Any ideas for our Cozy Cottage
Nature by Design
13 days ago
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Mae Day Organizing and Interior Design
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Cozy lake cottage addition--need help with floorplan!
Comments (22)If I'm understanding you correctly about the "back of the house is buried in rock up to about 5 ft up the wall" then everything your builder shows as 1st floor addition is really going to be pretty much underground. That's why that whole space is being given over to "mech room" instead of living space. Is that right? I think you're right that an L-shaped staircase would work better. But, unless you want to lower the slope of the roof over your kitchen and living room area, there is not a whole lot you can do that would result in upstairs windows being "closer to the floor." The roof height of the lower floor pretty much dictates where windows that face the lake on the upper floor can start. You don't indicate how you access the deck on the lake side of the house. Is there a sliding door or something leading from the living room? In addition to the things you mentioned that you didn't like on your architect's first draft, I don't like it that taking half that interior wall down leaves you with a view from your kitchen straight into the bathroom toilet. And, you don't mention where you keep the washer/dryer. If you don't have one currently, I would think that at a lake house, getting a laundry room to deal with wet towels and swim suits would be a priority. Here's what I came up with. (It really is pretty much what you suggested re L-shaped staircase and putting bathroom in the back right corner where the closet was; and from the exterior would look pretty much identical to your architect's plan. First floor: Second floor: The dimensions of the upstairs addition is 18' x 22' (since you didn't specify, I used those as the outer dimensions) and I've drawn the current plan as accurately as I could based on your sketch. The two closets upstairs closets are admittedly very very small but for a vacation house, small closets might be okay. And you don't have to go thru one bedroom to reach the other plus both upstairs bedrooms have a place for the bed. This is sketched with a 42 inch wide staircase with enough risers to for a 10 ft floor to floor rise. The plant shelf at the bend in the stairs, along with windows allowing light into the staircase, should make the staircase feel nice and spacious. Downstairs, this gives you a nice sized laundry room with room for some storage space under the stairs. Unfortunately, given the slope at the back of your house, the laundry wouldn't get any natural light unless you could put in a window well or maybe install some solar tubes. I've shown a normal sized dining room table for six. The space around the dining table is pretty tight but I think it would work. In order to keep the path to the staircase open, you would not be able to center the dining table in the room so an alternative might be to have a bench seating for 1/2 the table built-in against wall next to the bathroom. That way the table wouldn't require as much width in the admittedly small dining room space. I went back and forth about where to put the door leading into the laundry. You'd have more useable storage space if the door were over next to the door leading from laundry to mech room. But then you would always have to be working your way clear around the table to get to the laundry room so I think this is probably better. An alternative design might be to switch the laundry and mech rooms which would allow you to have a window in the laundry room (nice) but would force you to access it via the downstairs bathroom which isn't so great. There might be another alternatives swapping the laundry and mech room AND putting in a hallway leading from living room to laundry room if you were willing to tear out and completely redo the downstairs bath...but I'm guessing that a bathroom renovation is not in your anticipated budget. Finally, I think this would allow you to have small pantry which you desperately need and it blocks the view from the kitchen into the bathroom. Let me know what you think....See MoreFurniture ideas for my cozy deck
Comments (3)A pic would help. With an 8 x 10 space you should be able to add some comfortable furniture, and if you don't make it comfortable you'll never use the area. Post over on the Home Decor forum for more suggestions. Lots of folks over there have decorated their decks....See MoreCozy cottage in WA state, built for 2
Comments (15)I agree 100%, Lynn. After reading that article, I did some exploring to find out the price of them and found THIS ONE It's status = Sold-Pending since April 17, 2017, for $489,000, and the sq.ft cost is $485. A few outside pics of others that have sold; some are houses and some are condos. https://www.landcast.com/development/43260/greenwood-ave-cottages-shoreline-wa Another article on them - http://tinyhousetalk.com/961-sq-ft-beltane-cottage-at-greenwood-avenue-cottages/ And another that sold a year ago with pics - https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.972836089416125.1073741830.172947309405011&type=3I really liked the loft in the one that's pending - ETA - aputernut, I think the tiny house movement began in the 70's. A tiny house, according to this Wikipedia article- LINK "Frequently, the distinction is made between small (between 400 square feet (37 m2) and 1,000 square feet (93 m2)), and tiny houses (less than 400 square feet (37 m2)), with some as small as 80 square feet (7.4 m"...See MoreLooking for advice how to make our backyard more cozy and inviting
Comments (7)Visit the blog www.livinginyellow.com. She is a fashion blogger and has a great in-ground pool area that is decorated with practical, comfortable and cute furnishings! I promise if you search through her photos, you'll get some inspiration ideas. She's also pretty good about posting where she buys from!...See MoreNature by Design
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