What a lovely home. I especially like your kitchen color....beautiful. You mentioned several times that something seems off about how the different colors butt up against each other. I see that too. Like some of the planes of color don't seem to make sense or "collide", I think you said. I think you will for sure want to get that figured out if you paint the family room or it's still going to bug you. I can see how hard it is to find the right place to end and stop colors in an open plan like you have. Just as an example: You know the horizontal plane above your sink where you have the hook and is currently white? I think that should be your russet kitchen color under there, and continue all the way over to your dining area where the white column starts. Know what I mean? It would look like the thick structural element it is. A similar thing is happening over the desk area in the kitchen. I think the "ceiling" of that inset space should also be the dark color rather than white----again, it would thicken up the structure of that inset area and wouldn't cut it up like it is now. There's definitely a collision of color when you look at the two columns by your kitchen table, and running over to the staircase, like you mentioned. What would you think if you used the white column color on the skinny bit of high-up vertical wall right there (started from the left side of the left column over to the staircase)? I think it would eliminate some of the choppiness and also would help define the columns/railing element as something in an of itself. There might be some other odd intersections of colors to look at too. People here can definitely help sort that out.

Oh, ok. I thought you were an accountant! (CPA rtist) LOL!!!! At least then you understand the intangibles that are always present in a well designed house. I like your magazine cover.....congratulations......AND it incorporates the rule of thirds!! A couple of ideas. Lower the ceiling from 9'4"to 7'6" just at the 2nd floor bath entry and put the unit up there on a platform. Looks like then we'll have about 3' to the bottom of the rafters but we might not even need the lowered ceiling to achieve that. It's so small it can be easily insulated. Should not count against the house area as it's not habitable space. And the air filter is at the return grill at the floor level so you don't have to go up there to change it. I did this in one of my own houses and it worked great. A quarter turn of a latch with a dime or penny on the hinged grill and out popped the filter. We could do the same thing above in the back of the garage. Looks like we have about an 11' ceiling height there. If so we'd have to separate the unit from the garage with 5/8" drywall on a normal wall assembly just like it was interior space so we get the typical separation from the garage. Don't know why your guy isn't thinking up this stuff instead of you and I. Another LOL!! As an afterthought got you more closet space in your studio but still underwhelmed by the elevation(s). EDIT: Was putting away the drawing and in looking at it, just thought of a third place for the HVAC unit.....in the ceiling/roof above the kitchen/dining area but accessed from your studio on the second floor.

Regarding the sq. footage, if you look at the image in the original post, it looks like it is 2546. Back to the initial request, if you are trying to squeeze out every possible square foot, maybe take the time to lay out furniture on the plan to see where you may have an issue or opportunity. For instance, that is a lot of space in the bedroom, which would make sense if you have a big bedroom set of furniture. These days it seems like people are opting for more walk-in closets with storage systems that take the place of needing to have any dressers in the bedroom (possibly some bookcases and a flat-screen TV). Regarding the garage size, check the width/length of the vehicles you plan on parking in there and assure you still have space for other things you want to store. I've seen some recommendations to shrink garage size, but then you need to account for space somewhere else. If you have a truck or large SUV, you might also be constrained.

I like your plan. I think glass is pretty easy to clean and you will have a hood, so not too worried about your cooktop there unless you fry stuff in grease and let it splatter all over constantly! We only had a painted BS behind the range in our original kitchen and a wipe once in a while was fine. You certainly have to balance things you can't have everything perfect when doing a remodel because of existing constraints! We are in the midst of our kitchen remodel right now. We have a small kitchen but opened up the wall to the dining/living area and removed the counter under the window in order to gain drawer space and walking space, moved the sink to the peninsula. A peninsula is another option for you but I think your wall of fridge/ovens looks good. I would fill that corner with full cabinets though and not have a recessed area that might be hard to reach (to the left of the ovens). Here is our original floor plan - approximated as it was not an Ikea kitchen. The wall at the top had a "pass through" window to DR, the fridge was awkwardly placed in the middle of the wall and DW right next to it (more dead space than shown here with Ikea cabinets, no super susans) and the range was right next to the doorway with the light switch above it! Opening any appliance meant no one else could walk around in the room. This is the new layout for our Ikea kitchen, after much guidance from this forum. We also considered cooktop on the peninsula but we decided against it not only due to the visual interference of the hood, but because DH was worried our cats - who are not allowed on the counters but are occasionally naughty - might jump up there and get burned or cause an accident... and when we entertain we use that area as a "buffet" and even with the cooktop not in use we worried that guests settling down dishes etc might crack the cooktop by being careless. So instead, at somewhat increased expense due to labor (we are on concrete slab) we moved the sink and DW to the peninsula and I think we will be very happy with this layout. When we entertain, dirty dishes can be easily loaded into the DW right from the peninsula. The range will be safely off to the side, and we have a great food storage wall with pantries/fridge. The floorplan doesn't show but we will have an overhand toward the DR, the counter will be 36" on the peninsula but no cabinets on that side as 15" more was too much stolen from the DR.