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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   2256 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for May 22, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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A mildly-interesting two-story house design (including a version with cl*sets, plus one-story parent designs for comparison purposes): In theory (to satisfy code requirements), the living room is on floor 1 and the dining room is on floor 2. But, in practice, the room on floor 1 serves both living and dining purposes, and the room on floor 2 is just an extra living room.

Whether it makes sense hinges on how the first-floor room is reconfigured between living and dining uses. Obviously, folding tables and folding chairs are perfect for dining use. For living use, folding couches apparently are available for purchase, though I'm not sure how compactly they actually fold up. Alternatively, perhaps the folding chairs and folding couches can be replaced with comfy, headrest-equipped office chairs that can serve for both living and dining.

You censor "closet" after this comment?

You know, I really will never truly understand you.

Censoring words that are totally innocuous is a very common online joke. On /r/mapporncirclejerk, a few months ago it was extremely popular for people to say "Fr*nce", and jokingly complain in the comments that anyone who failed to do so was using coarse language in the presence of children. That trend has died out at the moment, but see also this humorous post where the use of "Gr*ece", "K*rdistan", and "Arm*nia" was hardly questioned.

Why do I enjoy calling myself a nigger without censorship on this website (past instances: 1 2 3)? I don't know. I guess I'm just being edgy for no good reason.

I'm grateful for the explanation, but I must note that you've explained the thing that least needs explaining. It's all good. You clearly know more about floor planning or the lived experience of Blackness than I can ever hope to.

cl*sets

May I enquire as to why you censored the term "closets", what is the new secret most awful problematic usage of this commonplace word? And if it is so terrible a word that we must return to the 18th century habit of writing, why not replace it with "walk-in wardrobe" or some other euphemism?

I'd also say that having the kitchen and dining room on separate floors is a bad idea, unless you're going to incorporate a dumb waiter or the likes. Just take five minutes to imagine having to carry the Sunday roast upstairs. Combination living/dining room is a better idea. Or make the kitchen bigger and turn that into a combination kitchen/dining area.

May I enquire as to why you censored the term "closets"?

I personally dislike closets (which, being immovable, needlessly constrain the rearrangement of furniture) and much prefer shelving units and wardrobes. Past discussion: 1 2

I'd also say that having the kitchen and dining room on separate floors is a bad idea.

Read what I wrote again. For code-compliance purposes, the living room is on the first floor and the dining room is on the second floor—but, in everyday life, the room labeled "living room" serves double duty as either a living room or a dining room depending on circumstances, and the room labeled "dining room" serves as a living room for the people occupying the upstairs bedrooms.

I personally dislike closets (which, being immovable, needlessly constrain the rearrangement of furniture) and much prefer shelving units and wardrobes.

There’s got to be a clinical term to describe this. Lol. I don’t have a great relationship with them either. Closets always dredge up the memories of where all my mother stored my toys when I was grounded and not allowed to play. On one occasion I went and grabbed my father’s toolbox and step ladder and removed the hinges off the closet door and my mother found me inside, playing with my toys. Yeah, I was whooped pretty hard, and I was a very young child.

There’s got to be a clinical term to describe this.

Autism. I have a case study:

https://www.themotte.org/post/3755/friday-fun-thread-for-may-15/443629?context=8#context

<- You’re talking to a case study right here, :/.

Yeah buddy, I know. The diagnosis was never in dispute. Luckily (?) you aren't as autistic as TK. He's hella autistic. He needs his own entry in the DSM-6.

Not that it takes a particularly good psychiatrist to figure that out. If I wanted to reliably find autistic nerds on the internet, I'd start here (or on LessWrong). I'm a nerd with ADHD instead, so I suppose I can pass/mask, or at least meet you guys half way.

He's hella autistic. He needs his own entry in the DSM-6.

Level 6, huh? Damn. He’s way more advanced than me then. But I highly doubt LW was ever more autistic than StarCraft Battle.net channels back in the day.

I personally dislike closets

Ah, so you're French. Truely, this explains alot.

(I'm joking. This explains nothing, nor are you actually French. Unless you are, in which case it explains everything.)

I can understand the dislike, personally. Though it might be due to having to deal with some very awkwardly designed closets that I've forcibly redesigned into something approximating a walk-in wardrobe.

which, being immovable, needlessly constrain the rearrangement of furniture

And yet you design floor plans that only allow for one reasonable arrangement of furniture, if that

I don't know what you mean by that. My bathrooms and laundry/utility rooms are cramped enough that the accusation may be accurate there. But my kitchens, living rooms, and dining rooms are ample. And I believe that my bedrooms permit a few different configurations even at maximum occupancy—and how often are bedrooms at maximum occupancy anyway? (For example, the design that I am having built will have nominal occupancy of five but actual occupancy of just two.)

Have you considered sliding into the wall doors for the bedrooms access into their respective bathrooms? That way, it avoids the risk of two people trying to enter the bathroom simultaneously from different doors and slamming into each other. Most likely when there are guests invited who are not familiar with the layout.

Edit: The laundry room and front door are a greater risk of collision, actually.

In this design, it is not intended that a bathroom will ever have both doors unlocked at the same time. Rather:

  • 99 percent of the time, each bathroom will be in "private mode", with the door to the living/dining room locked from the bathroom side.

  • On the rare occasion that a guest is present, at least one bathroom will be in "guest mode", with the door to the bedroom locked from both sides.

Also, it's my understanding that sliding doors are very bad at blocking sounds and odors, so using them on bathrooms is ill-advised.

Regarding the laundry/utility-room door, I could have used a sliding door there, but I saw no reason to. IMO, having eight swinging doors is simpler than having seven swinging doors and one sliding door.

I understand your point on bathroom sliding doors, indeed they block sound poorly. But maybe if you have not started constructing your home yet you can widen the entire house just for the laundry door. If you and your roommate or wife live in the unit together, eventually someone will be exiting the laundry room at the same time someone is entering the home. Or someone will forget something in the house and step in quickly to retrieve it (keys, wallet, credit card, etc) and not communicate the entry as normal to the other person, knocking them senseless in a rush.

But maybe if you have not started constructing your home yet you can widen the entire house just for the laundry door.

(1) Construction already is underway.

(2) The house already takes up the entire buildable width of the lot (34′2″ vs. 35′).

If you and your roommate live in the unit together, eventually someone will be exiting the laundry room at the same time someone is entering the home. Or someone will forget something in the house and step in quickly to retrieve it (keys, wallet, credit card, etc.) and not communicate the entry as normal to the other person, knocking him senseless in a rush.

I do not assign much probability to this hypothetical event. If you disagree, you can join the betting pool with @orthoxerox. (Come on! Are you people in the habit of opening opaque doors with all your strength? I certainly am not. People can be standing behind doors unbeknownst to you even if those doors don't swing into other doors.)

More comments

I'm talking about realistic configurations, not theoretical ones where you use office furniture in the living room and people always keep doors closed.

I normally do not use office furniture in the living room in my designs. I just had that idea this week, and the designs at the top of this thread are the only ones that use such rigmarole.

If you don't keep your doors closed when you're not using them, I don't know what to tell you.

One floor plan that I can't get right is a five-bay colonial with a mudroom-style entrance. Traditional foyers are designed for people who have no coats or wet boots or kids that track dirt everywhere.

I am looking at something like 13.2x8 or 12.8x8.4m (so that the footprint of the house is around 100m2). But no matter how I try, I can't design a staircase that feels natural without interrupting the regularity of the facade.

Having incorporated the rest of your comments to get an idea of what you are looking for, I think I may have a solution for you. A few preliminary items:

  1. I'm assuming that when you say "Colonial" you are referring to what is known as "Colonial Revival", which is a 20th century update of the Georgian and Federal styles that were popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Basically, I'm assuming you aren't referring to French Colonial, or Spanish Colonial, or Dutch Colonial, or any of the other "Colonial" styles which may exist in North America.
  2. As a 20th century American style, this type of house would have no need for a mudroom per se. Most of these were built in auto-centric suburbs beginning in the 1920s, meaning the front door would not be used much. Early examples of this style were mostly built in more upscale neighborhoods, and once it became more common after World War II most people would have had a car. Prewar suburbs with these houses would have likely had detached garages behind the house, and later examples would have had attached garages. In Pittsburgh, the terrain is hilly and the garage is usually integral and opens into the basement. What I'm getting at is that the home's occupant's wouldn't normally use the front door, so a mudroom would be built in the back, off the garage, or it would have an unfinished basement to use for that purpose.
  3. Despite the ever-ballooning American house size, the dimensions you've proposed aren't modest. I don't use foreign units without conversion so you'll have to bear with me here, but 100 sq. meters is about 1076 sq. feet. Since this is a two-story house, doubling that gets you to 2152 sq. ft., which is plenty big.

To give an example to tie it all together, this is a 5-bay Colonial Revival home in a suburb of Pittsburgh. It was built in 1968 by Bryan, who is a reputable local builder that mostly focuses on custom homes these days but was doing tract houses in the 1960s and 1970s (not to be confused with Ryan Homes, a national developer of tract houses that's been building junk since at least the 1970s). The total area is 1890 sq. ft., though the footprint is only 875 as the second story slightly overhangs on both sides. It has 4 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths. You will notice that the driveway goes down the hill behind the house and the garage is integrated into the basement. Ignore the assymetrical front layout. Here's a more upscale example from 1910. While it precedes the era of widespread automobile ownership, at 6900 square feet, it owner would have probably had a car, or at least a horse. [Note how the driveway leads to a carriage house in the rear [https://www.google.com/maps/@40.4513598,-79.9114955,3a,24.5y,311.56h,95.08t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1s_vxsZmkSMf0FSWoXMHGrIw!2e0!5s20220901T000000!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D-5.0819782887585205%26panoid%3D_vxsZmkSMf0FSWoXMHGrIw%26yaw%3D311.55661009264486!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDUyMC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D]. The owner would not have entered through the front door.

I initially intended to tell you that your problem was hopeless if you wished to remain architecturally correct, so I consulted The Bible, namely Virginia Savage McAlester's indispensible A Field Guide to American Houses and consulted the sections on Colonial Revival, Georgian, and Federal houses. What I discovered was that, contrary to my mental image of a colonial house, there is a rare variation with a centered gable. While these gables are usually small, and may not protrude from the central mass at all, it would be possible to bump this out and create a large enough area for a mud room. Unfortunately, since, per the book, this occurs in fewer than 5% of Colonial Revival houses and 10% of Georgian and Federal houses, it's hard to find pictures, and bump-outs of sufficient size are less common still. But I don't see why it couldn't be done. This House only bumps out slightly, but you could extend this by 5 feet or so and get a small mud room out of it. Some people build small mudrooms on their houses and they always look tacked-on, but with a central gable running all the way up it would be an integral part of the house, and from there you could just use a standard floor plan.

Beyond this, I don't see why there would be a problem with the stairs. Every house like this I've been in (and I can almost guarantee the layout of the first example) has the stairwell in the center of the house. Basically you'd walk in and there would be an entryway with a foyer leading down the center of the house to the kitchen in the back, with the stairwell running parallel on whichever side you want. To the right there's a family room, and to the left a living room and dining room. You can sacrifice some family room space for a half bath or hide one under the stairs. These houses almost always have four bedrooms.

  1. Staircase goes at the back; perpendicular to the long axis of the house and either facing the entry or above the basement stairs. (which would then be facing the entry, probably behind a door)

  2. The traditional mudroom is behind the backdoor (which is probably on the side of a colonial); front doors are for guests, and you should be taking their coats for them and laying them on the bed in the spare room! However, you could build something like #2 or #4 here in which the exterior wall of the house (including the front door) is bumped out about 3 feet in some part of the porch area, the roof of which extends something like a further 3 three feet). This creates space for hangers inside the entry and funnels people into the living area; there's a nice spot for a closet if you have winter coats. (or just want to piss @ToaKraka off)

Like this:

                          (stairs are up here somewhere)
                                   
                                  |        __
               Optional wall -->  |       |  |  (some other room here)
       (nice place for hooks tho) |       |  |<--closet
                      ___________ |       |__|___________
                          |       |          |       |
                          |       |__......__|       |
                          |                          |
                          |__________________________|

Fuck guests, if I am using the house every day, I want it to be tailored to my needs.

One floor plan that I can't get right is a five-bay colonial with a mudroom-style entrance. I am looking at something like 13.2 m × 8 m or 12.8 m × 8.4 m (so that the footprint of the house is around 100 m2).

Extremely lazy spitball sketch (though possibly a bit too big)

But, no matter how I try, I can't design a staircase that feels natural without interrupting the regularity of the façade.

I don't get it. What does the stairway have to do with the façade?

Traditional foyers are designed for people who have no coats or wet boots or kids that track dirt everywhere.

Just add a closet under the stairway, and/or a wardrobe next to the wall.

How do you get into the kitchen, through the master suite?

I don't get it. What does the stairway have to do with the façade?

In your plan, nothing. But if the stairway touches the external wall, it has to fit between the window openings.

But if the stairway touches the external wall, it has to fit between the window openings.

You could have a window in the stairwell, offset vertically if necessary to have it a reasonable height off the floor.

offset vertically

And this is precisely what I try to avoid.

Have you tried making the house deeper than eight meters? I'd be surprised if there were any actual colonial houses of such modest dimensions.

I also find it amusing that the colonial house plan is now colonizing Rus'.

It's colonizing me personally, no one's building them here. It's all "Mikea" clones if it has one floor and "Wright style" if it has two (and I hope you can wrap some copper wire around ol' Frank's body for some free electricity, because it's always a gloomy brick-clad cube with vertical accents).

And I can't make the house too deep, or it will be too big. I have a great 10.4x10.8 floor plan, and I want to see if I can squish it into a more oblong rectangle.

As an architecture fan I'd be interested if you could find any pictures of what you're describing, and if you're really generous letting me feel free to use those terms if I find them apt. Especially since I'm guessing the "Wright Style" has only the most superficial resemblance to anything actually designed by Wright.

More comments

How do you get into the kitchen? Through the master suite?

The line between the dining room and the kitchen does not represent a wall.

And that's exactly what I've been trying to avoid: pathways that lead through the foyer. I want it to be semi-contained: there's the front door, maybe the door to the utility room, the door that leads to the rest of the house. No through indoor traffic.

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