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A Small Lakeside Cabin at Lake Poinsette
In any premium lot with a view, all primary living spaces ‘need’ to be facing that view. Such primary spaces could be considered:
• Great room
• Master bedroom
• Kitchen/living.
With this design study at 123 Lake Drive on Poinsette the clients had to make a tough decision as to which of these spaces would front the lake. I sketched as close as possible all permutations for the client to review and decide. Another variable driving the layout of spaces location/configuration of stairs.
Studio 285 Architecture does not decide for the client and present only one option, but always a range from which a client may choose, or mix and match. A write up that accompanied the sketches specific to each scheme follows.
Scheme ‘A’:
Owner’s original scheme (30’ x 34’ Footprint) Functional layout. Great Room and Kitchen placed at lakefront side. Bedroom in the back. Bedroom in back does not have lakefront view/ access. Stairs work as a feature of the great room May be open or otherwise dressed up
Entry door to M. Bedroom has direct line of sight from from door. Not the best. Added a closet to the room, which helped in this light. Closet effectively cut the room down from 14 feet to 12 feet. In retrospect, if the star is not an open tread stair the closet will fit under the stair giving one a full 14’ deep bedroom, doing this would also provide a more direct light of sight into bedroom. Noted that with the kitchen there is a big ‘hole’ of space on the east side. Not sure if there is a reason or just ‘is’? Entry door is flush with exterior wall
Drawn as close to client's sketch. Would want a wall between the return on the kitchen counter and the entry hall? Entry hall is kind of long.
Scheme ‘B’:
Stair moved to NW corner of cabin. (30’ x 34’ Footprint) Did this to get the stair out of the middle of the cabin space. This frees up the core for greater flexibility of layout and puts area back where it is most needed. Also puts the stair right by the entry door. More convenient? Direct access in and out from upstairs with less disruption to rest of cabin?
Kitchen moved to SE corner of cabin. Noting the ‘unused’ space at the east end of kitchen plus the advantage of having the great room right of the entry. Makes for a better and more comfortable space flow, and logical as the is the space that it all revolves around (well the kitchen is a hang out space, too). To the south is the big blank wall of the motel. The north side is not so bad with the house. Kitchen walls have cabinets, not conducive to windows . . . so the motel side is better? I indicated a window on the north side of the great room.
Workable location for washer and dryer OK for a cabin? I see how I might be able to flip them over to be facing South and also create a more private entry for the master bedroom. Upper floor. 30’ wide footprint is tight. Manage to get it work by putting ¾ bath over ½ bath below Bonus of stacking plumbing? There is a mini loft created by lidding over the entry area.
Scheme ‘B-x’
Basically the same as scheme ‘B’, only 34’ x 34’ footprint. The extra four feet made it possible to put the half bath right of the entry. Which is convent as this is a three season lakeside cabin it is easy access from those recreating outside Also means that sand/grit don’t get tracked far Swapping locations means that the M. Bedroom can be a full 14 feet deep.
In this scheme I made the washer/dryer an entry closet, making the spot at the entry door a little wider and less confined. Its not noted, but I moved the washer/dryer to the ½ bath and made it a stacked unit
At upper area I moved the ¾ bath adjacent to the stairs and above the ½ bath below. That made the area in front of Bed #2 a usable loft area. In spite of adding 4 feet in width the bedrooms actually got smaller.
Scheme ‘C-x’:
34’x34’ footprint. Moved Master Bedroom to East, lakefront . . . just to see how/wether it would work. As I noted when we first met the ideal lakefront cabin would be long and narrow so that all of the primary living spaces would front the waterside. Its all a series of trade -offs and one’s preferences.
It is nice to have the kitchen front convenient to the lakeside deck where most of the lving will happen. You lose that. But you do have views out to the lake from the kitchen through the great room. The master bedroom suite works best in this scheme The Bedroom-closet-bathroom sequence is very common. Upper area works very well, I think. With the M. Bedroom up front it can be lidded over to make a very generous loft area
Scheme ‘D-x’
34’ x 34’ footprint. Moved stair to central core. Personally I like this scheme. At least with respect to stair placement. I like U stairs with an intermediate landing One long flight is kind of tedious. This type of stair is more compact, though the landing does use up some space. The stair could be open, closed or half and half. The way it is drawn the first run up could be open and the second run would be closed with an entry closet below, as indicated. An open stair is an opportunity to put in some distinctive millwork that set the cabin part Kid spots, kids love to hang out on stairs I can see kids hanging out on the landing, playing with their toys when a rain squall hits the lake . . . It also helps create a nice entry with the stair landing right I front of the door.
The M. Bedroom suit works well. (Well, at least I think so) The layout of it is the same sequence of of spaces as in scheme ‘C-x’. I made provision for stacked washer/dryer unit in the ½ bath. Alternate locations for a side by side could be one of the closets in the M. Bedroom or BR #2
Upper floor. This layout works reasonably ell and is efficient, not requiring a long hallway. There is no ‘loft space’. A lid over e entry to create a bit of loft, though B R 2 was getting kind of big for a secondary bedroom. I cut the space down with two ample closets One can never have enough storage space, Especially for a lakeside retreat with all sorts of toys.
The cad drawn floorplans represent the final configuration. It works very well. Living room and kitchen placed forward, towards the lakeshore. M. Bedroom in the back, by the road. A nice sequence of spaces from M. Bedroom through closet flanked hallway to M. Bath. M Bath conveniently located with direct access off entry/stair landing.
Upper floor has twin lofts. One place for the adults and another kids. (Or a natural separation of younger kids and teens?) For privacy there is a sliding door at bedroom #2. Upper bathroom is centrally located. For a three season cabin, the owners felt that showers only were sufficient. (And yes, there is supposed to be a door into the upper bathroom . . .)
Follow this link for a blog post that goes in depth into issues designing a waterfront residence:
