Open Plan Living room remodelling - any experience / thoughts?

del_c

Hi,
We have a standard 1990's 4 bed Semi-D, and we're in the process of renovating it - it's newly purchased. As with almost all houses of this ilk, when you enter the front door, there's a hall area, with doors off to the sitting-room and converted garage.

We are drawn to the idea of removing the wall between the living room and the hall in order to get a more open plan roomier feel when you enter the house and widen, the somewhat narrow sitting room. As part of the living room renovation , we were looking at putting in an 8KW stove in the sitting room - as this would then be at the centre of the house, this should serve as heating for both downstairs and upstairs.

We're a bit worried however that the sitting room will now become overlay drafty, as the heat from the downstairs living room will tend to move upstairs, therefore I wanted to ask if anybody had done anything similar. The house has a C3 BER, so by no means passive.

Any thoughts or input welcome.
Derek

Miname

your as well off leaving some sort of break or trap when you come in the front door or it ends up being a disaster if you open the door on a wintery night.
Most hall walls are structural too so will probably be carrying the joisting above and could lead to getting a lot of steel and specs made up to sort out the changes. not a major hassle but not as simple as just knocking a wall.

ammc

Use to live in house with stud wall taken away between hall and living room. With more space there was definitely a better feel to it, I thought. It was a BER D1 mid terrace house and no issue with draughts. Though we did have 2 radiators and gas fire in this area so didnt take long to heat if necessary and we had a storm porch as well. Like previous poster mentioned, I don't think it would have worked out as well without the porch to the front. Also, only 2 of us at the time, so not much traffic on the stairs but if there were a few more I'd imagine it might get a bit annoying others going up and down the stairs after a while

steveroy

Budget should be your first consideration. What is your overall budget for your home remodeling, room remodeling, kitchen or bathroom remodeling, and how much of it will be for furniture, structural changes, and decorative items? Determine the goal you wish to achieve next. How do you want this space to feel? Will it be bright and airy? Are you looking for a feeling of homeliness like that of visiting your grandmother? Are you looking to make a statement of elegance and sophistication? Thirdly, what colors appeal to you the most? What about simple, neutral colors? Or do you prefer bold, bright colors? Is there a color that means more to you than all others in the space, and you would like to incorporate it? You can begin browsing decorating magazines and websites after answering these questions. If anything appeals to you, you can save or favorite it. Find out what connects them. Create your own version of that look. Thanks for reading. Wishing you the best.

houseyhouse

I used to live in a house that was built without the wall between the hall and living room. There are pros and cons. It definitely feels more spacious and in fact we had a very good sized living room in a small house. That’s really the only advantage but it’s a big one.

There are plenty of disadvantages but none really dealbreakers. It’s difficult to organise storage for coats, shoes etc. Not sure if you currently have kids/plan to have kids but they have so much stuff as they get older and (my) kids tend to want to drop everything as soon as they walk in the door so you may not want that in your living room. There’s also issues with sound - if you have a TV in the living room, the sound will travel up the stairs. One of my kids likes the hall light on and the bedroom door open so we would have to watch TV quietly if they were in bed. Another problem is lack of privacy. Anyone who comes to the front door is alrrady in your living room, which is not always ideal. Layout can be tricky too, because the living room becomes a circulation root. Finally, people will track wet and mud straight into your living room when entering your house so can be tricky to keep rugs clean.

We didn’t have a fireplace/stove so can’t comment on that. We had forced air heating (it was in the US) and drafts weren’t a problem but then they don’t have the winds we have.