Thanks for the beautiful eye candy, those are great inspiration pictures and I'm enjoying the "study."

birdie234 You said, "The current plan allows for the old house — which is essentially a knock–down — to eventually be demolished, leaving a new five bedroom house on the lot." What will support the right side of the new house when you tear down the old house? It seems like a ticklish job to reinforce the old structure to support the overlap of the new house. Will you have to support the new house while a new foundation is constructed or will you demolish part of the new house and then build it back? Will you build a new foundation inside the old house? I would expect a wall section of that construction and a written construction sequence from your designer before trying to design the facade. You also said, "The second floor is attached because we are using the space between the dormer and the new house." That doesn't require the houses to overlap; the houses could share a foundation and the old dormer could be extended to meet the new house. The overlap makes no sense unless there is a zoning restriction. If the side yard setbacks don't limits the width of the house, you should pull the houses apart and save yourself a lot of headaches as well as improve the appearance of the house.. You have asked if the left gable could be eliminated. That might make sense but not if you intend to eventually tear down the old house. Your designer should be designing two projects: one with two attached houses and one with just the new house. Or do you intend to build a new wing in place of the old house? But first find out if the width of the houses can be increased. Whether it does or not, you have a tough design task ahead of you.

@Windows on Washington Ltd and @quasiexpert Sorry if my last message came through in a different tone, I'd been up for awhile and was just stream of consciousness posting. From my research here on this forum, it just seems that invariably quite a few posts discount the entry level windows and recommend the Anderson 400 or Marvin Integrity ++ type windows. Hoping that I can learn from you all. Our situation is a new construction in the deep South (Birmingham AL). About 60 windows on the house. Front facing windows I believe have to be aluminum clad, the rear might be able to get way with a vinyl window. Rear will be facing the South West, but looks like there will be some tree coverage as well as decks/roofing for the majority of the windows. The builder has spec'd Piva Group vinyl windows. They are Argon filled, double glazed, Low E 366. U-factor 0.26, SHGC 0.21, Visible Transmittance 0.49 and air leakage < 0.3. He mentioned that the Anderson 100's might be within the same price range, and we would be interested in the Smart Sun if it's available with the low E4 coating to help protect the wood floors. While I can appreciate the beauty of the wood interiors, our preference is for something low maintenance and can handle sun without fading. We've never had a double hung window before and a single hung is fine. We open the windows in our current house maybe 8-10 times a year to air the house out, otherwise they stay shut. Sadly, we wash our windows even less times /duck Given the above criteria, might you have some thoughts or recommendations, or are there any additional questions I might answer?

We have given thoughtful consideration to all suggestions - thank you. I would like to ask another question - not sure of Houzz protocol about starting new thread so forgive me if I err here. We have a beautiful elk antler chandelier and thinking about where to install in the new house ... great room is obvious choice. We could hang it from the middle beam in the room - other opinions? Here is a pic. Size is approx. 42" side-to-side and it is about 28" high ... without the chain. In this picture we don't have a very high ceiling in the entry so had to squish it close to the beam.. PS To give you all an idea of our aesthetic, my husband is a bow hunter and ranch/hunting style house is naturally where we lean ...