No expert, but the bathroom in bedroom #3 has a lot of doors for such a small place. Master bath seem strangely configured, and kind of tight. Can you steal a bit of room from the master closet?

Good point with the doors. I think I will make the door going into the bathroom from the bedroom a pocket door, hopefully that will help some!

You need an architect. Home plans are not something anyone without proper training should DIY.

A few notes

-You're wasting so much space with that pantry design

-Your main floor powder room is in an off location

-The master bath/closet needs rework. They're poorly laid out

-Do you really want a sink in the island? And a curved island too?

-Dining room is far from the kitchen

-The bath in bed 3 has too many doors

-That garage seems massive

-You don't have any sort of coat closet for guests

Make the closet in BR3 open from the room, not the bath, and your door problem is fixed. Otherwise, I agree with most of the previous comment -- in particular, the pantry seems large but is getting ruined by a pointless hallway -- and you need a pro to draw this up and consider issues, even when only dealing with one floor.

Thank you for the feedback. We've had a coat closet in the last few houses and never used it, but we live in the south and don't wear coats much so maybe that is why :) The half bath and dining room are closer to the main area than our previous houses so I don't think we will mind too much. For the pantry I had asked friends and family what they would change in their own homes and almost every single one said a larger pantry so I wanted to make sure it was big enough. And yes the garage is BIG. We are building on 78 acres so we will have a lot of tools and an ATV to store so we need room. :) Thank you all for your feedback. I will be revisiting the master bath and the pantry!

I think you're missing the point. Just because things are "closer than they were before" does not mean this new plan is good. It's not about size, it's about usable space, which this plan does not capitalize on.

To put it bluntly: This plan is not good. Hire a professional.

I'm curious about room sizes. Bedroom 3 is quite large, large enough for 3-4 children, but the bathroom is small and the arrangement with closet only works for one. Since you appear to homeschool, I'm going to assume that Br3 provides lots of space for doing projects, where the student can control the light 100%.

The study is also quite large, yet the schoolroom is long and narrow. Is it more of a resource center for materials? The schoolroom is about the same size as the closet in the study.

None of the bathrooms have a window. None? If you don't need bathroom windows, why not put the kid baths on the inside of the house and the bedrooms on the outside, so they can have some daylight and check the weather, The bathrooms, they could have solatubes (the light effects are very cool in a thunderstorm!)

You don't say which direction it will face, but there are no windows at all on the left and right sides of the house. Our house has nearly the same issue, just a small window on the two ends of the house, and we don't like it at all.

If you are on a farm, I imagine that you are all in and out a lot. Wouldn't you like a breezeway, screened or enclosed, as an entry point between garage and house? It could have a door to the outside so you are not always having to go through the garage. I love the bathroom in the garage, something we couldn't do up north here!

Here are my thoughts:

Pantry-For a (assuming larger) homeschooling family, you need a Large Pantry. I will have a 6*8 pantry on the main floor in addition to a basement pantry. I will also have much more kitchen cabinets than in your plan. Your pantry has too tight of a walkspace. I would put cabinetry or the fridge on the pantry opening space and put a pantry behind the kitchen (in your master area) with a walk through cabinetry door, probably where the fridge is now.

School Room-Nice length to the room, but the 7 feet depth is not comfy. Take it to the depth of your door opening since you would be eliminating the pantry. Then you could also have a closet space in there behind your new kitchen cabinetry/fridge.

Dining Room-Fine location if it wasn't the only eating space. This would be better located where the porch is off the kitchen. You could move bedroom 2 so you still had your large porch.

Foyer-Imagine where your furniture/fireplace will be. Your view from the foyer would be nicer if it came in more to the right (in the space the dining room is)

Powder Room-Nix the current powder location by the master suite. Move the study's closet/bathroom. Make that bathroom accessible from hallway instead.

-Lots of hallway for study/bedrooms that could be minimized.

-Assuming you are putting 2+ kids in each bedroom, the closet space does not seem sufficient for clothing and any other storage they may need?

Laundry-Do you really want to walk through the laundry space to get in and out of the house?

Master Suite-This is a really long hallway to get to the master. Some rearranging could be done. Maybe bump the back half of the garage out....bringing the master bedroom in and adjusting the closet/bathroom to the back half of the current garage?

Things I do not do to my clients:

Make access to closets directly from a bathroom.

Provide insufficient space to clean around a free standing bathtub.

Angled walls without good reason.

Barn doors.

Turn corners with clothes rods.

Provide large expanses of exterior walls without windows.

Rooms with insufficient natural light.

inadequately sized closets.

And more things that I see in this plan that I don't have time to point out.

.

Don't try to take someone else's bad design and fix it to be yours. Find a local architect to design a home with you that meets your needs and fits your site. Good design starts with the site.

What everyone above has said, plus the DR is too tiny for a family of 4. I have a DR that is nearly square - almost 13x13 - and it is too small, in particular, too narrow. When people are seated at the table, I cannot walk around behind them to serve or remove plates. I do have a very wide table and a sideboard, but in reality a DR needs to be about 15 ft wide and if large groups will be sitting in it, with multiple leaves in the table, it should be 17 ft long. Otherwise, it's very awkward to use. It's a lot of space, which is why most homes today no longer have a DR - can't afford all that square footage.

Thank you all! We only have 2 children. I will read through the comments. Thank you so much for the feedback!

Why are bathrooms and closets getting the choice locations on the outside of the house? The spaces where you can have multiple windows should go to bedrooms and public rooms. This is an extremrly dark house for the occupants.

Its not good design.

KP,

Your floor plan is better that the average DIY plan I have seen at this forum. You have a kitchen window! (make sure the porch is not too low so the great room and kitchen get a lot of natural light.).

Do you have exterior elevations or an inspiration picture?

Having said that: The left half of the plan is not too bad, there are fixable issues (mainly bathroom and closet layout/locations) and the hallway is a bit too narrow.

The right area needs a lot of work. The pantry, the way it is, is not that functional or big (and it could be).

When I look at your master bath I get this feeling of sadness (lol, but, really).

You will get there, good luck

I don't think it's awful as some have said, but I do think it could be improved. If you are going to the trouble to build a custom home, it is well worth it to hire an architect, even if they just look over and tweak your current design. You won't regret it.

I would make your kitchen an L-shape with the sink under the windows at the top of the plan. Then square off the island and put seating on the left and bottom of it. I would make the pantry a rectangle with shelving on each side. You'll have just as much shelving, but use the space more efficiently. Right now, it looks like it would be really hard to get into that skinny part at the end.

I would also highly recommend rearranging the kid's rooms so the bedroom has the exterior wall and the bath and closets are on the inside. Move bedroom 2's closet and bath to the porch side. Reconfigure bedroom 3 so the bath is on the inside. you could also move the office's bath and closet to the foyer side to make room for bedroom 3's bathroom on that side. Also, does the office need it's own bathroom? That could double as your guest bathroom if you opened it to the hallway and then you could eliminate the extra half bath.

A school room that's only 7' deep? I guess the kids will shimmy past one another.

Where are the elevations?

Where are the mechanicals?

Which direction faces north?

Is there a reason you don't want any natural light in your bathroom, your kitchen and bedroom 3?

Is there a reason you put bathrooms and closets against exterior walls instead of having windows on 2 walls in the bedrooms?

How do you intend to get into the back of the pantry? It's too narrow.

Is there a reason your mudroom is sharing space with your laundry?

Why the extra long hallway to the master? Thats just wasted space.

How is the child in bathroom 2 supposed to get into the tub?

The toilet in the study doesn't look like it has enough room. Code states that there needs to be 15" from center of the toilet to a wall or cabinet.

A refrigerator can't be against a wall because you can't open the doors wide enough.

The dining room is small.

The house will be dark.

Ideally to let the most light in, you want a house where it's only 1-2 rooms deep so that you can get windows on at least two exterior walls throughout the house.

If you're in the south, building on 78 acres, why do you need the garage attached the way it is. Attach a single or a 2 car garage and have a separate building for the other stuff you need.

The half bath and dining room are closer to the main area than our previous houses so I don't think we will mind too much.

If you're building a custom house, you can have things exactly the way they should be. Don't settle for less.

We're a home schooling family too, and one of the benefits has been the ability to tailor our kids' educations to our kids, and avoid the cookie cutter, "once size fits all" aspect. Another benefit has been able to help our kids with both their strengths and their weaknesses. I've also found there are some areas, especially as the kids developed certain interests -- such as ornithology -- where I just had to hand the subject off to an expert. Which is to say, make the most of this opportunity to build a custom house, and also know when to call in additional help : ) .

Good luck with this next adventure!

This is an instance where an architect could save you more than their fee by eliminating wasted space.

The only time a house should not have windows on the sides is when it is a townhouse or row house that is attached to another structure.

. . . Or you have received an attractive offer from Mail Pouch chewing tobacco to put a billboard there.

In the house i will be selling soon, there is a bedroom 9 feet wide. It is fine as a kid's bedroom, or an office. I am trying to imagine the functionality of a room two feet narrower - and it certainly wouldn't be as a school room, holding 3 people at ease and unconstricted at a time.

Did you tell us which way is north?

A true architect can design so that windows will enlighten all four sides of your home.

You are in the south, so you say you don't need a coat closet? What about when it rains?

That kitchen continent is nearly the size of one of the baths.

Master suite thoughts:

- Since the master jig-jogs out towards the back, you could have windows on three sides -- would be attractive. Completely different thought: That's a long hallway to the master. Think of fire safety and put in a backyard door ... or a door to the porch.

- Look at the floor plan and imagine yourself bringing in big bedroom furniture. It's not possible. You won't be able to make the turns.

- Circulation in this area is poor. Here's a way to improve it:

Move the bedroom door waaaaay down to where I've added a red wall. This moves your bedroom door out of the way of both the bathroom and the closet doors ... and it allows you a second door into the closet, which means you're now carrying clothes a shorter distance between the laundry and closet (imagine carrying baskets through the bathroom /making a turn - no thanks).

It's still a long, dark hallway. I'd move some things around.

Given that you have a large master closet right there, I'd remove the small linen closet ... and keep linens /things just inside the main closet ... losing that one door gives you more wall space for art in the bathroom, and the function is unchanged.

Note that your toilet closet doesn't work. Imagine you enter the room, your choices are to scoootch between the toilet and the wall or to stand on the toilet so you can close the door. I'd lose the toilet closet altogether.

I agree that you don't have adequate space for the tub.

I also agree that bathrooms are 100% better with natural light.

Kitchen thoughts:

- I like a large pantry, but I don't like the curved space. Reaching things in the back corner will not be convenient.

- You've got a lot of space between the island and the window. I'd move the backyard door to this kitchen space /let the great room be all window ... it'll allow for better furniture placement in both the great room and the patio, and it'll give you direct access to that outdoor cooking spot. I'd go with a big slider -- so much more practical than French doors.

- Someone else commented on the sink in the island. I'm ambivalent about that, but be aware that sinks in islands are terribly expensive.

- I agree that the dining room is too far from the kitchen for convenience. Yeah, maybe your current dining room is farther still, but you want BEST, not better than I have now. You know the poem: Good, better, best. Never let it rest 'til your good is better, and your better is best.

School room and study:

- Why are these both needed?

- The school room is too narrow to be much use, and what will you do with that narrow space after the children are raised?

Kids' bedrooms:

- You're building 4 full + 1 half bath for four people. Do you love cleaning toilets? I'd go with one nice-sized bathroom between the two kids' rooms -- with plenty of storage. Something like this -- I also made the walk-in closets into a jack-and-jill closet -- cool for the kids to have a "secret connection" between their rooms and very practical if you one day have one adult kid come back home /he or she can have access to both closets. The three rooms are all the exact same size as Bedroom 2 was originally, but it chops a lot of square footage off the house, and each bedroom can have lots of nice, natural light -- as can the bathroom. .

Overall, the house looks like a combination of all the things "nice houses are supposed to have" -- but without a lot of thought /editing as to what really works. If it's a first-draft, it's a good start -- but I'd want to edit it 'til it's a whole lot better.

KP,

That looks great Naf_Naf! You incorporated everything people said. It really fixes a lot of the problems.

Ah, that feels better. You might, maybe, extend the living room wall across from the closet, to contain sound a bit better, and better separate the public and private spaces.

and, would it be an easy change to move the powder room to between the schoolroom and laundry?

Thank you for your nice words, Emily.

bp, yes, is possible to move the powder room and the good thing is that the Laundry will get more area and part of the hallway can be incorporated to the laundry.

-

The quality of the pictures once they are uploaded to the forum is terrible! There are a lot of dashed lines that do not show, my original pic had good quality.

Well done on the plan Naf_Naf.

Here is a quickie rendering using it. Not sure about the dormers I added, but they would bring light into the core of the house.

I wonder about making the bathroom and closet back to back, making way for a corner window.

I don't know where you are building, but if it's in a location that freezes, you have a major problem--you've got plumbing running in exterior walls. That is a big no-no.

And, 6 bathrooms? For 4 people?

A practical matter: Where is the water heater (or will you have multiple ones)? Look at how far apart the fixtures are that use water--hot water. How long will you have to let the water run to get warm water from the water heater?

A real architect would take that into consideration. He would also ( as much as possible) place plumbing fixtures on common walls to share pipe and drain runs and simplify venting.

By placing windows in the middle of bedroom walls, you are limiting the options of arranging furniture (but at least it lo longer will seem like the cave that the first one was).

When you walk down the hall to the garage, why can't you walk straight into the garage rather than jogging around the bathroom every time? If the laundry/mudroom/bath were combined and rearranged, you could get rid of the pointless outhouse in the garage and have easier access to the house.

PPF,
Wow, you are fast! Nice job, and looks like you are one of those persons that know the dimensions by just looking at something :)
Yes, it is always good to cluster bathrooms, but this time I went with creating a buffer space between bedrooms. If I had a saying, I'd get rid of one or two bathrooms.

You could make a jack-and-jill bathroom between the two bedrooms to cut down on the number of bathrooms. Put a door on the shower/toilet area and have two sinks. Would simplify a bit.