Calvin's Room The Victorian House

Moving the Door Over

We’re still a ways off from finishing the conversion of the kitchen on the second floor into a bedroom and finishing the hall, but it’s moving along.

Hallway Renovation

We were going to keep the original doorway to the room and reuse one of the other doors to fit. The cabinetry is staying though, and it would have been difficult to find a good spot for a bed without making the room awkward or blocking access to drawers. So I talked to Brandon and the contractor about it and we decided to move the door across from the other bedroom door on that side of the house.

Second Floor Layout
(You can see the original plan here.)

The hallway bumps out into the room a little on that side (where the door will now be placed) because we didn’t want the hall to feel cramped, and it also makes it easier to bring furniture in and out of both rooms. Since the radiator is behind the door (and thus unusable floor space anyway), it doesn’t make much of a difference on the new room itself, and the little nook that will now be next to the door will be a great spot for a comfy reading chair or a desk.

New Doorway Plans

Framing for the New Hallway Section

My sister came by over the weekend, and I was explaining the dangers of scope creep to her. We’re moving the door, which means we’ll also need to move the room’s light switch over. We need to put down new flooring from where the hallway built-ins started all the way to the bedroom doors, and now we’re wondering if we should redo the flooring in the entire hallway at once. I’m not looking to change the look of the wood — it’s appropriate to the house — but there are a couple of soft spots that do need to be addressed eventually.

Ripped Up Flooring, Lathe Behind Original Plaster

Hallway Progress

And then there’s the whole issue of finding a replacement for the bathroom storage that we lost. There is a huge bedroom closet that could be split into two, with half of it accessed from the hallway near the bathroom. We could probably even reuse some of the wood that we saved from the built-in that was removed, but that isn’t a project that we’re going to do right now. Instead, I’ll reorganize the small linen closet down the hall and be on the lookout for a shallow dresser, cabinet, or armoire to place near the bathroom.

Moving along, moving along…

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  • guest
    July 21, 2014 at 11:32 am

    i am not sure if the hallway outside the bathroom is wide enough, but perhaps a narrow console could work in the hallway for storage – we have one in my parent’s older home and it works pretty well for extra towels and soaps.

    • Making it Lovely
      July 21, 2014 at 2:32 pm

      There is a spot next to where the chimney comes up from downstairs that would be good. It’s just to the left of where my floor plan above ends.

  • Jaimie
    July 21, 2014 at 12:18 pm

    Scope creep… yep. That’s why I can’t touch my kitchen. It would never end.

  • Ellen
    July 21, 2014 at 4:06 pm

    I admire how you and your husband identify the changes needing to be made and have a plan. I have been living in my house for 6 years and need a stairwell built, and not even sure where to start or the vision of the project. Could you share how you found a contractor for your project? Did you meet with several? How did you make your selection, was it the price or experience of the contractor, or both?

    • Making it Lovely
      July 21, 2014 at 8:42 pm

      We met with a few contractors when working on our built-in bookshelves downstairs, and the man we went with was recommended by the previous owners. He’s been working on this house for 15+ years, and he knows it inside and out! He was a little bit more expensive, but not terribly so, and we’ve seen his work firsthand (since it’s all over the house).

  • Amy
    July 21, 2014 at 8:26 pm

    Maybe you’ve already thought of this, but would the old built-in linen cabinet (that was removed from the hallway) fit into the existing nursery doorway? Instead of closing off the original doorway, build the linen cabinet into that space instead? It would be convenient to the bathroom, but I’m not sure how deep that cabinet is or how things would fit.

    • Making it Lovely
      July 21, 2014 at 8:44 pm

      It would be great for the bathroom storage — very convenient — but I don’t want to take any more space from that room. The cabinetry in there already takes up 2′ along an entire wall. Plus it wouldn’t be as simple as just plopping the old built-in into a new space. The doors and drawers are fine of course, but the rest was custom built into that hallway space, using the side and back walls as part of the support system.

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