garden kitchen and dining room on different level from parlor living room?
I’ve been scouring archives about the different configurations of living in a townhouse, and struggling with whether it’s a good idea to separate the kitchen/dining room from the living room on different floors.
We live on the garden and parlor level and rent the top floor of a 16′ wide townhouse. The kitchen and living room are currently on the garden level that opens to the backyard, which we love. The master bedroom is in the back of the parlor level, and the children are in the front of the parlor level. It’s not ideal because the nicest, brightest room (the front parlor) is being wasted on a kids’ room, and they have to cross through our bedroom to get to it.
So, we are thinking of dividing the garden level front living room (which is dark with low ceilings) into two bedrooms and moving the living room to its “proper” place at the front of the parlor level. But that leaves the kitchen and dining room on the garden level separated from the living room on the parlor level. I know the “usual” arrangement is to move the kitchen to the parlor level and build a deck for backyard access, but we don’t have that kind of money for renovations. This keeps the kitchen and dining room next to the outdoors and puts the living room in a grand parlor space, but any insights into problems with this arrangement?
emmavaa
in General Discussion 3 years and 10 months ago
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5 replies
cate | 3 years and 10 months ago
You can try out this arrangement in advance before you attempt any construction simply by swapping the children’s room with the living room, right? You don’t have to do anything else. I would try it out first. A few other points: (1) Normally the front parlor would be accessible from the hall. (2) Long story short, we live in an original two-family with parlor upstairs and kitchen and dining room downstairs. It works out great for us as a family but it’s terrible for entertaining. If you want to have people over, try to get living room-dining room-kitchen all together on one floor, ideally on the parlor floor or whatever floor has tall ceilings and good light. (3) Whatever your situation, consult with an architect who is clever at floor plans. They might have an easy fix to give access to the children’s room through creating a tiny hall rather than having to go through your room , they will know how best to arrange the downstairs to create two optimal bedrooms, and they can advise about how to best get living-dining-kitchen on one floor. (4) Beware of dividing the front garden level room into two overly narrow rooms. Also, sometimes there are windowless middle rooms that make ideal bedrooms because they are dark and quiet. However, a room without a window is not a legal bedroom nor is it safe without a window for egress in case of a fire.
brokelin | 3 years and 10 months ago
The proposed change sounds fine – parlor front living room is nice (though I don’t agree that using sunny rooms for the children rooms is a “waste.”) The biggest issue with your current situation is the access to the children’s rooms is only through your bedroom. Moving them downstairs solves that problem, presuming you can alter the upper floor so that access to the new living room isn’t also only through your bedroom – that’s the main issue you need to fix, in my opinion.
hkapstein | 3 years and 10 months ago
I think I’d prefer the bedrooms on a seperate floor from the living/kitchen area. Having someone watching TV while someone tries to work or sleep in the next room is not idea. Walking out of a bedroom dressed “informally” and enountering company might also be less than ideal. Honestly, I wouldn’t like this layout. However it’s your house, and I have no idea what your lifestyle is like. I’d leave it as is and save up to move the kitchen upstairs. If a deck isn’t in the budget, a simple staircase leading down to the yard is not that expensive.
RobertGMarvin
in General Discussion 3 years and 10 months ago
BTW the REALLY grand houses in my neighborhood he ave TWO dining rooms—an informal one on the ground floor front and a formal one on the parlor floor rear, connected to the kitchen by a back staircase and a dumbwaiter
RobertGMarvin
in General Discussion 3 years and 10 months ago
The original layout in all but the grandest of most of our houses (at least those with high stoops) is to have the kitchen and dining room on the ground floor, the living rooms on the parlor floor, and bedrooms on the floor, or floors, above. I’ve been quite happy with that c arrangement. The layout you suggest functionality replicates major parts of that arrangement and would, IMO, work well.