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Furniture Design Dilemma Storage & Closet

Need help with layout of a small sunroom!

Alison Kuczwara

4 years ago

We moved into a new house a few months ago and can't figure out what to do with this space! Photo is from the house listing; it's about 6'8" x 15', with a stairway immediately to the right of the window (with zero landing - it's a stairway straight out to the backyard), and the left of the bench shown is the entry to our kitchen. We definitely need some sort of coat/shoe storage (2 adults + twin 1.5 year olds in a house with no coat closets!) and ideally a place to sit to enjoy the sun… though I'm not in love with how the previous owners made use of the space. Any ideas on how to layout the space to make the most of it?? Thanks!!

Featured Answer

ShadyWillowFarm

4 years ago

Do you really want to sit in there with dirty shoes, dog food, sports equipment, etc? Mud rooms and sitting rooms don’t always combine well since mud rooms can get a bit chaotic, and a sitting rooms seems to request tranquility. If you are a neat nick, and your family members are too, you might be able to get it to work. Is that the main entry to the deck from the house, and is the deck large enough that you will use it for entertaining? It’s almost a pass-through space since the kitchen entry is diagonal from the deck slider. Do you enter the deck from the slider

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Comments (7)

tob123
4 years ago
following
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I like everything I see at your website homepage and have been following your kitchen progress from onset at the Kitchens forum. A young newlywed couple embarking on this whole house DIY renovation is truly ambitious and impressive! Your progress pictures and narratives of the plans and dreams make me look forward to MORE. A hallway connector from the breakfast room to the sunroom would look great and better serve you than an outside-only narrow alley betweeen the two rooms. (You'd be hard pressed to turn around with a broom in hand in a deadend alley between the two tall walls.) I have no doubt you'll find a perfect connection solution. So, who will be riding the lawnmower come spring? A huge homesite spread you have at seven acres (compared to So. Calif. standards anyway), but fortunately it looks that a goodly portion is wooded. Oh, the energy of youth!
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Thank you all for the great thoughts! It really helps to hear others' opinions. I do agree that I need something to hold the plants. I've been dragging my feet on this because I didn't know how I wanted the rest of the room to look, so I wasn't sure what kind of stand to buy. I also like the idea of the indoor/outdoor rug. I think that will bring color into the space and keep the floor a bit warmer (tile gets cold here in New England!). This is a high traffic room (since it's where we enter the house, as well as where guests enter), so I want it to look put together. I am thinking a sitting room is the way to go. I may consider moving some of my current living room furniture there and buying something new for the living room itself. I need to figure out the paint for this room also. I am thinking of a sunny cream (something like BM Windham cream) or perhaps a blue-green shade akin to BM Palladian Blue (have this in the dining room and it looks nice with the dark wood molding). Any thoughts on this?
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Get a pro KD and contractor on your site. ASAP. and don't waste time seeking online opinion of which there will be a thousand. ..................and not all will even be feasible. The "layout that makes sense" is one you develop WITH the designer, not a cabinet seller. It is in consideration of all that is on your wish list, and also what is possible within the space. Possible is partly a budget function, load bearing wall function and other things as well. What makes the most sense, is to EXPLORE those possibilities with a pro, ON your site.
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More pictures. I would like to paint the front door a more neutral color eventually!
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ShadyWillowFarm
4 years ago
Meant to ask if you use the deck slider as a main entry to the house?
acm
4 years ago
With all the doors and windows, I think you're unlikely to be able to get both a mud room and a pleasant sitting room out of the space in here, so decide which is more important. You could easily convert the current bench wall into a closet wall, either as open cubbies or as closed storage with bins and hanging zones.

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That might be your best bet, and maybe the single chair at the end with a proper reading lamp can be an occasional perch while passing through. But probably you'd sit outside, weather permitting...
Alison Kuczwara thanked acm
Alison Kuczwara
Original Author
4 years ago
Thank you everyone! @acm - I think your comment makes a lot of sense (and solves the issues @ShadyWillowFarm pointed out for me!) This space is used as pass-through - we normally use the side door, but as the weather gets better here in Chicago, we'll use the sliding door more often to hang out in the back yard/on the porch. I like the cubbies/open locker look, and as a bonus I think it'd add value to our home because of the lack of general closet space!
PRO
Celery. Visualization, Rendering images
4 years ago
last modified: 4 years ago
I did sitting corner in our Florida room.

First I created my mocking up

and then we ended up with Serta futon.
It is still in progress, waiting for my hubby to hang on wall art above the futon and throw pillows.
ShadyWillowFarm
4 years ago
You know, you could do a little bar cart or beverage station near the slider for the warmer months. And store grilling utensils, outdoor dinnerware and cutlery, tablecloths, citronella candles, etc.

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