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I've never really stuck to specific home styles, only how a particular house on a particular site happens to "wear" the style it was given. One might be a peacefully decomposing log cabin, Cape Cod wannabe, depressed 50s bungalow, anonymous mid-80s raised ranch, or diluted craftsman.
I wouldn't know how to label my current house and suspect the owner/builders didn't either . It happens to fit it's spot. The only rooms with "normal" 90 degree angles are the garage, a half bath, and a utility room. All the rest require...shall we say..."an open-minded approach to furniture placement". Subsequent occupants might comment "why the heck would anyone deliberately put thatthere? (doors, walls, windows, counters, electrical outlets, built-ins, etc).
But then I live in a pretty small town that was "re-designed" by an 9.2 Richter scale earthquake. People built or rebuilt their own homes however they wanted without the benefit of an architect or building codes. The more thoughtful or less creative (depending on whether you consider this a good or bad thing) picked a canned plan out of a catalog. Most started off tiny and sprawled as necessary. They tended to build UP instead of OUT...cheaper, as that took less material. I've been in some edifices you'd need to be a mountaineer to navigate.
The closest you might get to a regional "style" could probably be described as "whatever fit most cost-effectively on the freight barge". Either that or "contractor grade Big Box store standard-stock". In other words, without much character at all. Oh, wait, I almost forgot...some rooms do have what passes as character or focal points...usually the remains of some large animal hanging on a wall. There may be a Bowflex eliptical parked right under it adding to the ambiance.
Funny how you can walk in to homes of very disparate design but find the same finishes and fixtures in all of them because there's only one or two local stores to shop at without getting on a plane or spending 8 hours in a car.
Last edited by Parnassia; 06-05-2019 at 03:28 PM..
It's been my dream to renovate for about 12 years so I'm on the pay as you go plan.
Reading these replies - thank you!
Ours is just a one story, 4 bedroom, 2 car garage pool home on a lake. Quiet neighborhood.
No steps.
Home built in 1982 so we have the 1982 kitchen which our children totally detest.
My parents' home had clutter - I realize part of that was 4 kids, all the friends over all the time and they had another home in the Chicago area. So when they moved the contents of that home to Florida, nothing matched.
So, in our home, things match. Light and bright. Lots of windows, 12 foot sliders where the outside comes indoors.
We have the large white tile in many of the rooms and one of my sibs is pushing for wood floors but I think I would get tired of that and the tile still looks OK.
(Note: I have 2 very creative sisters both of which do interior decorating. Their homes are lovely but have more clutter than I would want).
Our style is eclectic and comfortable. Our small pool is the focal point of our back yard with the lanai and three triple sliders opening onto it. It has a pool cage enclosure, so we took the screens off the kitchen windows and use them as a pass through when we eat out there. In hot and humid SWFL, a pool is a wonderful thing.
The magnificent live oak in our front yard is the focal point there, with so much shade and many birds. I was disappointed not to have a house with a huge palm tree in front, but now I wouldn't trade our live oak with its leaves and Spanish moss. For us, there is nothing better than working up a sweat (which takes walking out of the door this time of year) and then taking a dip in the pool or cooling off under the tree.
Wow! Love your tree, love your pool. What a paradise!
Thank you, Piney Creek! We feel like we need to pinch ourselves sometimes. I only wish my parents could have visited us here, they would have loved it too. They visited and stayed with us many times at our 1875 bungalow in NY over the years and we had such good times together. By the time we moved, they weren’t able to make long trips anymore and never made it here.
We built a smaller home 11 years ago. Living room, dining area, kitchen and 1/2 bath on the 1st level. 5 steps up and 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. 5 steps down, family room, 1 bedroom, laundry room/office and a full bathroom. 4 steps down from there is our basement. Our home is not open concept. We like the kitchen closed off from the living room. We also don't really entertain so it works for us.
We are on 40 acres and love the quiet. We are at the end of a cul de sac and there are about 6 other houses on our road each on 2 acres.
A small (about 1300 sf) ranch on 1/2 acre in suburbia. It is not my preferred style or size (I dislike having the bedroom on the ground floor, and would rather the house was larger) but is all that my finances allow(ed). Since purchasing it six years ago it has been named The Money Pit and for good reason. But I will never be able to move and so I am making the best of what I have. It's tough sometimes though because it seems like every time I start to feel really fond of being here, a new and expensive problem comes up and I start regretting my decision to commit to this house. But as my mom used to say, "you've made your bed, now you have to lie in it", lol
For reasons too complicated to go into here, moving elsewhere is not an option.
Our home is not open concept. We like the kitchen closed off from the living room. We also don't really entertain so it works for us.
I'm with you on the anti-open concept thing. I understand how it can be a plus for some lifestyles but also remember when having a separate dining room (for example) was considered a great selling point! LOL
My current house does have a handy setup due to a prior owner adding a room to it behind the garage. There is a large window opening into this room (like a giant pass-through) in the middle of one kitchen counter wall, which means I can watch the tv in that room while working in the kitchen. None of my other four houses had a line of sight from the kitchen into the room where the tv was, so the best I could do in those houses was turn up the tv and listen to it while in the kitchen. I'm a news and politics junkie so that did work okay sometimes but still I'd have liked to be able to see as well as hear it. The passthrough has a pair of glass 'pocket windows' to allow it to be closed if wanted. I just leave it open.
To actually walk from the kitchen into the tv room you have to turn two nearby corners and go down one step, so today's design gurus would not consider it "open concept" -- not that that matters, lol
I don't entertain either so I look at my house as having features that benefit me rather than anyone else. For example I love not having any interior doors except for the bathrooms and the one little hall closet that only has my winter coats and the vacuum cleaner in it. Not only do I not need interior doors, it also gives me an extra 24 feet of usable wall space (36" w x 8 ft h) that I wouldn't have available if a door was there and had to be opened against it.
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. It happens to fit it's spot. The only rooms with "normal" 90 degree angles are the garage, a half bath, and a utility room. All the rest require...shall we say..."an open-minded approach to furniture placement". Subsequent occupants might comment "why the heck would anyone deliberately put that there? (doors, walls, windows, counters, electrical outlets, built-ins, etc).
Renovating this year....
