First, the existing floor plan:
On to the photo tour! The photos that follow were taken on the day the keys were handed to us in January. While so much will change (work is already well underway!), you'll catch glimpses of the home's salient features, including original millwork (beautiful window & door casing) and the bountiful natural light that floods the home from the east and west. To help with orientation, please refer to the floor plan below, which marks the vantage point of each image.
SCREEN PORCH | Upon entering the home, you arrive first at a screen porch, and from there proceed inside through the main door. In rainy or buggy environments, a nicely finished screen porch can offer a relaxing chance to experience fresh air while staying semi-protected from the elements. But too often, rather than function as the best of both worlds, the screen porch sits vacant, lost somewhere between fully indoors & fully outdoors, acting as a catch-all for miscellaneous outdoor items. A wasted opportunity, in our view, to connect to the outdoors and the neighborhood streetscape.
LIVING ROOM | The living room is generously sized, receiving good light from a pair of transoms and a band of casement windows on the west end of the room. Cedar beams puncuate the ceiling, highlighting the room's lofty 8'-6" height, and lending unique visual interest. Unfortunately, somewhere along the line, the wood beams were covered in chocolate brown paint. We'd like to keep the beams, but either refinish to a natural wood tone or paint a crisp white.
FAMILY ROOM | Refering to this room as the family room might be a stretch. It's a dark & gloomy space located smack in the middle of the house, with walls closing it off from other rooms & concealing natural light. A half-wall opening in the corner attempts to connect the room to the kitchen, but the awkward placement misses the mark. Addressing this space will be key in our new plans.
SUNROOM | We're quite sure that the sun room at the east end of the house was added on after the original build, since the basement doesn't extend below it, and remnant exterior siding covers the main wall. That said, we're so glad that it's here -- the light coming into this room is unreal, with windows along three sides, opening up the house to trees and greenery outside. The space is severely under-utilized in its current form, which we plan to remedy in our updated layout.
KITCHEN | The existing kitchen suffers most from its poor location in the house. Cramped into a small corner off of the back stairway, it lacks countertop space as well as seating of any kind. The cabinets, countertops, and appliances have all seen better days. We'll address these kitchen shortcomings, along with the family room and sunroom, in our re-worked layout of the main level.
BATH | The bathroom on the main level is small in size, but big in function. We'll keep it as a full bath (extra baths/showers are always welcome!), swapping the placement of the toilet and sink, and updating all of the finishes throughout.
DINING ROOM | Lucky for us, the dining room comes packed with natural charm -- it features beautiful original windows on two sides, and a built-in hutch along the west wall. We'll freshen up this room with new finishes (goodbye, peeling orchid wallpaper and painted brown trim), but otherwise plan to let the original details shine.
This wraps up the tour of the main level in its current state. Flaws & all, the potential is there for this house to become something truly special. Our plans for how we'll transform the main level will be coming up in the next post. And then, we'll move on to share the upper level, with lots more to come after that. Thanks for following along :).