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Until we built a huge log home with a great room on the main level, I'd always lived in homes with separate rooms and didn't think I'd like the open floor plan concept. It all depends on the layout. I love my great room although not too sure about the roof pitch height of 23 feet! Too much air up there to heat. It's nice that the dog and cats can see where we are but when I don't want the cats helping me cook, they have to go into the bedroom. While I don't like stairs, it's nice to be able to escape into the basement when the TV is too loud upstairs. With an open floor plan, you definitely need someplace you or your pets can retreat to.
My whole life, we have lived in houses that have had a formal dining room and a dining area included in the kitchen. My whole life, we called the formal dining room, "The formal dining room." This is before I ever met a real estate agent or knew anything about stuff like that. The reason it was 'formal'? It had the fancy table and chairs and tablecloth and we had our formal dinners there (whereas we ate on the smaller dining table off the kitchen otherwise).
So, yes...there have always been (in my life) TWO dining rooms...and one was always the 'formal' one.
Growing up we had a eat in kitchen, a living room and a dining room. It was never called a "formal" dining room, it was, it is, and it will always be, just a dining room........
Our dining room, obviously was much fancier than the kitchen, but the term "formal" was never used....just using the dining room alone was already know it was just used on holidays and big family gatherings, as the kitchen was never as big as the dining room....
My BIL, has the really formal dining room, and yet no one wants to really be in there, we have dinner there, yet desert everyone likes the kitchen overlooking the family room, as the formal dining room is kinda away from everything, thus making it not "friendly" if that could be possible???? The family like the kitchen overlooking the backyard, the family room with the TV....who want to be in the formal dining room overlooking the street.....
You are definitely not alone, as many of the other posters have already stated. We like separate rooms, but the main living areas have oversized doorways and archways. I, too, like my kitchen to be separate from the other areas of the house, but again, it has an oversized doorway and two windows in it, so it doesn't feel closed in at all.
I will throw my two cents in again. I stated earlier I have a semi open floor plan. I was asked by a family member if I would watch her 2 yr old for a week at my home. I said yes. I have to say I have no idea why parents prefer an open floor plan with little ones. For me, it has been a complete headache! When my son was a toddler we had a traditional floor plan with rooms and doors. Easy. He was locked out. Watching this child run marathons from one room to another...ugh. I managed to get a baby gate up to the living room. I would go crazy if I didn't have that one separation!
add me to the list --i HATE the open floor plan--which i unfortunately have now. how i miss my last 1950's home. it was perfect except for the location
I prefer open, even more so after having a handicapped child. I found out just how difficult it could be to move from room to room in a wheelchair. Unless the rooms were very large, just about any furniture ended up being an impediment to access, and the doors just made it even more difficult. My husband and I are planning our retirement home, which will be small but open so that as we age we won't have any difficulty using our home in comfort. Even if we end up with a cane, walker, or wheelchair.
I will throw my two cents in again. I stated earlier I have a semi open floor plan. I was asked by a family member if I would watch her 2 yr old for a week at my home. I said yes. I have to say I have no idea why parents prefer an open floor plan with little ones. For me, it has been a complete headache! When my son was a toddler we had a traditional floor plan with rooms and doors. Easy. He was locked out. Watching this child run marathons from one room to another...ugh. I managed to get a baby gate up to the living room. I would go crazy if I didn't have that one separation!
Excellent point. Works for pets (especially new puppies!) too.
I think I ~might~ like a super-open floor plan at a weekend place (beach cottage or mountain cabin for instance) but for my daily-living space....not so much. I LIKE closing the kitchen door when I host a dinner party in the dining room!
That being said, when we did our addition we made sure we had an informal space adjacent to the kitchen where guests can hang out for casual get-togethers and BBQs.
This thread really got me thinking about all the many homes I've lived in during my many years of life. I have never lived in a house that actually had doors that closed off a kitchen. From houses built in the early 50's to homes built in the 90's. From little houses to relatively large homes, I've never experienced one that was truly closed off. DH and I did live in one house for about 5 years where the kitchen and breakfast room were isolated by a short hallway, but no doors. I hated that house because I could hear the family in the family room, but I couldn't see what was going on.
I guess the houses I've enjoyed the most are like the ones I have now, where the kitchen, breakfast room and small family room are all in one open area, but we still have a formal living room and a dining room at the front of the house. And we have a spare bedroom upstairs that we have a TV in for the kids.
It doesn't have the big soaring ceilings, which I think look nice, but after having 2 houses with them, don't want again. We bought one of those homes when our kids were little, and I hated it. There was no privacy in that house. Not only did we have this giant space we had to cool, but sound carried upstairs terribly. I could stand in our kitchen and have a conversation with my husband upstairs in our bedroom (directly over the kitchen) without raising our voices. Horrible.
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open floor plans
