Rooms and Spaces

As a vacation home, most anything will work when it’s just the two of us. But the house also has to work when we bring friends and family. And it has to work as a vacation rental when we’re not there.

Lots of tradeoffs – we want to keep it as small as we can, but not cramped. Comfortable, flexible, and practical, not luxurious.

Constraints

The architectural committee of the HOA has some restrictions. The most relevant:

• Single-story only, with a maximum height of 18 ft.
• Fully enclosed two-car garage (can be detached).
• Mostly flat roof design, some sloped roofs possible. (This style differs from the existing homes in La Estancia.)

Kanab regulations mandate a setback of 25 ft from the street, and 10 ft on the sides and back.

Bedrooms and bathrooms

After exploring different configurations and thinking about future family gatherings, we decided that the following would give us a lot of flexibility:

• Two main bedrooms with a king bed and ensuite bathroom.
• A smaller bedroom with a queen bed.
• An office with bunk beds.
• A bathroom that’s shared by bedroom and office.

That’s a total of 4 bedrooms, each sleeping 2 people, so comfortable for 8. With a pull-out couch in the living room, we can accommodate a maximum of 10, which will work well for a lot of family gatherings.

Three bathrooms are plenty. However, if the bathroom is not in a convenient location, a powder room near the entrance would be helpful.

Other spaces

We want an open layout for the other spaces: living room, kitchen, and dining area. The dining table should be designed for 8 (and be able to accommodate 10), and we want a smaller table near the kitchen for casual meals, board games, or kid activities. The layout should provide flexibility for several groups involved in different activities.

Entry: The entry should be useful whether you’re entering through the main door or the garage.

Patio: The sun in Kanab is strong, so being able to sit outside in the shade is crucial.

We’ll need a private storage area that we can lock during rentals.

Not a priority

There are a number of features that we can easily do without in a vacation home:

• Walk-in closets: Regular closets in each bedroom will be sufficient.
• Huge bathrooms: Not where we want to spend our square footage.
• Exercise room: Just get outside and hike.
• Media room: We’ll have a TV in the living room.
• Laundry room: A small laundry area will work just fine.
• Fireplace: We’ll have a fire pit in the backyard. Having a fireplace in a passive house would be a big headache, anyway.

Floor plan is next.