House Plan Blog

Like a gently winding stream, eyes are drawn by a curved path of steps to the Springvale’s distinctly arched entry. Cut into the front side of a hill, this Craftsman-style home provides elevated views of the area around it. Coach lamps emphasize framed-out columns flanking the entry and garage. Other Craftsman attributes include stone veneer wainscot, gable end projections, and shake-textured siding that accents both gable peaks..

Inside, most of the living area is on the main floor. A small loft and unfinished attic space for storage are to the second-level, while the garage is below.

Ceilings are higher through the center of the home, running from the front towards the back. In the foyer and living-room, the ceiling height is ten feet. The playroom is two stories high, and overlooked by the second floor loft.

A wood-burning stove fills one corner of the large living room that's partially open to the kitchen. The kitchen’s raised eating bar offers seating for informal dinners, snacks and homework supervision,  while hiding the inevitable clutter of food preparation and clean up. The eating nook is open to the playroom, next to a deep pantry with a stainless steel table and a second refrigerator.

The luxurious owners’ suite is reached via both an arched opening near the foyer, and a door off of the playroom. Features include a direct-vent gas fireplace and a spacious walk-in closet, along with a private bathroom complete with a heated spa tub. Secondary rooms are at the front.

A bathroom off the Springvale’s left-front bedroom links using a large laundry and hobby room. The dumbwaiter there eliminates the need to carry heavy or bulky objects up from the garage.

Rounded roof tiles and stucco exterior of the Rosabella house plan can’t help but evoke the sunny climes of Spain and Italy. Gentle arches cap window and door openings, adding to the Mediterranean ambiance. Bold stucco-clad columns frame the lofty entry porch, and keystones add a classic element.

Entry doors open right into a high-ceilinged entry where light washes in through an arched transom. Moving forward brings you to the highly glassed hexagonal great room. The inside is completely present-day, and nowhere is the fact that more visible than in this extensive and expansive house.

Arched transoms crown wide banks of glass that fill most of three walls. All but the windows flanking the fireplace slide open to allow in gentle breezes, or offer use of a patio that spans the whole rear of the home. The poatio effectively enhances the living area, if the weather allows.

A angled pony wall bounds one side of the G-shaped kitchen. Entering the great room, you are able to look over it to see what’s cooking on the range. The sink hides behind a raised eating bar that rims another peninsular counter. While washing up kitchen ware, you can take in the great room plus the patio and the landscape beyond.

The vaulted owners’ suite fills the whole left-wing. Luxurious features include an interestingly shaped  shower, double vanity, walk-in closet and totally private bathroom. Sliding-glass doors in the sleeping area allow direct deck access.

A large utility room, a bathroom, as well as two more rooms are in the right wing, which links with the Rosabella’s two-car garage. A deep walk-in pantry at the back of the utility room adds to the kitchen’s  ample space for storage. Steps for the basement are next to the garage.

Curved windows, clustered faccent tiles, and raised stucco detailing offer a clean-lined, special appearance towards the Southwest Mesilla house plan. Individuals who enjoy entertaining will recognize the possibilities of this plan, as will families who like lots of room to spread out.

Entering, you step into an extraordinary, high-ceilinged foyer in which the entranceway is crowned by a plant shelf, and another high plant shelf rims the right wall. On the left, columns flank an arched opening that leads in to the vaulted living room and dining room.

Ahead, another columned archway marks the entrance to the bright and spacious vaulted family room. Natural lighting washes in through the richly windowed rear wall, and spills down through two skylights. A fireplace, nestled between a storage cabinet and an entertainment center, adds cheer and warmth on grey days.

The kitchen is large, expanded by a nook that's windowed on two sides. Its large work island houses both a prep sink and a cooktop. The far side also serves as a conversation bar.

Just behind the generously-sized walkin pantry is a spacious utility/hobby room, designed to accommodate a sewing machine and still leave lots of counter space for folding clothes. In one corner there's a half-bath, and across the hall is really a storage closet set into a triangular space. A door conveniently opens to the three-car garage, which has a deep third-car bay.

The Mesilla is elegant owners' room has a huge walk-in closet, plus a two-section bathroom with a double vanity. The second bedroom faces the street. If preferred, the den can serve as a third room, a home office, library or what have you.

Multipaned windows, decorative shutters and front gables put a welcoming face to the Eastford. Stone veneer wainscoting and slender posts add to the exterior appeal of this mid-size ranch house plan.

Entering via the covered patio, you step into a vaulted entry leading right to the spacious vaulted great room at the rear. But not before passing a wide opening on the left, and a hallway to the right.

The left opening accesses a room that could be a parlor or den, and links up with the kitchen through a pocket door. The hallway on the right takes you to a wing of private spaces: a bathroom, two bedrooms, and what could be a third bedroom, home office or study.

Side windows let even more light into the dining room and kitchen. A flush eating bar bounds the two spaces. Cabinets, appliances and a wide sink line four sides of the kitchen.

Sun light washes into the great room and dining room through windows that fill most of the rear wall. The dining room windows slide open, offering easy access to a covered patio, which may be screened. A fireplace is located to the right corner of the great room.

Laundry appliances are mere steps away from the bedrooms, in a convenient pass-through utility room/mud room with direct access for the Eastford’s two-car garage. The utility room comes fully furnished with plenty of cabinetry, folding tables, and a deep sink.
 

Crisp lines and window grids provide a fresh clean look to the Sahalie. This is an update of the Prairie home, one of few indigenous American architectural styles. Originating in Chicago, the style was popular in early 20th century suburbs through the entire USA and is again rising in popularity.

The wide covered porch that wraps around across the front and to the left is punctuated by four sets of slender posts arranged on squarish framed-out bases. These support a low pitched hipped roof with wide eaves, typical of the Prairie home.

Entering, you step into a bright and large gathering area that contains the living room, dining room and kitchen. Sun light, slightly muted from the porch overhang, washes in through the gridded glass in its sidelights and the front door. Still more spills in through the tall, similarly shaped doors and windows on two walls of the dining area and a shorter window in the kitchen. Families that thrive on light and openness will love this space.

A sizable work island rimmed by a raised eating bar gives partial separation between the kitchen and the rest of the room. Standing at the kitchen sink, you can stare out the window in front of you, or track activities outside. A generously-sized utility room is nearby, as-is direct-access to a rear-facing two-car garage—handy for unloading groceries securely and from the weather.

The owners' suite is at the rear. It boasts a double vanity, completely private toilet, and a sizable walkin closet. Both of the Sahalie’s secondary rooms are up front, where they share another bathroom that also offers a dual vanity. These rooms each have broad closets that fill about two-thirds of just one wall.

Guests are wowed by Hillview, inside and out

Walking through the European style Hillview can simply take your breath away. It’s gorgeous inside and out.

Columns and a high arch frame the front porch, which is centered in front of a rising hexagonal roof with many side gables. A stone veneer colonnade spans the rear. Lower column sections bound an extensive covered terrace around the basement level that wraps across three walls of the hexagonal area. On the main floor, column tops link railings that edge a similarly wide deck.

On the main floor, arched clerestory windows crown wide multipaned windows that fill nearly all of two rear walls. A home entertainment centre and a stone veneer fireplace cover most of the third.

One side of the unusually large two-section kitchen is totally open to the great room. An eating bar rims the sink’s peninsular counter, which looks into the dining area. Another eating bar rims the central work island, which also houses a pull-up mixer and a built-in ice maker. Appliances, including a large freezer, are built in.

Double doors open into a richly windowed two-story entry leading into the hexagonal great room. The circular staircase directly ahead of the entry curves up to a vaulted loft that covers half of the great room and overlooks the other half. Hidden storage lines two loft walls.

Surfaces and cabinets wraparound two sides of the spacious butler’s kitchen, which also has a second sink and oven. A bedroom, bathroom and utility room fill out the space behind the kitchen, while the sumptuous owners’ suite uses up a lot of the right wing.

A workout room and a third bedroom extend off the big hexagonal room about the Hillview’s basement level.

There’s no question that designing a new home is the perfect time for homeowners to dream up new features that will contribute to a more comfortable lifestyle. Home designer Rick McAlexander of Associated Designs in Oregon has reviewed thousands of must-have features over the years with clients who plan to include as many amenities as possible when designing their new home.

While each person’s vision of their new home is as varied as the homeowners themselves, one new trend that Rick is definitely seeing is the request for a centralized mobile device charging center. This idea is akin to a clutter-catching spot for various wired devices such as cell phones, laptops, tablets, MP3 players, E-readers and cameras. Americans own an average of 24 electronic devices per household, according to the Consumer Electronics Association, and each has its own custom charging pack. All those devices need a spot to suck in electricity.

Susan Lafky is a mother of active teenagers, whose entire family is involved in multiple sports while she and her husband also work. “Everyone plugs in their chargers on the desk in the kitchen and I’m tired of trying to clean around all the wires,” she said. “And, when the kids come home, their backpacks and gear are dropped from the entry way to the dining room table. We need a real solution for all of it.”

But, the old standard clutter catcher, the kitchen desk, is going away, according to Patti Julber, owner of Complements Home Interiors in Bend, Oregon. She’s designing cleaner lines, sleek counters and more built-ins. “My clients are trying to de-clutter their lives and the kitchen desk acts as a big magnet for junk,” says Patti. “I’m looking to move that clutter away from the cooking and entertaining areas.”

Dump The Junk
With the kitchen no longer the preferred area for a family’s dumping spot, Rick has started to incorporate more organizational space into the classic mudroom, creating a drop zone to hide the clutter and manage loads of family stuff. He says it’s the best spot to “dump the junk”. In this space, all members of the family can find a spot to cast off backpacks and boots, car keys and laptops, phone and outerwear, school work and even the mail.  It can also work as the staging zone for carrying groceries or other items to and from the house.

 “We’re also designing new home plans with separate spaces for the laundry, away from the mudroom,” he explains. “Some people don’t want to pass dirty clothes as they walk into their home. In those plans, I put the laundry room next to the bedrooms where the clothes are.”

For Patti’s clients, she orders top quality cabinets, counters and cubbies for the mudroom to create a well-appointed room for all the stuff. “I like the entry space off the garage to have the same level of quality as the rest of the house”, she says, “so that it feels good to come home.”

Patti’s husband, Evan Julber, is used to working with Patti on her various interior design projects as well as his own commercial ventures. He says the best concept for this electronic hub is to build in a long strip of 110v outlets in the wall above the counter for the ever changing chargers and docking stations.

“We can’t predict what’s coming our way,” Evan says, “but we know it’s going to require electricity and perhaps, cable. So, it’s important when designing the area to include space for outlets, cable and enough room for the wireless router or the hub for a future smart-house.”

Mike Gansen, of Gansen Construction in Eugene, Or,  likes the Tillamook house plan from Associated Designs in part because the mudroom calls for plumbing to be built into the room’s corner with ability to expand even more into the garage. This feature allows Mike to work with the homeowner and truly customize the area, adding a cleaning station, a toilet or even a dog washing tub. “The homeowner really likes to put their stamp on this space”, Mike says, “configuring it to match their own lifestyle. It makes the final build-out unique to them.”

Whether it’s the older couple who is ready to de-clutter their well decorated living areas, or the large and busy family with an active lifestyle and loads of stuff, a well-planned entry room or mudroom is the ultimate solution.