If you’re on my email list, you’ve heard me mention plans for buying land and building a house quite a few times! Since we’ve been married (and even a little before 🙂 ) my husband and I have been coming up with different designs for our future log cabin. Today I’m going to share some of these with you!

There were actually 22 designs total, but many of those were small changes and revisions, so I’m going to share nine of them with you.

Note: all of these would be log cabins and we are building ourselves using a traditional design similar to the one shown at the top of this post

Design #1: The Hexagon

This uniquely shaped house was our original idea for our home together. While interesting and different, we realized it is not a very practical shape for a house. Another major design flaw of this floor plan is that there is no bathroom. 🙂

Design #2: Double Loft

Here, we switched to a traditional rectangular shape with two lofts above two bathrooms. One would be the master bed with the master bath and closet below it, then the other would be a guest or kid room with the regular bathroom below. In this design, we liked the open kitchen, dining room, and living room, but the bedrooms and bathrooms ended up quite small.

Design #3: Transparent Walls

It seems in this design we were experimenting with the software, so we made the walls transparent and added sky, grass, and a sports car. 🙂 The design itself is similar to the last one, but we made both lofts twice as big by putting one on each side. Both bathrooms and the closet would be below the main loft and the other loft goes over part of the living room and kitchen, leaving part of it still open. After this design we decided it would be best to have at least one bedroom on ground level.

Design #4: Single Loft, Master bed/bath extension

We liked this design and many of the ideas from it have continued through the rest of the designs. It contains a main kitchen and dining room space with a small living room and bathroom to the side. There is a loft again as a guest or kid bedroom. This design has an extension off the main part of the house with the master bedroom and master bathroom. This makes the whole house feel roomier.

Design #5: Simple single Loft

This design is almost exactly the same as the last one, except it removes the master bedroom and bathroom extension. The idea was that this would be the original cabin, and we would add the extension later. The “add on more later” design is very traditional. People used to start their houses as one room cabins and as their family grew so did their house. This is a very practical approach to house building and often saves time and money in the long run.

Design #6: Family Cabin

After the last design being small, here we decided to go big again. This house plan features an open concept living room/dining room/kitchen, a mudroom/mechanical room area, two bathrooms, two bedrooms, and a loft. We were attached to this plan for quite awhile and we thought it would end up being the final design. However, we decided to make more changes after all.

Design #7: Family Cabin Mirror Image

This design is essentially the same as the last (with a few minor changes, and ignore the random extra ceiling/floor in the front view image), except it is mirror image. We mirror imaged the design after we started looking at the land that we are now in the process of purchasing. Having the rooms oriented this way would make the majority of windows and doors face the woods, which is where we would want to look anyway. 🙂

Design #8: Complete Redesign

After we thought we were set on our last design, we completely redid it again. The main reason for this is that the last design would require a maximum log length of 35 feet. Logs longer than 18 feet are hard to find and much more difficult to work with. This design has almost the same square footage as the last one but the maximum log length is 18 feet instead of 35. Having multiple open rooms and a separate living room space also makes the house look and feel bigger even though it’s the same size or slightly smaller. This design also has a regular second floor instead of a loft and a basement under the main square of the house. We also experimented with making the upstairs into two rooms and this could easily be done later. Some of the chimney, window, and door placement is different in the drawings as we were experimenting with where these should go.

Design #9: Current Design, Simplified

This design is what we are thinking right now, and it is the same as the last except without the master bedroom and bathroom extension (sound familiar?). We went back to the idea of starting small and adding more later and this design is what we like right now. My husband and I don’t need multiple bedrooms and bathrooms just for the two of us, so we would start with our bedroom upstairs and one bathroom. Every room in the house is spacious and open and the perfect size for right now. The current plan is to build this design, then as our family grows we could turn the upstairs into two bedrooms by adding walls, and then later add the master bedroom and master bathroom extension. Other possibilities for extensions are a workshop or garage area off the kitchen/bathroom side of the house and a screened in porch outside the living room door.

This was so fun to get to share! I hope you enjoyed seeing some of our house designs. Maybe you’ll get some ideas for your dream home!