The house looks very livable. I love that you have concentrated on creating one nice bath with separate walk in shower and a windowed tub! Since you have already thought of it, I'm going to assume that the attic is for future expansion and cannot be adapted for use as the current "away room." We are also in the process of designing a small house, and we've designated our study as the "away room." Ours will open off the dining room. If you switched the locations of the Study and Bed 1 on the same side, you could put french doors or an extra wide door with etched or decorative glass from the hallway into the right hand corner of the study. This would give you a really long diagonal view through the lounge and out the french doors, and from the lounge through the study to the window at the far end... The study window should be increased in width to match the neighboring window in Bed 1, and it then becomes ripe for a small window seat, either a clip on bay bumping out, or a "built-in" bay using narrow built ins on either side. Or both: build "in" for now, putting file cabinet drawers under the window seat, and angled corner units in for storage, and add the bump out bay later when you know whether your offspring would prefer a really cute desk, or a window seat, or a bed nook. You would, alas, lose the door from Bed 1 into the bath.... but honestly, there are lot of doors into that bathroom already, and that one has substantial collision potential. It might be best to make the single access point that door from the laundry. Either a glass panel set high in the bath room doors or a transome would make it easy to tell when someone is in the loo. Other ideas would be to split the nook under the stairs, so that half the depth opens to the lounge, and the other half to Bed2... with the wall thickness, you probably get close to 600mm or 2' on each side. Add a deep bookcase or other built in, and you're easily at a depth that makes both spaces very tucked in. Lastly, if funds allow a shallow bay window over the kitchen sink would visually expand the kitchen, particularly if you could arrange it so that the counter runs right into the bay.

Take a clue from the pics....Do it's hard when you're starting and everything needs doing. Find a picture you like and use that as a guide. Do you like the looks of the colors in the two pictures above? Very simple and straight forward with beige/gray bricks and white and black accent colors for shutters and trim.

My new home needs painting. I’d appreciate suggestions for a suitable colour scheme. My neighbours all have dark grey so keen to avoid that. I quite like the ‘Timeless’ and ‘Fresh Classic’ schemes from the Dulux popular exterior colours site but not sure they’d suit. https://www.dulux.co.nz/inspiration/popular-outside-schemes?ef_id=Cj0KCQiAgP6PBhDmARIsAPWMq6mCFckajc5kvYFnMn7jjjQxn9UlB_VUpQf75jCaYMyEil_QhRpDMlMaAkbwEALw_wcB:G:s&s_kwcid=AL!4726!3!462995484142!p!!g!!exterior paint&gclid=Cj0KCQiAgP6PBhDmARIsAPWMq6mCFckajc5kvYFnMn7jjjQxn9UlB_VUpQf75jCaYMyEil_QhRpDMlMaAkbwEALw_wcB

The house is in desperate need of a refresh and we are struggling to pick the colour scheme to complement the features. The design of the house is quite busy with the use of yellow bricks, timber and rough cast. The main feature differs depending on which side of house we're looking at: - front: bricks, timber and rough cast - sides: mostly bricks & timber - back: mostly bricks & timber We are not wanting to paint the bricks at this stage and would love some help with chosing the colours to make it more modern! Will be painting the timber, rough cast, balcony handrails, pergola & roof. See photos below (excuse the mess as in the middle of tidying up) Thanks in advance!