I really like your plan but if I might suggest a couple of minor tweaks... 1) Flip the entry door to the masterbedroom so that it opens against the powderroom wall instead of against the masterbath wall. That way, when the bedroom door is open it won't partially block the entry to the bathroom. 2) Then, after doing the above, you can move the the opening to the masterbath toward the front of the house so that it starts about 1 ft from the wall separating the toilet room from the rest of the bath. This would allow you to put in a swinging door that opens toward the toilet room wall. Because this door would open more than 90 degrees, when fully open it should not block the entry to the toilet area. 3) The space between the shower and tub in the master bath looks like it is too narrow to be of any particular use. Have you considered just incorporating it into the shower area thereby making a large "neo-angle" shower instead of a rectangular one? 4) In the pantry, if you swap sides with the narrow and deeper cabinets so that, as you come into the pantry you are facing the narrow shelves instead of the deeper ones, it would help alleviate the sense that one was "walking into shelves." You could also angle off a couple of inches of the corner of the shelf is closest to the pantry door so there is no corner sticking out to accidentally walk into. If you don't need or want enough deep cabinetry to cover the entire right hand wall, you could use narrow shelving or cabinets for the 4 or 5 feet closet to the pantry window. (I don't agree about getting rid of the pantry window. That window is on the front of your house and, while you didn't post your front elevation, I suspect you need the pantry window to maintain the "rythm" of the repeating windows across the front of the house.) Across the end of the pantry (under the window), I'd put in a base cabinet to provide another work surface. I might even put another sink in under the pantry window thereby convert the entire pantry into a working "butler's pantry". 5) It isn't totally clear to me where that mountain view is in relation to your house but if by "to the right" you meant toward the northeast, I would want a window on the northeast wall of the study to capture that view. You might also consider windows on the NE and SW exterior walls of the girls' rooms upstairs. Although they already have lovely large windows, light from two directions is always nice - especially if the view in those directions is good. 6) In the kitchen, I would center the sink in the center of the curving bulkhead. Aesthetically, I just think having the sink centered would be more pleasing. You might want to move the dishwasher to the other side of the sink but this shouldn't be a problem if your aisleways are wide enough. (I'm guessing you'll have 42" or more.) Is that HP/OVEN a wall oven? I hope not because you really should have at least 12" of free counter top on either side of your stove to set things down if you need to. 18" would be better. But a wall oven right next to the stove would mean you would have no free countertop space on that side. Not good. If you are planning a fancy hood over your stove, I would also love to see some way to line the stove and hood up with your island but with the current size kitchen, I see no way to do that. I'm not understanding exactly what you meant by moving a kitchen wall by 18 inches to make room for trim around the office door... but you do need to figure out a way to gain a few inches there. Is your intention to move the counter with the sink 18" into the dining room area? If so, then I would consider flipping the (undercounter???) oven and stove because, with the wider kitchen, I think that might allow you to line up the stove and hood with the island and still have 12" or so of counter space to the right of your stove. which might allow you to line up the stove and it's hood with the island. Note however that your sink is already a good long distance from your fridge. If you move it 18" further away, I would put the prep sink on the side of the island closet to the fridge. That would give you a prep zone on the front side of your island and a clean up zone on the backside. Be aware that you'll have traffic through your kitchen prep zone so you'll want that aisle to be nice and wide. 4 ft minimum, 4.5 ft would be better. 7) Do make absolutely sure how deep an alcove you will need for your refrigerator/freezer. Better to lose a couple of inches more pantry space now than wind up with your built-ins not fitting! 8) Upstairs, I don't know about your daughters but my experience with teenaged girls is that there are certain times of the month when they might want a hot soaking bath instead of a shower. Plus, bathtubs in some of the secondary bedrooms would give the house more resale value since families with small children want tubs. So, instead of the small showers, I would consider putting in a tub/shower combo up against the front (windowed) wall in each of those upper bathrooms. Move the toilets where the vanities currently are and the vanities where the showers currently are. If I'm reading the dimensions correctly, those windows are only 24 inches (600 mm) tall anyway - so the bottom of the window is probably 4.5 to 5 ft from the floor. That means that if someone were showering right in front of the window, only their head would be visible from the street. So privacy isn't really an issue. But, even if it is, you can use glue-chip glass in the windows. To protect the windows from moisture while showering, you can either slope the inner window sill slightly and tile it, or hang a second shower curtain (cut short) where it can be pulled across the windows. 9) Also, be very careful when planning to put pocket doors in closets. Remember that your clothes hanging rod has to be supported by solid bracing... not just sheetrock. There may not be enough room in a standard thickness wall for both a pocket door and that necessary bracing to support a clothes hanging rod. 10) I definitely agree about insetting the laundry room door and was going to suggest that until I saw that you had already intended to do it. 11) I'm not sure what you mean by dryers in Australia not being vented to the outside. Dryers put out a tremendous amount of lint. If they are not properly vented, where does the lint go? Into a wall cavity? Or is it just dumped in the space between the dryer and the wall? I can't imagine having to pull my dryer away from the wall constantly to clean behind it! And if the lint is just dumped into the the space between walls (vented into the walls), it is going to build up and, combined heat from the dryer, become a huge fire hazard. So, even if nobody else vents their dryers to the outside in Australia, I strongly encourage you to insist on properly venting yours. It can be vented through your roof if you don't want the vent on the front of your house. Just my ideas on how to make a lovely plan just tiny bit better! I do hope you'll post the elevation drawings because it is a great plan. And, when you start building, [pst some pics of the property and views. It sounds beautiful!

I'm having trouble looking at the plan too. The font is tiny, and I can't tell which rooms are which upstairs. How will this house be used? Is it a vacation home, or will all those bedrooms be full all the time? How many people will live/stay here? It looks like there's no interior staircase from the garage to the upstairs. Is that typical in your area? This looks like a beach house to me, so you may plan to use the garage more for storage of beach toys than parking, but even so, having stairs that are protected from the weather would be important to me-- hauling groceries upstairs in the rain is not fun. And based on the number of bedrooms you've got planned, you're going to need a lot of food! When people have posted plans with the wraparound stairs you've got inside in other plans, one of the experts usually tells them they're not up to code. Apparently those tiny angled stairs aren't allowed in new construction. It's a good first effort, but I agree with Mrs. Pete that the room sizes are all off. The kitchen is too big to work in efficiently (the work triangle is massive), the dining room is awkwardly long and narrow (I'm in a 12 foot wide dining room right now, and I wouldn't want to lose 2 feet of width-- if a big person sat at the far end of the table and needed to leave during the meal, they may have real trouble squeezing between seated people and the wall to get out. If you go this way, I'd buy a narrower than standard table and seat people on benches. I think you should place furniture in the living room to see if you can come up with an arrangement that makes you happy. Your kitchen and living room have a bigger footprint than my entire first house-- it's a whole lot of open space for just sofas and cooking. Good luck! I'm sure you're going to have a beautiful home!

IMO, a list of spaces, their approximate size and how you want to use them would be more helpful to an architect. This diagram suggests you want certain relationships that might not be accurate or important to you. Confusing or misleading your architect can waste a lot of time and result in missed design opportunities. Floorplanner software is hopelessly amateurish. For instance, the stair winders are ridiculously unrealistic. You would need to add over 6 ft to the length of these stairs for safety and code compliance. Many people think input from an architect is more valuable in the later stages of design but in my experience it is just as valuable in the early stages.

bubbafide I'm also undertaking new construction on land we bought a few years ago. Like you I sketched some plans myself and saved lots of pictures that I liked. Then we met last July with a custom home builder in the town near our property. We liked him a lot. He told us which local home designer he thought was the best and we signed a contract with her to design the home. Meanwhile the builder visited our site and told us the best place to build and which direction to face. The designer didn't like my plan but I think it helped us with thinking about the functions we wanted in the house. It took us about 6 months of intense discussions and back and forth to finalize the floor plan with the designer and the builder. The home builder and his construction supervisor made a lot of critiques and suggestions to the floor plan. Then we had another intense go-around with all parties on the electrical plan. Then there was a month for the builder to cost out the plan and give us a price quote. They started construction two weeks after we approved the budget. I'm not sure on your utilities but we also had a three-month wait during the design phase for a water well digger to get around to us. (hope you don't have that problem) Last week they started construction on our foundation. This is all to say that I think your next step is to select a custom home builder and then use a designer or architect they recommend since they need to work closely together. I'm in Texas so can't help with specific suggestions but perhaps you could start with looking at home builders who have done a style of house that you like. We went with a home builder whose specialty is environmental issues. Please let me know if you have any questions on the general process.