How To Confidently Create the Perfect Floor Plans For Your Home

This project spotlight features an Architectural Design Review of a new single-story home in North Carolina. Check out our previous article to learn more details about design reviews.

Do you have floor plans for your new home,
but you’re worried that they’re just not right yet?

You know you only get one shot at building your home and once the walls go up, that’s it. No going back. So it’s important that you create the perfect floor plans and home design for you and your family before you start building.

As is the case with many homeowners, you create a sketch of your house on a piece of paper or computer using whatever software you know best and hope that you’ve created a great design – because your next step is giving it to a builder or drafter to draw up and then soon after, build it.

But sometimes, you’re just not entirely confident in your design. You’re not sure if it’ll turn out the way you imagined in your head. You reach a bit of a stalemate. The design doesn’t sing, and you’re out of options and ideas.

In cases like these, an expert second opinion can be very worthwhile. Before you commit a lot of time, money, and energy to creating your perfect home, having a professional opinion on the design eases a lot of anxiety.

That’s where our Design Review service comes in. We believe that the design phase is one of the most critical parts of the home creation process to get the home just right. Here’s a spotlight on a Design Review we did for a new home in North Carolina.

The Homeowners and Their Land

The homeowners own a beautiful plot of land in the mountains of North Carolina and would like to design and build a new home on it. The property is a trapezoidal shape wooded site and slopes downward from the road to the south.

This new build would give the homeowners the opportunity to create a modern, minimalist, cost-effective, and low maintenance house for themselves, while also providing them with the chance to work more effectively from home.

As design enthusiasts, they wanted to be try designing the home themselves, something many aspiring homeowners dream of doing. They were also budget-conscious and were willing to try unconventional ways of managing their costs on the project.

Aerial View of Site

They started talking to a local builder who had a “new building technique based on concrete floors and roofs and used manufactured panels for the walls,” which intrigued the homeowners since they liked the cost-effective nature of this construction process AND the modernist exposed concrete look. So, over the next couple of months, they crafted their floor plan based on standard dimensions provided by the local builder and their own project needs.

“We

[were] acting as our own designer…We [couldn’t] afford an architect on this project – but we [did] talk about having someone help us with “design”. While we have owned several homes, we have never built one before. We wanted to “get this right”, as this is intended to be our last house.”

Finally, they had a builder with a cost-effective construction method and a workable floor plan that met their budget. BUT, the problem was: they weren’t fully confident in the design. They kept making small changes here and there to improve it, but it just wasn’t right yet. In fact, when they contacted us, they were on their fourth floor plan version.

Project Goals

The homeowners wanted their new home to be:

a modest 1-story, 1500sf home with 3br/2ba
modern, minimalist compact home
one bedroom to act as a home office
low maintenance and durable building materials
plenty of light and views to the southwest facing the mountains and pasture
open floor plan for main public spaces
affordable and cost-effective with a construction cost of about $150-$170/sf

Additional considerations included:

the contractor had a proprietary building system of precast walls, floor, and roof
the future garage/carport would be off to the west side of the house
there would be a potential roof deck, accessed from an exterior circular stair

The drawings to the right are the existing floor plan and south elevation provided by the homeowners.

Existing design drawings prior to our Design Review

Design Observations About the Existing Design

Space Planning – Public vs Private Spaces

The existing design floor plan was a good start, especially for non-designers.

They laid out the spaces so that there was an open concept main public space for the entry, kitchen, dining, and living area. The open public space was flanked on either side by private spaces. This type of space planning has a history of working successfully and can work for this project as long as the transitions between public and private spaces are considered and dealt with.

In the diagram below, the private spaces are shown in green while the transitions (the buffer zones) that need to be addressed are in yellow.

Private Spaces and Transition Zones

Currently, the main entry into the house is directly adjacent to the master bedroom suite door. This isn’t ideal and will need to be addressed. The solution involves thinking about how guests interact and experience the space as they are welcomed into the home; not just how the homeowners experience living in the space day to day themselves.

The transition from public to private on the west side of the house is working more effectively with the hallway acting as a buffer zone, a way to transition from a very public space to a more private zone. We do want to review the location and view into the bathroom as it relates to the public space. We don’t want guests to see into the bathroom from the living/dining area if at all possible.

Flow, Circulation, and Access Through Spaces

Circulation through the living, dining, and kitchen space will be busy passageways in busy areas.

Circulation and Flow

The main circulation path through the space could be improved. It’s currently compromising the furniture layout, potential kitchen bar seating area, and general flow through the spaces. The solution will involve defining a clear path through the open concept area (which will also contain the spaces better) and allow better organization of furniture.

Additionally, the kitchen seems a little closed off with its U-shaped configuration. We might want to explore opening it up a little. At the same time, the aisle between the kitchen island and the wall cabinets is fairly large (approx. 5ft). The homeowners expressed interest in bar seating but didn’t have sufficient space for it in their existing design. Reducing the aisle width presents an opportunity to provide bar seating. Increasing the length of the bar would be nice, also.

Daylight and Views

The site is a beautiful plot of land and the homeowners recognize it’s potential and want to capitalize on the views. As the homeowner says, “We have a lovely site, with a great southern exposure and pastoral view.”

Google Earth view

Their existing design rightfully acknowledges that the main view is to the south/southwest. They’ve located their living/dining space as well as their master bedroom on the south side of the house to take advantage of views. Less important and more private spaces like the bathroom and closet are tucked in the back.

The design utilizes large windows and doors along the south elevation. Doors open up to an exterior deck for entertaining and view watching which will be a nice feature.

Flip Guest Bedrooms To Give the Office the Better View

One observation we have is the location of the home office, which is located in bedroom farthest north. Considering that the home office will be used nearly daily, a lot more frequently than the guest bedroom, we might want to consider flipping the office to the south side of the house to take advantage of the views and nice daylighting.

Additional design considerations with the large windows to the south are solar heat gain and glare. The design solution should consider ways to block solar heat gain and direct sunlight in summer months.

Our Design Review

Given the budget (knowing that the existing design meets it) and the proprietary nature of the builder’s construction assemblies, we didn’t want to move the external walls. Our design review will focus on reconfiguring the interior spaces for a better outcome.

Defining Public/Private Spaces and Transition Spaces

Considering that the most public area of the house is the main entry and the most private area is the master bedroom suite, we don’t think it’s a good idea to locate the two functions next to each other. The first thing houseguests see is the door to your bedroom.

Mirror the Kitchen

Because the floor plan is laid out with 2 private zones flanking a main central public zone, our suggestion is to mirror the spaces in the main public area so that the entry to the house moves to the west, switching places with the kitchen. While the kitchen is also a fairly public space, the transition to the bedroom is not as bad as it would have been near the entry.

There was also a very large amount of space dedicated to the entry in the existing design. Giving some of this space to the kitchen allows us to make an L-shaped layout (which is more open to the rest of the public space) with a longer kitchen island.

As we mentioned, the transition to the guest bedrooms works effectively already because there is a small hallway to transition people’s experience from public to private.

Creating Better Flow and Defining Circulation Paths

Even with an open concept layout, it’s important to consider users’ path of travel. This helps with the furniture layout, defining zones within the overall bigger space, and ensuring there is adequate circulation around the room. While the existing design started to define this path, it could be improved.

Circulation Axis and Flow

By intentionally defining the main circulation spine, we started to deliniate spaces better. The kitchen space is contained in its own zone between the main circulation path and the entry. And there is now a sufficient width for circulation between the kitchen and living/dining area. This also gives us the opportunity to define the entry access into the house and direct views clear out in the southerly direction as soon as guests enter the house.

Design Review: Flip bathroom so you don't see into it from public space

Mirror Bathroom Layout

To avoid views into the bathroom, we suggest mirroring the bathroom layout. This moves the door to the north, which is less visible from the dining/living space. And because the door swing is reversed, guests won’t see any of the fixtures inside even if the door is open.

Capitalizing on the Surrounding Views to the South/Southwest

Move Office So It Has the Better View

The current design nicely directed the main focus to the pastoral and mountainous views. We like the way the large windows and doors open up to an exterior deck and how the master bedroom gets the money view, as well.

One thing we would suggest is flipping the home office and guest bedroom. This is a simple move since both rooms are essentially the same size and are both technically defined as bedrooms with their own respective closets. This enables the homeowners to enjoy the views even while they are working at home.

South Elevation Review

We also took a look at the drawing they created for the south elevation. It was a great start in conveying their design intent. We further developed their elevation by standardizing their window and door spacings to only 2 different widths and adding some optional awning windows under the high roof for natural ventilation should they want it.

The only real issue we saw with their design was the corner where the wall between the living/dining space and the (now) office hits the south window wall. The existing design didn’t account for this wall intersection so we needed to make sure there was solid wall to capture the intersecting interior wall.

South Elevation Options

We also provided a quick alternate elevation option of raising the window sills up to 2′-10″ AFF. If they intend to place furniture or desks against the windows, it’s sometimes better to have a solid wall behind the furniture instead of glass.

Considering Solar Heat Gain and Glare

Sun Path Diagram and Sun Control Options

While good views and daylight are nice to have, they do pose potential concerns, especially when facing south and southwest.

During the warm summer months, the homeowners will need to consider solar heat gain. We presented various methods to control heat gain with supporting images and studies for the homeowner’s consideration. Methods they considered were extending the roof overhang, installing exterior shading devices, interior curtains or shades, and using high-performance glazing.

We also did a study using local solar angles based on the site’s geographical location to determine how far out the roof overhang would have to extend to cover extreme summer sun. A 2′-10″ overhang would be effective in blocking out the summer sun.

After our Design Review, we incorporated all of our suggestions into updated drawings. Here’s what the final drawings looked like.

Drawings Edits Afer Our Design Review

Conclusions:

Here’s a side by side comparison of the before and after drawings. The design didn’t change significantly, but there are a few bigger design moves that make the home design better. And, most importantly, the homeowners are much happier and more confident in their design.

Before Drawings

After Drawings

The homeowners had this to say how they benefited from their Design Review experience:

“First of all, we gained confidence in our project. This is a self-designed home – and we freely admit that we are unskilled at the art. So having Yvonne review our plans and, basically, blessing them was a huge relief. Second, she added value in discussing the “flow” of the layout, where to place doors, windows, etc. The changes that resulted have made the plan much better.”

Over to you…

This is just one example of how an architect can add value to your home project. For these homeowners, we were able to lift their spirits and give them the peace of mind that they would have a well-designed space to live in for years to come.

This article was a spotlight of an Architectural Design Review for a new single-story home in North Carolina.

Do you need a second opinion on the design for your home, addition, or renovation? If so, we would be happy to help you out. You can find more information about our Design Review services here.

3 Comments

Chanua Johnson April 10, 2017 at 11:14 am

Would it be feasible to bring the bathroom up flush with the living room and provide access to the bath directly by the living room and access to the bath from office and guest bedroom is via each room separately.
So that guests that go to bathroom do not have to pass by the entrances to the guess bedroom or office.
- Yvonne April 11, 2017 at 9:19 am
  
  Hi Chanua, thanks for your question. Technically speaking it can be done. You’d lose storage space in order to access the other rooms though.
  
  For this particular client, the hallway was actually intentional. It served as a buffer between the open entertaining spaces and the private rooms, both visually and acoustically. The small hallway shielded much of the views of the bathroom door from the living area. It also provided a sound buffer, which you can imagine would be important (you don’t want guests feeling like they have to turn the sink on when they used the bathroom).
Karen January 5, 2018 at 2:50 pm

Small changes equal big differences! Well done in explaining a real-life scenario in a way the layman can understand.