Alistair and Mary’s 1920s semi-detached home in Eccles requires tweaks to the existing internal reconfiguration to improve the layout, making it more user-friendly. Currently, the property is too small, dark and narrow and is in need of extra light, a better flow between rooms, an open plan living area and better views of the garden from the kitchen.
At a loss for meaningful, practical and creative ways to resolve these issues, Alistair and Mary contacted Magda at Pride Road to devise a range of design options to enhance their home, according to their main priorities. Magda undertook a collaborative Concept Design Workshop to explore ways of reconfiguring the couple’s house to maximise its living potential, in turn carving out their dream home. If you’re stumped for inspiration, we also have a host of shrewd ideas to help with your home redesign projects and reconfiguration work.
The ground floor in its current layout includes a small front living room, a middle combined dining and sitting room and a rear kitchen with an adjoining utility room that was built 60cm lower than the rest of the downstairs rooms. The staircase is straight ahead upon entry to the house.There is also a coal shed that is only accessible from outdoors, meaning no real connection between the house and garden has been established as yet.
This was the most expensive of the new design layouts and with it, we managed to successfully accommodate all of the couple’s domestic requirements. We started by locating an adjoining toilet and utility room in the front room, alongside a small office and playroom. This meant that the largest middle room would remain untouched.
We then played around with the home’s split level proportions, by moving the kitchen table into the middle room to create more space at the back of the property. We decided that a galley kitchen design would prove to be the most effective and efficient use of this rear room as the layout is narrow and would not be able to include an island. Beyond that, we designed a spacious three-metre rear extension, the justification being that we had already taken away the front room living area and needed to replace it with an alternative family friendly room.
We were unable to move the entire kitchen to the middle section of the property because of the original fireplace that resides there, which Mary and Alistair adore and requested be kept in tact.
After that, we examined storage options underneath the staircase, designing new pull out shelves and units that cleverly added extra functionality to this otherwise largely redundant area.
This was our minimalistic option and did not require an extension, the plans economically slotting into the home’s existing footprint. We went on to look at making the ceiling at the rear of the property higher and installing tall, glazed windows to offer lovely views from the kitchen into the garden. A new toilet and utility room would be conveniently located underneath the stairs. We have many more amazing tips for introducing more light into your home.
Here, we wanted to make the most of the kitchen space with a 3.5-metre rear extension that would incorporate a living and dining area, along with a downstairs toilet. Get a measure of what else you can do with your kitchen space by taking a look at our helpful guide.
The installation of a new door between the front and middle rooms means would allow for a more comfortable furniture arrangement. Previous access to the front living room was from the hallway and the angle was restrictive, meaning that the room was not laid out and used to its optimum advantage.
Mary and Alistair appreciated the considerable value added by our Concept Design Workshop and were extremely satisfied with the options that we presented to them.
Their priorities were to gain extra light, perspective and views to the garden, which we aimed to tackle across all of the options presented and that we firmly believe were achieved.
If you are unsure of where to start with your home rebuild, we have information all about how best to invest.
Mary and Alistair say: “We asked Magda to redesign the layout of our house because we felt we had no flow. We’ve been living here for the past few years and kept trying to think of ways we could do it ourselves but we kept coming back with stumbling blocks and limited creativity.
“When Magda came round, we went through our priorities, our budget and drew out plans for different options and looked at what didn’t work and what we liked until we came up with our ideal option and another option if the budget doesn’t support the first design.
“The workshop gave us an actual plan and puts things right into context to actually see what will work and what won’t. Now, we feel much happier that we can actually get a builder to come round and say what they’re going to do and we feel like it’s going to be what we want, which is reassuring.”
Mary and Alistair will now obtain quotes from builders in order to price up the options so that they can make a decision and inform Magda of their preferred choice, budget permitting. The plans included variations of scale, according to the budget, so that the quantity surveyor would be able to fully assist with all aspects of the valuations. Our plans are hand drawn to scale so that the clients and builders can measure from them to get those crucial first cost estimates.
Would you like to change your house to create more space? Book a workshop
“We asked Magda to redesign the layout of our house because we felt we had no flow. We’ve been living here for the past few years and kept trying to think of ways we could do it ourselves but we kept coming back with stumbling blocks and limited creativity.
“When Magda came round, we went through our priorities, our budget and drew out plans for different options and looked at what didn’t work and what we liked until we came up with our ideal option and another option if the budget doesn’t support the first design."
Alistair and Mary
"We feel much happier that we can actually get a builder to come round and say what they’re going to do and we feel like it’s going to be what we want, which is reassuring.”
"Mary and Alistair appreciated the considerable value added by our Concept Design Workshop and were extremely satisfied with the options that we presented to them."
"Mary and Alistair's priorities were to gain extra light, perspective and views to the garden, which we aimed to tackle across all of the options presented and that we firmly believe were achieved."
Pride Road
