To Think That Open Plan Living Is Just a Fashion of The Moment

A long room with partitions can be flexible if you want to entertain.

I have never understood a separate dining room and even some cafés now have kitchens where you can watch the food preparations.

I like to talk to my guests whilst cooking though woe betide them if they get in my way.

Back in 1960's London we had a serving hatch to the kitchen. It was small but by the 1970's these had grown into proper dividers with breakfast bar.
Always a separate sitting room though.

I agree with the majority, kitchen diner and separate living room. Utility room would be a bonus.
chocolatelovinggran why is it our children only discuss our shortcomings and never the positives ?

10 years ago we moved to a house with an open plan ground floor - hallway, kitchen, living area. It had been altered by a previous occupant. It was what attracted us so much to the property! It has a spacious feel and is light and bright because of windows on different elevations. We still love it, BUT - perhaps because we are now in our seventies and feeling the cold more, we are beginning to think about having some doors. This winter particularly we have really noticed how difficult it is to keep the living room warm. But if you are younger and aren’t bothered about that I would say go for it!

We have moved a few times, built our own house once, and now have adapted where we are to suit us. We have a large kitchen/diner, with a small TV on the wall, and a separate living area which is often not used until late afternoon/early evening. DH also has a study, and we have a fab large utility room for all the washing, ironing and crap with nowhere else to go. Thus with a judicious closing of a few doors, all is quiet and contained. I don't like the idea of cooking in a room with soft furnishings (DH cooked kippers earlier, and I can still smell them) and certainly don't want a washing machine screaming in the corner while I am watching TV! In fact, I don't like washing machines and their associated laundry being anywhere near food prep.

I think it also depends on the size of your house. One large room gives the feeling of spaciousness which 2/3 separate small rooms doesn’t although others may find them cosy. I think open plan does need to be well planned. Dd is about to move to a small 3 bedroom house and intends to take out most of the walls downstairs but they aren’t solid walls anyway. Others have done it in the row. As for kitchen smells extractor fans usually work very well and if you wash up as you go along as my granny did or load the dishwasher you won’t have pots and pans to look at - you have to be well organised.

We have a kitchen diner and a living room. I would prefer the living room to incorporate an eating area and have a smaller kitchen. Next door is open plan, but it’s so small that it’s the best way to make use of the space.

There was no heating in the bedrooms so in winter I did my homework sitting in bed with my coat on.
In winter I did my homework at a little table in the sitting room and no-one was allowed the TV on until I'd finished.
We had about 2-3 hours homework a night in those days.
Dad used to be wanting the news on.

I agree with most of the above posters and for similar reasons. As I live alone it does not really affect me now.

I was brought up in a tiny two-up-two-down terrace and hated the lack of privacy and always being on top of one another. There was no heating in the bedrooms so in winter I did my homework sitting in bed with my coat on.

I can think of nothing more horrendous than "togetherness" and "family time".

OldHag

Thank you all for your thoughts. It would seem that most people prefer a kitchen/dining room with a separate living room, sitting room, lounge, whatever you prefer to call it. We actually live in a large bungalow, and in general the area is more retired people than young families, so going from what's been said, and most particularly about cooking smells impregnating soft furnishings, I think we may decide to keep the living room separate.

It's an Australian concept and works over there but generally, it's warmer over there so no need to keep a sitting room warmer and cosy.
There's no need to be looking at the kitchen area from the sitting area if the layout s good and they all seem to have separate laundry rooms.

Yes, a utility room is a must for me too, and also a study.

Gingster

Heating a large area is expensive.

Yes, this.

I'd like a kitchen/diner but a separate sitting room.
There would have to be a utility room too. It's essential imo, for laundry, shoes, an extra sink for washing veg brought in from the garden etc. And dogs if you have a dog.

Open plan is definitely not new. My childhood home in the 60s had the lounge and dining room knocked through, as did my first house in the 80s. That was common in older houses, with the small kitchen retained.
Now it is more common to knock through dining room and kitchen as people want a big kitchen. My last house had separate downstairs rooms with a small kitchen. Very few people still had the separate kitchen as most had knocked through to make a big kitchen/diner. I cannot imagine the desire for a large eat in kitchen to go away, for those that can afford it.
Modern flats and smaller houses have just a kitchen/living room which I don't like, but with high house prices now many people have to live with this.

My SiL parents live in a big Bungalow, his dad is a Builder. They knocked down walls to combine the kitchen into the living room. Looked lovely, lasted about 2 years, then he put the wall back.
His mum hated it, didn't like looking at the kitchen if pots etc not put away instantly or kitchen cooking smells even though they had extractor fan.

We stayed in a house we rented in the USA same thing open planned house, nope put me off too.

Thank you all for your thoughts. It would seem that most people prefer a kitchen/dining room with a separate living room, sitting room, lounge, whatever you prefer to call it. We actually live in a large bungalow, and in general the area is more retired people than young families, so going from what's been said, and most particularly about cooking smells impregnating soft furnishings, I think we may decide to keep the living room separate.

We modernised our home 12 years ago but kept the kitchen as a separate room, it is very large and has a door into the hall and one into the dining room. I would never have soft furnishings in a kitchen, they retain the smell of cooking.
I have a large lounge and the dining room is at the opposite end but I do have a smaller room which is the music room. We put a TV in the music room so that DH could watch football while I watched what he considered rubbish 😆

When I was growing up, and after I married, we had a couple of armchairs in the dining room so that we could sit comfortably when we paused for coffee etc during the day, We adjourned to the sitting room in the evenings or if we had guests. It was one way of making sure there was a decent tidy room if anyone came to visit.

The house we're in now has a dining area attached to the kitchen. Initially we had comfortable seating in there but it's become more of a work area! We use the sitting room more during the day now. It's still good, though, to have a separate area to relax in without the noise and smells of the kitchen.

Jewelle

Ignore trends. Just do what feels right for you, if you like the idea of open plan then do it. And if you don’t, then don’t!

It may 'feel right' but then turns out to be a very costly mistake that can't be rectified. Once you knock walls down that changes everything, so you need to be aware of what you're doing and all the pitfalls.

Why does it matter if it's a fad? Would that suit you and your lifestyle? That's the only thing that matters.

I've come to realise that it would quite suit us in many ways now there are only two of us, but it would also have it's drawbacks so I'm on the fence at the moment.

I think is largely depends on your lifestyle. We've lived in both open plan, and houses with separate rooms, and we much prefer the sociability of open plan. However, that's only if there's another small room to get away to for peace and quiet.

We're also currently considering whether or not to renovate our house, by knocking the kitchen/diner through into the living room, creating a big sociable space with kitchen/diner/family room. We like entertaining, and I don't like being left alone in the kitchen when we have family/friends around! Although, we do still have a separate utility room, so no noise from washer/dryer, plus a study, and currently a separate dining room, which I would convert into a cosy snug/tv room.

Just be mindful, if you decide to convert into one big open space, and you don't have any other 'quiet' room to escape to ... would that bother you?

Open plan living has been a thing for about 30 years, so not exactly a fad.
I don’t like it.
I like a big open plan kitchen/ diner but I’d have to have a separate living room.

I agree with posters about new builds that have just one room with a kitchen at one end. There are some apartments locally being marketed for retirees.The priority seems to be to make space for an en suite bathroom.
I understand the kitchen- diner/ separate sitting room arrangement. When my children became teenagers, they could lurk there to discuss the parent's shortcomings whilst I read peacefully next door.

Depends on lifestyle, time of life and type of house I think.
I like informal dining with large kitchen/dining room, but you do lose wall space for kitchen units and the downside is visitors looking at the detritus (in my house anyway) whilst eating!) My fan oven is a bit noisy too. It is essential I think to have a separate utility room with this arrangement.

I like a lounge with dividing doors to the dining space, that can be opened up in the summer to provide a lighter and more airy space.

I've been staying with my DS in New Zealand. Its a 2 bed bungalow built c1912.
They've taken out the fireplace between sitting and dining room and replaced it with a sturdy folding door which made it possible to use the sitting room end as a bedsit for my visit.

They have opened, with worktop height hatch, the kitchen onto the dining room as well as building patio doors to the sunny deck.
So it is open plan when you want it but can be cosy and separate too.

Versatility is the future!

They are now going to build a sleepout/home office in the garden to futureproof their little home for/against teenagers.

I love my large kitchen/diner but my sitting room is difficult to heat because of the open staircase. When we bought the house we could not afford a closed-off sitting room. For me a downstairs loo is a must, just a pity it is not large enough to fit a shower.

I also agree with Chestnut.

My OH used to go out when I had friends round when we had an open plan flat. Now we have a kitchen-diner and separate living rooms he is happier to stay at home. I used to feel uncomfortable that he felt the need to go out so wouldn't return to a completely open plan arrangement.

However, your space has to be whatever works for you. Hope you have fun thinking through the options.