So if we were to do a 1.5 story with the master on the main level, where would you put that, behind the garage then? My thought process would be to first determine priority of room placement in the most ideal location for the use of the room and then if conflicts between room placement develop then rank by how much time is spent and how time is used for each room as well as the importance of that use compared to the importance of the uses for the other rooms. If watching the sunrise from your bed pays off with more enjoyment than having the sunrise and morning sun striking your kitchen, then plan accordingly. For instance, do you plan on using your master suite as a parental get-away from the kids, using it during the day or will your non-sleeping uses be restricted to evenings only, meaning that any views from the rooms would be lost to the darkness of the night? If the views are not important, I'd bury the master suite near the garage in the above sketch. If however, views and day time use are important, then I'd move the master to the east/south/west walls, perhaps right off the entry or in the back off of the kitchen. I'm not necessarily saying to put the master off the entry or off the kitchen, though you could, I'm just using these as examples that reference the above sketch. The way I'm designing my own home is to use a very self-reflective process which tries to understand how I actually live my life rather than trying to contort my lifestyle into architectural trends which presuppose how people SHOULD live their lives. So, to continue on the questioning, why exactly do you appreciate a main-floor master? Is it so that you can avoid stairs? Is it so that you can hear the comings and goings of the kids at night as they try to leave the house, is it because you don't want the kids too near your bedroom, is it because you don't want noise transmission from the master to be easily heard by the kids, and so on? Once you can articulate to yourself why you want something then you can find the best solution for your plan, rather than adopting a cookie-cutter approach. For instance, what I found amusing in some plans was a main floor master with a child's bedroom directly over it on the 2nd. Now, to me, if the goal was to reduce noise transmission from either the child's room to the parent's room or vice versa, the separation by floor, while having intuitive appeal, would fail to achieve the mission. The example I used in an earlier comment was to have a master suite separated by a stairway corridor AND a children's hallway which together create a 7'-8' dead zone, possibly with some walls other than the master and child's bedroom walls also added in between. There are no common walls shared, there is a huge dead zone in between and the goal of reducing noise transmission is, I believe, better served than a downstairs master with an upstairs child's bedroom directly over top, sharing common ceiling/floor as well as sound transmission paths down the walls. Of course, if sound transmission has nothing to do with the appeal of a downstairs master suite, then what I've sketched out is a solution to a problem which doesn't exist, or doesn't matter. I was thinking the master/office space on one side and then the kitchen, dining, great room on the other. That makes sense to me. Would you move the great room from the center of the house below to the front where the dining study is and move the study to where the great room is? Lots of configurations can make sense, but they must make sense in relation to how you envision yourself using the space and the particulars of your lifestyle and preferences. I'd say grab some graph paper, or even blank paper, and just block out the rooms and see how they interplay with each other, note how you foresee traffic patterns within and throughout the space, imagine daily routines taking place within the space. Once you have an idea of how you live, or how you want to live in the new space, then get the graph paper and try to get a better handle on size and furniture placement, and traffic patterns and by the end of this process you should have a very good understanding of how you want the space to be configured. I did the same for my house and this has resulted in me doing away with a formal living room from the now traditional LR/FR combo pack and reallocating the space elsewhere in the home, such as combining the entry with the LR space in order to create a larger sense of space/volume, has led me to create a larger kitchen than would be warranted in relation to the size of the informal living room, has led me to other design changes that likely violate what trained architects use as benchmarks for how homes should be designed. Thank you for the garage tip also - I thought 24x24 was rather large? We will be getting an oversize door for sure. I'd say measure your cars, block out a 24 x 24 space on your lawn, use cardboard boxes or something else to fill the space of your cars, then throw in the other junk you're likely to store alongside the walls of the garage, and see how much space you actually need. Try to get out of your car and see if the door bangs the wall or the other car. A 24 x 24 garage is actually pretty good considering that many designed give a 20 x 23 or something similarly ridiculous.

Chipsa, if one climbs stairs from one habitable level to another habitable level there are two (2)habitable floor levels. What we may have here is a real estate/consumer terminology vs. the building code/architectural terminology. In determining floors, it matters not if the second level is under the roof, has pony walls or full height walls. Horizontal or sloped ceilings have nothing to do with the number of floors. The historical Cape Cod simply was an economical approach to a 2-story house, with the second story in the attic, under the existing roof framing! Dormers may or may not have been added for light on the rake side of the roof. But it was clearly a 2-story house with habitable floors on two levels. History is full o examples of buildings with unusual floor definitions. The mansard roof, for example, was a device to add a floor in Parisian houses without having to pay taxes for another floor in the house (it was under the "roof", not a normal floor enclosed by walls as defined by the tax regulations). Today, no one questions that it was a habitable floor despite the fact that it was under the sloping "roof" and illuminated by dormer windows. To determine floors, just count the floors connected by stairs--it's that simple! If there are stairs connecting two habitable levels it's a 2-story building. Conncecting three habitable levels means a 3-story house. The definition of floors really has nothing to do with wall types, wall heights, types of ceilings or types of windows. The only way one would have 1.5 stories is if one floor is only a half level above the next. Sometimes these are called "split levels", but even these most generally have a portion with one habitable floor above another. All of that said, it's really not that important whether one prefers to call something 1.5 stories or 2 stories. It's just important to remember whether one is talking in marketing terms or in terms of the building code and design/construction. Whatever floats one's boat!

Windows like you are describing are quite common for your house design. I suggest you try to find copies of books describing and picturing this style in the Hudson Valley; I think in a house as old as yours choosing the right style of dormer to go with the pitch of your roof would be very important to the look. I live in mid 19th c. house in the upper Hudson Valley so I am always interested in our local houses; I would be glad to post a list of books about Hudson River architectural styles, if you'd like. Inside, the windows will never be conventional (by modern standards that is) but will look just fine. I think you will find decorative treatments for these windows if you look for decorating books with pictures of English cottages, which often have low-ish second stories. You might find that casement windows work well for the sash design. FWIW, my second floor windows are only 22 inches from the floor, although they are full, double-hung windows in a full height room. (My house is Greek Revival with a deep entablature along the eaves which actually covers part of the room's height.) I kind of like my low windows, I like being in bed and looking out and slightly down at the outside world. And my cats think they are great, too. One thing to keep in mind, though, may be the inescapable code requirements if these rooms are to be used for bedrooms. There are building code formulas that require certain sized window openings (or windows) for each sleeping space. In my experiece these code dimensions are sometimes not compatible with historic proportions (they are much larger and squarer). But historic house-lover that I am, I am also a former volunteer firefighter. We had a tragic incident in our town where children were trapped in attic bedrooms in a 19th c. 1 1/2 story house with only the typical "eyebrow windows". They couldn't get out through the small openings, but neither could firefighters in turn-out gear and breathing packs get in to save them. So even if you have a lax code enforcer or are inclined to ignore this, I urge you make sure there is sufficient means of escape. Another issue you will need to consider is how you insulate under the roof down to the knee walls. You can't just slap some insulation against the underside of your roof cladding, you'll need to make sure there's some air space there. Molly~

We've done a number of bungalow top ups (as well as 3rd floor additions on two-storey houses) and we've found them generally to be quicker and easier than rear additions (chiefly because there is no excavation and footing/foundation work). You also have the option to raise the walls when the roof is off the add ceiling height to the ground floor. Also, by using modern truss joists (the ones that look like I-beams), you have the opportunity to have a completely open plan ground floor with no load-bearing interior walls. We've never had any concerns raised by the architect, structural engineer or building inspectors with respect to the bearing capacity of the existing foundation of any homes we have worked on. A house built in 1974 will almost certainly have a foundation capable of carrying the weight of a 2nd storey addition (as long as it isn't finished with brick, which adds a lot of weight).