Thinking about how your lifestyle might change as your children and you age -- and how those changes might affect the way you use your living spaces -- is not always top-of-mind when you build or buy a new home. But it is very important: we never plan to grow old but we somehow we always do!
Here's a new design, Plan 48-656, by Alan Mascord Associates that can help you think about some of the
lifestyle changes that might occur. The 4 bedroom 3.5 bath contemporary design -- handsomely photographed by Bob Greenspan -- shows how to maximize airiness and luxury amenities within an efficient three-level plan. Note the central elevator, which would allow owners to continue living in the home when stairs become problematic.
From the foyer with its closet and adjacent powder room you pass the kitchen island and enter the soaring great room
where window walls open to a generous rear deck. You feel you are in a spacious treehouse!
The major bedrooms are upstairs. An office/guest room with a built-in wall bed and its own bath (shared with Bedroom #2) is situated near the master suite so it can be used as a "snoratorium" in a pinch. It's a growing trend: as couples age one partner or the other sometimes needs a convenient temporary sleeping space!
The bottom level, containing the fourth bedroom, is actually a daylit basement since this house
is designed for a downsloping lot. It has extra storage, the laundry, media room, and fourth bedroom and can
function almost as an independent zone. It would work especially well as a suite for teens or "boomerang children" who might need more privacy, or even as part of an in-law suite with its own entry. This level opens to a generous covered patio for easy indoor outdoor-living.
So there you have it: a three-level house that can function well for at least three different lifestyles. How adaptable do you want your new house to be? To browse other plans with special features click here.
Here's a new design, Plan 48-656, by Alan Mascord Associates that can help you think about some of the
lifestyle changes that might occur. The 4 bedroom 3.5 bath contemporary design -- handsomely photographed by Bob Greenspan -- shows how to maximize airiness and luxury amenities within an efficient three-level plan. Note the central elevator, which would allow owners to continue living in the home when stairs become problematic.
From the foyer with its closet and adjacent powder room you pass the kitchen island and enter the soaring great room
where window walls open to a generous rear deck. You feel you are in a spacious treehouse!
The major bedrooms are upstairs. An office/guest room with a built-in wall bed and its own bath (shared with Bedroom #2) is situated near the master suite so it can be used as a "snoratorium" in a pinch. It's a growing trend: as couples age one partner or the other sometimes needs a convenient temporary sleeping space!
The bottom level, containing the fourth bedroom, is actually a daylit basement since this house
is designed for a downsloping lot. It has extra storage, the laundry, media room, and fourth bedroom and can
function almost as an independent zone. It would work especially well as a suite for teens or "boomerang children" who might need more privacy, or even as part of an in-law suite with its own entry. This level opens to a generous covered patio for easy indoor outdoor-living.
So there you have it: a three-level house that can function well for at least three different lifestyles. How adaptable do you want your new house to be? To browse other plans with special features click here.
