New Unique Small House Plan!

Simply Elegant Home Designs is introducing a new unique small house plan - "The Willernie Cottage" as illustrated below.  Architect Ron Brenner had this to say about the home:  "The design is definitely eclectic.  We combined farmhouse, shingle style, cottage and modern elements into a carefully composed exterior envelope. The interior layout is smart.  Like all of our designs we pay much attention to circulation patterns and potential furniture arrangements to ensure functional yet efficient use of space." 

Image from front

Main Level Floor Plan

Upper Level Floor Plan - Three bedrooms with two baths.

Front Elevation

Right Side Elevation

For more information on the home design you can follow this link:  Willernie Cottage

Home Design Ideas - Split the Garage!

At Ron Brenner Architects, I am currently working with a client on a new home design to be constructed in Rochester, MN.  Here we have run into a very common dilemma.  What to do with 3 1/2 cars worth of garage?   

If you put all of that garage to the side of the house you get one very wide plan.  If you put all of that garage forward of the house you get one very deep plan.  Many lots cannot accommodate either one of those plan arrangements.  So what I have proposed to do here is to split the garages into two separate structures.  The main two car garage is directly connected to the house via the mudroom zone.  The additional 1 1/2 car garage is placed on the opposite side of the lot; resulting in a nifty little entry court.  See sketches below.

Here you can see a birds eye view of the layout.  Notice the roof between the garage and house is low.  This helps to reduce the mass of the house.  Pulling the garages a bit forward of the front porch creates a nifty little courtyard.

view from street

view approaching courtyard

nice little composition

So when you develop your next house plan - please think about the impact of that garage and look for creative solutions.

New House Plan from Simply Elegant Home Designs

Simply Elegant Home Designs is offering a new house plan called the "Hudson Farmhouse". The Hudson Cottage offers an open main level floor plan with connected spaces that are perfect family gatherings. The master suite and a home office sit "around the corner" from the main floor public spaces. Two additional bedrooms and a shared bath occupy the second floor. At almost 2700 square feet this is the largest plan that Simply Elegant now offers, yet it still retains the modest massing and scale of a traditional farmhouse design. This was achieved through careful 3 dimensional computer modeling and study. The images below depict the design.

You can obtain more information on this plan and others at Simply Elegant Home Designs.