So,e tweaks to make vanity better. Also why change door near laundry?

Thanks Kate. I'm not sure what you mean about the door near laundry, the one in the hallway? I was thinking from the living room side it would look tidier to move that door up so it is a straight line with entry way wall and the kitchen wall and I figure that is an easy thing to change. I'm not sure we want the carport opening straight into the dining area. Is the main reason you've shifted that so that we get a longer vanity?

Yes to hall door. Depending on flooring it could be a cost saving. But your change would look nicer. Longer vanity is the aim

You're on the right track but consider streamlining flow better by repositioning front entry between car and consider whether having those two small living areas side by side will actually be better to keep the larger living where it currently is looking onto the north deck, which would be more usable without being split/limited by entry point......without knowing what the existing structure/fabric is I'd also question demolishing the back bedroom in way for a bigger south deck and then replacing similar sized extension at the back of the car is a relatively expensive move for arguably lesser net gain - sure add on but it feels like you could utilise what you have better....how much space do you actually have at the back??

please share dimensions of existing rooms and what are the walls, roof, floor and windows made out of?

Shallower cupboard

Thanks @Kate, that one with the shallower cupboard looks good. The bathroom looks good like that, I am trying to create a pseudo-ensuite, that is connected to master and private when we close the door near the dining table, but that we can leave open and use as the guest bathroom, so they don't have to use the teen WC down the hallway.

The dimensions on the plan are too small to read. Can you please write them on the plan in larger text.

Thanks @Paul Di Stefano Design, those are very interesting ideas. I think with an entrance to the house at the back of the carport, that would be the main path from the car to house. The house has a cottage look at the front, with the entryway through the garden up to the middle of the house. I think drastically changing the position of the front door might look strange, and then everyone would exit the house onto the driveway right behind the carport/garage which is a hazard for kids. The living area that I have moved to the front uses the existing window frame openings in bedroom. Our house has a truss roof so I’m conscious of how much we tamper with the external walls.

That existing front lounge has lovely light and aspect but it is completely disconnected from the living areas, so it is currently a quiet room/ office and it isn't used that much. Everyone congregates around the kitchen, even though it’s poky. The other consideration I had was that we don't want the open plan living to back directly onto the bedroom end of the house. The smaller "snug" I have included will still be lovely and used similarly to how it is now, and will act as a buffer between open plan living and bedrooms. It would also be bedroom sized, so it is our back-up guest bedroom and gives the house a 4th bedroom if we ever sell. Having said that, I don't want to make that main lounge area too small. Would like to comfortably seat 6-8 people around to hang out, which I'm hoping with the window seat that would give us 4 sides x 2 seats - It is 4.5m x 4m with no thru traffic.

The shift of the room at the back is to give the dining area an outlook to the greenery in the backyard, and allow the kitchen to be enlarged. With that plan it could also access northern light with clerestory windows, as carport roof isn't that high.

@oklouise Here is a copy with dimensions. The house is rendered single brick. House is on piers, timber joist floor frame with chipboard subfloor and solid timber floorboards. Roof is colourbond and needs replacing soonish. Window frames are timber. A large issue with current kitchen is everyone being crammed in that space and crossing paths constantly, I need an island bench so there are two entry points to the kitchen.

As a wild guess I would say in the current house the master bedroom and ensuite was the original lounge room, and the lounge room was the third bedroom?? I like your design and the forward thinking of the design to open up to the north. Great idea to have a multi use bathroom, instead of an ensuite, better use of space. I would remove the small linen cupboard near the new bathroom and incorporate that space into the bathroom. I would add floor to ceiling storage along the entry hall left hand wall. Maybe 400mm deep, with hinged doors. I also would keep the carport entrance separate, and away from dining area. I would rotate the island so the narrow ends are north to south. This will give more room for the dining table. Do you really need a seating overhang for kitchen stools, when the dining area is directly adjacent? Could reduce the island or add storage cupboards instead of the seating overhang.

Not quite @dreamer... the master and ensuite were always there but the original house didn't have the back lounge room, so the kitchen and dining opened up to the backyard. The original owners extended to add that back lounge.

Definitely need the kitchen island stool overhang, I love it and the barstools are where everyone congregates in our existing house (kids/ guests) despite my best efforts to move them and regardless of how poky and dark it is!). I would want enough overhang to tuck them under when not in use.

Great idea with floor to ceiling storage along entry wall, storage is the issue I feel like i haven't resolved in this plan.

@Phoebe Bradden you have plenty of space to do what you are trying to do and all this makes sense, but the kitchen and dining area feel arguably squeezed/compromised and flow through to rear through dining and one door is relatively tight..... I'd be looking at keeping existing back room and making use of it, still looking through to rear, put the kitchen there looking on to an deck w' the seats/bar etc and push/expand deck further east if you want the banquet outdoor dining....the dining would be then nicely centralised where the kitchen is, with plenty of swing room around the table/chairs ( trust me the way you have it at the moment is too tight) and doors/access directly thru onto rear deck (where the current kitchen bench/bar is) so the internal movement/flow from the entry through to rear is nice & straight and unobstructed and you're reducing "doglegged" flow pattern across spaces to external entry points. This will also give you more space and configuration options for the front living to have furniture positioned further south and TV/focus on wall against carport...the new bedroom behind the kitchen in same place would be fine with outlook to rear (+ as u say high level glazing potentially) -arguably not a dealbreaker to lose east window/outlook onto deck if it's the guest bedroom that it's south facing........anyway just a few thoughts :) PD

Thanks @Paul Di Stefano Design. Where would the master go if we kept the back loungeroom? There is only 4m space between current western wall and fence, so with 900mm gap that would be a 3.1m wide room. That back loungeroom extension has a concrete floor, so I imagine moving the kitchen there would be expensive, and it is only 3.4m wide, so with 600mm cabinetry 1000mm between cabinets and island, 1200mm island bench, that doesn't leave room for seating on other side of island. I appreciate your observations about the flow between kitchen and dining being not that spacious. I guess we're used to the flow currently being between the kitchen and dining (and then through the loungeroom) to get to the backyard, so having a door straight from dining/ kitchen to back deck would be an improvement, especially if I change that island to orient north-south as suggested by others.

my suggestions include a sliding door out to the deck and keeping the original kitchen window size would allow for more wall cabinets, there's changes to the new master BIW to improve daylight and, assuming that there will need to be steps up from the carport, there should be some new carport entry hall space for hanging coats etc but no easy access to an enclosed cupboard without compromising space in the bathroom...adding a clerestory window is possible but would probably not justify the huge extra cost when better window arrangement and possibly a roof window could improve daylight much more easily

@Phoebe Bradden ...just be aware you need to maintain (by walls on boundaries regulation) 1m min. clearance from boundary to building...potentially you could remove the west wall of that back room, and put that into the bedroom and then go as far as you can to keep 1m access path ( if you needed more room for the Master) - you'd possibly get away with 2.5-2.7m if you slotted in a galley kitchen within existing space....no you'd have to conceed island bench design with this, which appreciate could be not aligned with your vision, but just spitballing / throwing around broadform ideas/options - detail of course can be finetuned but I'd suggest exploring your options and try not to fudge furniture scaling and practical clearances around it, particular dining tables & chairs - usually would be shooting for 1.5m clearance around the size of the dining table, so if it's a 2.4 x1m you need to be thinking more like 5m x 3.5m space .......typically would try to work to 4.5m x 3.6m ideally for a Master bedroom but you can get away with 3.3m width depending on bed orientation....you'd have the sapce to do it but you'd have to have a different kitchen design...it's give & take and I supposed depends on your family size, lifestyle and how you see yourselves using the space, weighing up priorities.......it's all personal preference & not right or wrong stuff, rather just need to work through what I describe as the "series of compromises" in order to get to the best balance for the particular scenario....so am just making a few points on the things that stood out on first glance

Thanks @oklouise, I appreciate you drawing that up with the sliding door, that's definitely an option. The BBQ outside is great too. Re the clerestory windows, are they always really expensive? Because another thought I had was to have clerestory windows on the eastern wall of the bedroom, so they are above the roofline of the alfresco.

Thanks @Paul Di Stefano Design, definitely keeping an open mind to other ideas so I appreciate you throwing those suggestions out there. It's great to hear lots of options and think about what is a cost effective way of doing this. The island is not negotiable unfortunately. I love cooking and so do my kids, and I think a galley without an island would have the same issues as our existing u-shaped. My wish for a kitchen island is a driving factor behind this reconfiguration, as well as wanting natural light. The furniture scaling in my pictures should be spot on (except the upgrade from Queen to King bed in the master), the lounges are all exactly the same size as our existing furniture and dining table is our existing one (1.9 x 0.9), we are happy with that size if we have a large flyscreened, roofed alfresco for entertaining. It's pretty mild where we live, our biggest issue is mozzies. The master I have drawn there is 4.4 x 3.6m, and that will be a big improvement on our current master (3 x 3.6 - smaller than one of our kids' rooms!). Yes, as you say the series of compromises is ongoing, I do feel like I haven't resolved storage with this design. One option would be to enclose the carport to be an actual garage, but that would add significantly to cost.

it's not the actual clerestory windows that are more expensive (although installation is more challenging) it's building a different new roof shape to connect to the existing roof and needing raked ceilings that add to the costs but maybe you could post a photo of an example of what you mean and a photo of the existing front of your house and a Google earth photo of your roof so that we make sure that we're talking about the same thing!

Thanks @oklouise It's only for that master extension part, so the rest of the house would retain its gable roof, and I imagined that extension could have a skillion roof, but I haven't ask builders about how they would connect to the main roof. The existing lounge extension has a gable roof (so gable, north-south, intersecting with main house gable which runs east-west). If our extension had a skillion roof, I thought it could slope up to the east, and the clerestory windows would be above the lower roof of the alfresco. I was hoping that the intersection of the two roof sections might be less problematic as the overlap is only just over a metre.

Thanks @siriuskey, I appreciate you taking the time to draw up those designs, the first one particularly as it maintains more seating space and that lounge area doesn't become a thoroughfare to the front verandah. The TV isn't that much of an issue for that main area. we don't watch a lot of TV and we would have it in that separate lounge. The teens love an outdoor movie night so if we had a roofed and screened back deck they could take beanbags out and project movies up against the outside wall of the master bedroom. With your and @oklouise's suggestion re sliding doors to backyard, would the actual door opening be much wider than a large hinged door? Is the purpose of the sliding doors just to give more of a visual sense of openness to the backyard? I was thinking perhaps a generous glass door (1200mm) would provide the same opening as a sliding 2400mm door. Or we could have an 1800mm bifold door because the back deck would be screened to prevent mozzies. I've tweaked the plan a bit with the bifold and some changes in the master/ bathroom plan.

a standard width glass sliding door of about 1800wide would be the most cost effective and open up the dining area and rear deck without the problem that hinged and bifold doors create taking up too much walking space in a busy corner...compare prices for a 1800 sliding door to any of the other options you've mentioned and keep in mind that flyscreening the deck would not provide the same security as a simple security screen that can be included with the glass sliding door without taking up any additional space)

As OKL suggested an 1800 stacking glass door would be best in that small opening, large hinged doors require a lot of space to open and likewise bifold doors are better in a bigger opening allowing for a single hinged door for everyday use ie' not having to use the bifold action, good luck

If you went with my suggested floorplan you could have a great opening between the house and alfresco using Bi Fold doors.

Thanks @siriuskey, I'll keep that in mind. I was thinking it would make it more expensive to move the kitchen over to that side of the living area, and we lose some cupboard space with that design, but the opening to the al fresco is great.

@siriuskey - so much better config & flow & swing room around the dining.......cost of moving kitchen here or there relatively minor in the whole scheme of things for a project of this scope.....you could also potentially tweak by shifting the line of the bedroom extension wall further east so the access door from the kitchen is directly in line when walking through the kitchen and this gives another 1m or so of usable back wall of the kitchen for the sake of 30-40cm shift of wall, which probably needs to happen for a proper access/utility space between the boundary and extension

@Paul Di Stefano Design @siriuskey It's a great thought process to think about all of these suggestions. Unfortunately moving the kitchen to the western wall leaves us with only 3m of wall along the kitchen, which is a significant reduction from the 5m or more of wall in the L-shaped kitchen design. With the sink moved into the island bench and the width reduced to 900mm the bench space is also reduced. If we didn't cook so much (with family and friends) it would be a good option, but not that practical for us given how we use the kitchen. I have compared all of the dimensions with what we currently have and it's the same kind of walking path to get to the backyard as we have now, we live in a small home and we understand there are some compromises, but it is great to consider the alternatives. Thanks for keeping the access in mind Paul, we have 1200mm access down the eastern side of our house with a large gate so the master can get pushed west as long as we keep 900mm between wall and fence (NSW guidelines). It's hard to explain all of the things we are considering, but at the moment, we don't have people arriving at the front door and heading straight through to the backyard. People tend to congregate in the kitchen and help out, chat etc. If we catch up during the day in nice weather it is often on the front deck, so guests often don't even make it out to the backyard. It's an unusual site, in that the backyard is full of trees and the kids only really head out there for the trampoline. Front yard is onto a very quiet cul de sac, so kids play basketball and skateboard on the street, practice soccer in the front yard. The alfresco purpose is really to have a generous all-weather space for lunches and dinners with lots of guests (our indoor dining area is only really big enough for our family and a few guests).

My New kitchen is 4m from start of fridge to end of Pantry, I have also made the Island 2.8m x 1200 which allows for 2 back to back rows of under bench cabinets, you can configure these to suit sit up spaces of 60 x 30 per stool. There should also be enough space for 40cm storage beside the dining table. Plumbing is already on that side of the house using the existing ensuite plus you will add the new bathroom off that. Flooring and ceilings will need to be made good when removing any walls etc

These changes will give you a wonderful large light filled kitchen and open plan space for family and friends, the bonus extra space will be the front and rear Alfrescos

Thanks Paul I think this layout works to make the best use of what Phoebe said is a smallish house

Thanks @siriuskey, the bench size is better but now the kitchen is crowding the lounge area. With the kitchen extending that far along, the lounge area is now back to the same size as in our current house. Returning to my original brief - we would like the lounge area to be a little larger to fit lounges on 3-sides + bump-out window seat along the front of house. It would ideally be more conversation area, less TV zone. Great to see those suggestions, we will keep it all in the mix and continue thinking about our priorities. Thanks.

The island is the same length as the first kitchen only added an extra 30cm to the width

The kitchen is the same wall length as the original. but could be reduced a bit as you now have 2.8, x1200 = 5.60m bench space.

good to understand more about your site/context and lifestyle etc as ultimately that's what it's all about and making decisions aligned to this and your needs/priorities etc....you seem to be very clear on what you want & need which is great....it's a subtle and personal balance of various elements and preferences...it is hard to provide proper advice without a full understanding of site and brief requirements/goals....the proposal that you have come up with makes sense in regards to what you have described...but it will cost a lot relatively to reconfigure but maintain similar building......another concept that keeps all of existing structure but strategically adding on, but master stays where it is with small extension to front (assuming this is possible) but much more spacious rear open plan L/K/D which yes is to the rear but could always bring in light via skylighting, retains front living room in more of existing scale/propotion and gives you more separation/zoning between the different living spaces and avoids having to walk through kitchen/dining to access master...as well as potential for pantry and expanded laundry amenity..........just throwing ideas around to help you think it all through :)

I will leave you with more ideas,