Suburban Contemporary #9

I can't say exactly when I began this design, except to say it probably was started sometime after Suburban Contemporary #8 (still unfinished, but getting much closer) and before Suburban Contemporary #10. It has been quite a long time waiting to be fully finished.

Honestly, all that was missing was to fill the house with furniture, accessories, paintings, lights, and other things. Outside, all I needed to do was finish placing trees and flowers. Once I began working on it, I barely changed touched a single wall or window. Given that this design has quite a few curved walls, if it was happy with the walls where they were, I knew I was much better off not touching them.

But, on to talking about this design.

The house is a side-to-side split level, with the garage being ½ level down from the main floor level. The entry area (the curved area at the center) is 2½ stories tall. I think there's enough headroom, don't you? There is a family room and two bedrooms on the main level. The kitchen is over the garage, ½ level up from the entry. The master suite is on the second level, and over the kitchen is a casual family/living room.

There are some nice vertical spaces in this house, as we will see.

The Front

The Rear

The main level floor plan is below. Apart from what I've already said, you might note:

• The front entry overlooks a small pond, so I made the approach to the front door into a deck, so the water could come up under it, slightly.
• There is a half bath and the laundry behind the garage, a short flight of stair down from the family room. There is no basement, though I suppose if you eliminated the storage area (which is under a stairwell), you could put in stairs to go down to a basement below the main level (the family room and bedrooms).
• The downstairs main bath is under the master bath. We try, sometimes, to be efficient.
• Both bedrooms are fairly sizeable, with plenty of closet space. They could be made a tad bit larger if we reduce the closets to ½ their width and put them side-by-side.
• The back deck, which can be reached from both the family room and back bedroom, has a curved stairway down to a stone patio area, below.

The second floor is mostly master suite:

• The area just inside the doors to the master bedroom opens up to the third floor, and has skylights. There's an image below that shows this.
• The master bedroom isn't huge, but it's certainly large enough. Combined with the small living area that's open to the wide open front area, there should be enough space in which to stretch out.
• The master bath design is a little dated, but then I do like how I have done it. I suppose we could eliminate the second door to the curved deck, and put in a shower, or perhaps a large spa tub.
• Unlike most designs, the walk-in closet is not very close to the master bath. This design, with the L-shaped area available for the master suite, just didn't lend itself to placing things where I usually do.
• The kitchen is over the garage at the left. Neither the dining area or "nook" at the back are very large. I put the range on an island, which I commonly do, but I did not place a vent hood over it. That's a conscious design choice, but I think in real life you would want something to catch greasy smoke and vapor.
• There is also a deck that wraps the kitchen on three sides, though it isn't very wide. Not really terribly useful, I suppose.

Here is the third floor:

• There isn't much here, except the family/living room. I put a sofa, card table, and big-screen TV in this room. Seemed appropriate.
• There is a fireplace at the back of the family room, where the curved hearth is shown. You just can't see it in the floor plan.
• Also note the skylights, which do show in this image.

First we enjoy the main front view (at top) at night. Wow, this is a very nice view, and I especially like the light patterns that play across the water. Who knew it would do that?

This is an alternate front view, a bit more straight-on.

And of course this is the same alternate view at night.

Here we are from the left, showing the opposite side of the house. The deck above the garage wraps around the kitchen on 3 sides.

This is the final night view.

I decided to add a close-up shot showing the stairs up to the front deck.

Here we are inside the front doors.

From the same general area as above, we look more directly toward the back of the house. That's a closet on the right. I like to have some place where people can put their coats.

This looks toward the front doors from the top of the stairs up from the garage level.

Here is another view into the family room, from next to the stairs. The two doors on the right are to the bedrooms. The door on the left is to the bath.

This shows the stairs down to the laundry room and garage. That's a closet at the bottom of the stairs, on the right. The door at the head of the stairs is the bath.

We are standing in front of the sliding glass doors at the back of the family room, looking toward the front of the house.

This is the front bedroom, looking toward the front of the house.

From the curved "corner", we look toward the closet doors.

This is the back bedroom. There is room in the curved back part of this bedroom for a desk.

And here we look toward the back deck.

Here is utility room and half bath that's downstairs.

This is the bath on the main level, the one that's opposite the bedrooms.

From the top of the stairs, this is the kitchen and dining.

From next to the other set of stairs, this is the kitchen from a different angle. We can see the sink, which is in the curved corner. I like the curved cabinets on either side of the window.

From the "corner" of the nook, we look toward the front of the house. The stairs at left go up to the living area outside the master suite.

From the top of the stairs (as we come up from the kitchen) we look out to the very tall and open space at the front of our house.

From our vantage in the living room, here we look back toward the stairs. The stairs go up to the family room on the third floor. Down they go to the kitchen.

This living room view shows the wide open spaces that characterize this house.

Here is one view inside the master bedroom.

This looks toward the back deck, and shows the curved walls at the rear of the house.

I wanted to show the skylights inside the doors to the master bedroom. The double doors are at the right. That's the closet doors on the left. I put a wardrobe along the wall, which you can see at center.

If we were a fly on the wall, looking down at the master bath, this is something like what we would see.

This view of the master bath shows the skylights.

This is a more conventional view, not the fly's perspective.

And last but not least, here is the upper family room.