Part 1 – Lin Lee Residence, Utah

Posted on: July 15th, 2009 | 19 Comments

Part 1 – Lin Lee Residence, Utah (PDF)
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Part 1 – Lin Lee Residence, Utah (Demo)

  • Doug Roberts

    Here is one possibility. I used the old formal dining room space to create a larger kitchen and enlarged the old breakfast nook area into a proper dining area with room to expand the table for larger family dinners or dinner parties. I moved the powder room fixtures into the old laundry room, which I hope to relocate upstairs when we work on the upstairs floorplan next week. I added a closet and hall table where the old powder room used to be and put a bench (with storage under the seat and room for shoes underneath) where the old closet used to be, to make the combined front/back entry area both larger and more functional than it was before. I used a portion of the old formal living room space to enlarge the family room and turned the rest of the space into a partially enclosed home office. As we have been told that the old formal living room has a vaulted ceiling but not yet been provided with the existing upstairs floorplan to know the exact boundaries of the vaulted space, I am not sure how the new wall that divides the home office from the family room will integrate with the vaulted space. If the vaulted space lines up with the previous wall between the formal living room and the family room, then the new wall may end up with a plant shelf on top of it. Alternatively, we may consider changing, or completely eliminating, the vaulted space when we work on the upstairs floorplan next week.

    [img]LinLeeDemo.jpg[/img]

  • Brad W

    Here is a plan…

    Things to note:
    1. The main floor laundry has been moved either upstairs or to the basement.
    2. The two storey living room has been replaced with an enclosed study. Additional space will now be available for the upstairs renovation.
    3. A large kitchen, dining and living space is now open to the backyard deck and garden.

    [img]shdp21-1.JPG[/img]

  • Brad W

    Doug – great minds think alike…

  • Doug Roberts

    Brad — it will be interesting to see if John or anyone else comes up with anything materially different. The plans that you and I came up with seem, at least to me, to be the logical solution in this case. Eliminating the vaulted ceiling may make sense, although doing so may present some challenges (eg. the existing window in the living room may be 2-storeys high).

  • Brad W

    Doug – I agree. It would not surprise me if John located the kitchen at the front of the house.

    In my plan, if the vaulted ceiling must remain, an easy change is to eliminate the office door and cap the entry wall at approx. door height. Obviously, my hope would be to develop the entire space above the study.

  • John Brown

    Brad and Doug,

    Good plans. I think your strategy of using the front room as the study makes good sense. As you say, it will be interesting to see if anyone has a materially different idea. If not, the discussion for the exercise will be more about the resolution of the individual detailed design of the front and back entry, laundry, guest bath, and kitchen.

    Anybody want to venture a design with the kitchen in a different location?

  • Doug Roberts

    Brad — Putting the kitchen at the front of the house would have the advantage of allowing you to turn the old formal dining room into a fully enclosed home office, but my concerns with that approach were that:
    1) it would take a lot of work to extend the plumbing over to the NW corner, and I prefer to consolidate the plumbing in one area whenever possible;
    2) the front entry would look directly into the kitchen, and it would be difficult to shield that view to any significant extent;
    3) if you were not able to eliminate the vaulted ceiling then you would end up with a 2-storey kitchen, which would be even more strange than a 2-storey home office; and
    4) it would pretty much force you to turn the family room into a dining area and move the family room away from the fireplace and into the oddly-shaped kitchen/nook space, as otherwise the dining area would be too far from the kitchen.

  • James Scott

    Where is this home located and what is the weather like. Some parts of Utah get a complete dumping of snow and others just a few inches total. I guess what I’m getting at is it may be a bad idea to lose the fireplace and what kind of an entrance would be appropriate?

    It would be cool to see the dining occupy the are near the front door backed up by the kitchen. On the Eastern side of the stairs the garage, utilities, washroom, study and living spaces. But I feel the climate needs to be addressed.

  • Paul C

    I am usually moving all the interior walls about on these exercises because the location of the mechanical and structural walls are maybe not that clear. On this one however there is a very high probability that the thicker walls between the living/family and the dining/kitchen are the mechanical/structural walls. Notwithstanding the demo plan, I wanted to try to get something that did not impact these two walls too much. The laundry is in the basement, maybe a chute can be created in one of those voids near the new pantry.

    [img]utahmf.jpg[/img]

  • Brad W

    Doug – To some extent, I share your concerns about locating the kitchen at the front. It could work but the biggest problem may simply be its uniqueness.

    Paul C – The pantry is an interesting solution to squaring off the kitchen. I like the bathroom/storage option at the main entry. I prefer the living/dining space at the back but you have given us a fresh option – well done.

  • Paul C

    Brad W,
    Thanks for the feedback. Even though angular layouts are not always advocated for they can create odd little spaces (as seen by the pantry), I thought, given the extent to which an angle is part of this home, (more of a macro element) I would try to utilize it. With that said I did try to square off that front door, but found it would be quite involved.

  • Grace

    Hi all. I like your plans–especially Paul’s squared off kitchen–with one caveat. The laundry must not go in the basement! A chute is a kind thought, but perhaps only for the one who deposits the dirty clothes, not for those who run the machine. I find that the best way to do laundry so that it doesn’t consume a lot of time is to do it in breaks from other things. Turn on the washer, read a book; transfer to the dryer, work on the slow home project; fold the clothes during the news. A main floor laundry works best for the majority of people who actually do the work. A bedroom-floor laundry is okay. The basement–no way, guys, no way.

  • Paul C

    Grace,
    Thanks for the feedback. Laundry location can be a love/hate type of thing for sure. Speaking as the one who deposits, runs and returns the laundry in this 5 person homestead, believe me, I can relate and I hear you. Our laundry facilities however, sorry to say, are in the basement. (which is finished)

  • MichaelG

    I did a quick draft of something different, but I dont really like the result. The kitchen ends up being far to small, which is a complaint of their current house. And the re-designed entry wastes a lot of space, and money. If I have time I might try something else, but the front of the house as the study, and removing the vaulted ceiling is probably the way to go…

    [img]shdp21draft.JPG[/img]

  • Brad W

    Grace – Some guys do laundry and we prefer it in the basement adjacent to our home theatre/bar/work out area.

    Seriously, in the plans above the laundry has been traded for either a large closet/storage area or a bathroom. What would you trade or would you keep the original entry design?

  • John Brown

    Grace,
    In our practice I would estimate that 40% of our clients want the laundry beside the bedrooms (on the second floor if there is one). 40% prefer it close to the kitchen and at least 20% don’t want to use any part of the above ground space for anything as “lowly” as laundry. They are willing to make the tradeoff of convenience for space. No one preference seems to connect to either singles, couples or families.

  • John Brown

    Michael,
    I appreciate the time you took exploring a different approach to the plan as well as your critical review of the results. That kind of process of trial and error is an essential part of the design process. It is hard to know if a particular strategy or idea might work until you draw it out.

  • Grace

    Brad W—hahaha Yes maybe right next to the wet bar/gym is the ideal place for the laundry. Just substitute ‘hop on the treadmill’ and ‘relax with a beer’ for ‘read a book’ and ‘work on slow home project.’

    Where to put it? Half of Paul’s closet next to the half bath would work. I’ve lived in Rome over the years where we always had a washing machine incorporated into the lower kitchen cabinetry. No dryer of course; a line or drying stand on the balcony was all that was needed.

    John–I’m surprised that no trends appeared correlating to who actually does the laundry. Laundry in my household has always been a collective enterprise: ‘life skill’ training in the laundry began in late elementary school for the kids (although in their retelling of it, it began when they were two!). Having the laundry near the family/living room made the process just another activity.

  • John Brown

    Grace,
    Thinking about it, I would say that in most of our client’s households the laundry task is a shared experience – between spouses and then children if they are older. The difference lies in the preference for where the laundry is in the house.