice so we don't take our shoes off when we come in the house. I probably should have written "drop zone" instead.