Purchased Plot with Existing Plans

[Steve]

Hi Everyone,

 

I'm new to the forum and a complete novice with self-build so please be gentle!

 

My Wife and I have purchased a plot of land with planning permission in place already (granted in March 2017). We quite like the floor layout as it is, bar a few changes and would be very grateful for any advice and ideas. I understand we have until March this year to make changes to the plans and not have to pay for a complete new planning application. I'm not sure what changes are allowed - I assume it's only minor modifications? 

 

The plot is on a side garden on a semi-rural street overlooking fields to the rear and a garden to the front.

 

The building designed is quite modern and whilst we like the large windows to let plenty of natural light in we'd also like it to have a bit more of a country cottage feel. We're planning on cladding in brick or 50/50 brick/render.

 

The things we'd like to change would be:

 

• Turn the living room into a garage (although we'd need to increase the length to fit anything other than a mini in)
• Ideally incorporate an open porch (possibly oak)
• Put a side access door in the utility so it doubles up as a boot room and cat-flap access!
• Flip the two en-suites around to serve the rear two bedrooms (one with Juliet balcony will be a guest and the master ours) although this does mean the other two bedrooms are furthest away from the bathroom, if that's a big issue?
• Have a wall in the master bedroom which the bed will be against facing out to the view with a walk-in wardrobe behind (access from either side of the bed) then leading into the en-suite bathroom
• Add another staircase into the loft space directly above g/floor to 1st floor staircase - we're hoping to increase the ridge height to allow enough space to stand up and potentially have bedrooms in the future and also have a plant room in the loft - only the master bedroom will have a vaulted ceiling

 

We're planning on constructing with SIPS although open to other options. We'd like to incorporate eco-friendly tech to keep our bills as low as possible. Definitely MVHR system and possibly ASHP although we are on mains gas so this needs more research to see if it's worth the investment.

 

Any help would be much appreciated!

715503-Block Plan.pdf

743530-Amended Plans.pdf

764055-Amended_Plans.pdf

[TheMitchells]

agree with the garage - move the utility to the other side of the hall into the lower part of the dining room and make the kitchen/dining/living space slightly L shaped, or just have a large utulity and storage.  You also need to factor in a plant room - part of the new utility?

Good luck with the plans.

[RandAbuild]

Is there space in front for a detached garage? Seems a shame to use valuable (and costly) internal space to park a car!

I agree about a having a plant room for MVHR etc.

The main bathroom is huge! Could this be split to provide upstairs storage or reconfigure the en-suites?

Don't know if it helps, but your design is similar to ours (even down to the balcony) - see attached. You can see we went for fewer, larger rooms. So many houses these days compromise on space in individual rooms for having a lot of them, but perhaps we did want a more open-plan layout.

Good luck with planning!

 

33 GL Site-Plan-Proposed-1-200@A3 edit.pdf

33GL - AS PROPOSED - FLOORPLANS & ELEVATIONS - REV C.pdf

[Steve]

Thank you very much for your suggestions so far 

 

On 22/01/2018 at 17:21, TheMitchells said:

agree with the garage - move the utility to the other side of the hall into the lower part of the dining room and make the kitchen/dining/living space slightly L shaped, or just have a large utulity and storage.  You also need to factor in a plant room - part of the new utility?

Good luck with the plans.

 

@TheMitchells - We'd really like an external door into our utility, unfortunately moving it to the other side won't work as the plan is right up against the neighbours plot, there's no space for access down the right hand side of the house. Was hoping to have the plant room in the loft space if possible, though I don't know how practical this is.

 

11 hours ago, RandAbuild said:

Is there space in front for a detached garage? Seems a shame to use valuable (and costly) internal space to park a car!

I agree about a having a plant room for MVHR etc.

The main bathroom is huge! Could this be split to provide upstairs storage or reconfigure the en-suites?

Don't know if it helps, but your design is similar to ours (even down to the balcony) - see attached. You can see we went for fewer, larger rooms. So many houses these days compromise on space in individual rooms for having a lot of them, but perhaps we did want a more open-plan layout.

Good luck with planning!

 

 

@RandAbuild - thanks for the photo and plans for your's - it is very similar and given me some food for thought. It looks great, has it taken you long to complete? What build system did you use? Your bedroom layout with the low level wall is exactly how I would like ours. I do like the staircase at the rear with the full height window too.

There's potentially space on the front for a double garage similar to yours although I don't know if the planners would allow it as it would sit much further forward than neighbouring properties, we also only have about 1.5m down the left hand side of the house so we wouldn't be able to set it back as far as you have and it may make the living room very dark?

The main bathroom is very large and I am going to speak to the architect about reconfiguring the en-suites or incorporating more storage.

I agree, we recently looked around some developer houses to get some ideas more than anything and couldn't believe how small the bedrooms were, most literally had a double bed and two bed side tables and that was it, no space for wardrobes/dressing tables etc.

 

 

We're seeing the architect next Wednesday so any more help and advice before then would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance

 

[RandAbuild]

It's taken us about 18 months, mainly because many of our better trades were very busy! The structure is a 140mm Timber Frame with Protect TF200 Thermo Breather Membrane

and 120mm Celotex. We're pleased with the way the staircase with the big window behind has worked out.

I can see the planners might want to hold you to the building line, but moving the house back might give more space for a garage and still leave you with a big garden.