Building a New Old Cottage with America’s Best House Plans
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We’re building a new old cottage using a set of plans we ordered from America’s Best House Plans!
Today on the blog… I’m sharing all the details: from the house plans we chose, to what we love about the layout, to modifications we’ve made, to how we are adding old house character into the cottage, and I’ll also be answering some of your FAQs.
I’ll also be sharing a ton of photos throughout today’s post! Consider this post a mid-construction tour of the cottage. We’ll do another tour once construction is complete!
Be sure to scroll all the way to the end – I’ll be sharing a few other house plans we found and loved… ones with new old house potential!
Our New Old Cottage Floorplans – Barn Plan 041-00348
But before we get into all the details, I have to show you the house plan we chose: Barn Plan 041-00348 from America’s Best House Plans!
The photo below is a rendering from ABHP’s website. It shows our little cottage built “barn-dominium style”!
The cottage is 1,260 sq.ft. with 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and an open concept living space.
Here’s a peek at the floor plan and all the details!
What we LOVE about our Cottage House Plans
There’s so much to love about the cottage house plans!
The layout just works! It flows well, and I think this home is going to feel bigger than you would think because the layout is just so well thought out.
You wouldn’t expect a home of this size to have such a big kitchen, a separate walk-in pantry, walk-in closets in both bedrooms, and a full laundry room.
Also the porches add a ton of outdoor living space, which will be used year-round here in Eastern NC!
The cottage is on the smaller side. But it has everything you need, and it’s the perfect size for my parents who are empty nesters.
There’s still plenty of space for guests and the grandkids to come for sleepovers, but not so much space that it will be burdensome to maintain as my parents age.
Modifications We Made to the Exterior of the Cottage
We ordered a reverse layout
We ordered a reverse copy of the plans. This flipped the layout of the house so that the porch is on the left hand side, and the bedrooms are on the right hand side.
This reverse layout just works better for the location where we’re building, where the sun rises and sets, how the driveway will be positioned, etc.
We lowered the ceilings / roof line
The house plan called for 10 foot ceilings, which seemed like overkill for the size of the house. So we lowered them to 9 feet.
This actually lowered the roofline of the house so that the roof over the attic sits on top of the roof over the porch. We think this makes it look like an older house!
no garage
We opted not to build the garage to save money during construction.
This is what the back of the cottage looks like as of right now. We could always add the garage on later. But for now we’ll just add some sort of gravel drive / parking pad out back.
Porch ceiling fans & can lights
North Carolina summers are no joke! We added ceiling fans to the porches so that these outdoor spaces can be comfortable and enjoyable even in the hotter months.
We also opted not to install any can lights on the porch, even though the plans called for them. Can lights feel very modern in my humble opinion, so I try to use as few as possible!
Pointed Arch Window in the Attic
This window is THE WINDOW of my dreams!
We added a pointed arch window in the attic. It was a big change, and it one that really MAKES the front profile of the cottage feel special!
Let me explain more about the window and where we found our inspo for this cool design detail!
Old House Inspo for our New Old Cottage
When we started designing the cottage, we wanted it to complement our farmhouse next door. Not match – but feel like it belonged. Like it had always been part of the story.
Designing the farmhouse was a little easier because we had the original house as our starting point, and as our design “north star.”
Speaking of the farmhouse…
Have you taken the tour?
We re-built our family’s 1800’s farmhouse… and I put together a mini tour of the before photos!
With the cottage, we were starting from scratch. I don’t have any formal design training, so everything you see here is thanks to a whole lot of research, lots of trial and error, and lots of time spent gathering inspiration wherever I could find it.
By the way, I shared some of my favorite places to look for design inspo here!
In gathering design inspiration and ideas for the cottage, I came across the house that inspired it all – the American Gothic House in Eldon, Iowa.
You might be more familiar with Grant Wood’s painting than the actual house.
I’d always assumed “American Gothic” referred to the couple in the painting, but it’s actually the name of the architectural style. And the house in the painting is a real house!
The house was built in the 1880s and is a beautiful example of American Carpenter Gothic. It’s a style I instantly fell in love with, and once I learned more about it, I knew we had found our design north star for our new old cottage.
Key Features of American Carpenter Gothic Style
- steeply pitched roofs
- board and batten siding
- decorative bargeboards along the eaves of the roof
- intricate gingerbread trim and woodwork
- pointed arch windows
Now that you’ve seen the old house inspiration, it’s probably easy to spot some of those details in our new old cottage.
The white board and batten siding… and THE WINDOW! I’d love to add some pretty corbels to the porch and some decorative bargeboard detailing to the roof line eventually too!!
Mid-Construction Photo Tour of our New Old Cottage
Now let’s take a peek inside! I want to show you around and give you a little tour of the cottage. We’ll start in the living room…
The Cottage Living Room
When you come in the front door, you step right into the living room, which is open to the kitchen.
No major changes were made to this space. But we did fancy up the trim around the doors by adding rosettes to the top corners. You can see them pretty good in the first photo below.
That same trim piece can be seen over all the doors inside the cottage. I think they add a little something special!
One thing I love about the living area is how bright it is! This space has so much natural light thanks to the big beautiful windows and the glass entry doors.
Also, we opted out of almost all the can lights in the cottage because they just felt unnecessary with as bright as it is in here.
They also look pretty modern to me. Which is not the vibe we’re going for in the cottage. If you want a little preview of the lighting – head to this post to see all the cottage light fixtures we picked out.
The Cottage Kitchen & Pantry
Let’s move on to the kitchen!
If you come into the cottage through the double doors on the side porch, the kitchen will be to your left. It’s open to the living room and is essentially the center of the house on the floor plans.
We made a couple changes to the kitchen layout from what is seen on the plans.
We added cabinets underneath the windows in the kitchen so that the sink could be centered under the window instead of in the island.
Our kitchen island is an antique general store counter, and we didn’t want to cut into that to add plumbing for the sink. This antique piece will function as storage, countertop / prep space, and it will have an overhang for barstool seating.
Because we added cabinets by the windows, we decided to turn the island to allow ample walkway space around the kitchen.
Also, the island isn’t shown in these photos because the flooring has to be installed before we can bring it back into the house, but I shared photos of it in my “designing the cottage” blog post.
The walk-in pantry is right through this doorway, just behind the kitchen.
We were able to make the pantry a little bigger than the plans called for by doing away with the built-in lockers in the back hallway. There is now enough space to add shelving on all three sides of the pantry with room to walk in the middle!
The Guest Bedroom
Now let’s back up and head back to the living room so I can show you the guest bedroom!
There is a small hallway just off the living room that leads to the guest bedroom and guest bathroom.
The house plans call for linen storage at the end of that hallway. We actually have an antique piece for that spot that will function as linen storage. So we opted not to have a closet / built-in linen storage here.
One of my favorite things we’ve done to give the cottage “old house charm” is incorporating salvaged doors!
You can see two of those old doors here in the guest bedroom!
Can you believe we found these old doors for $15 a piece on Facebook Marketplace?! Such a good price!
No major changes were made to the guest bedroom from what is shown on the plans. But we did end up putting the attic access in this room. That’s the little rectangle you see on the ceiling in the last photo. It’s not quite finished yet but it will be soon.
The Guest Bathroom
On to the guest bathroom…
I had so much fun designing this little bathroom, and I’m very excited to show you a progress update in here today!
If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen me working in this bathroom recently. I did all the tilework in here myself! What do you think of the pattern?!
We wanted to go with a vintage-inspired penny tile pattern for the floors. Both my daughter and my niece have flower names. So we chose the daisy pattern inspired by both the girls!
We’re also adding a little extra character in the bathroom with beadboard paneling that will eventually wrap all the way around the room.
There will be a little shelf on top of the beadboard, and peg hooks for hanging towels too!
No major changes were made from what is shown on the plans.
The sink & the toilet will go on the wall where you see the beadboard paneling, and we’ll also be hanging a vintage medicine cabinet on that wall.
The Back Entry Hallway
Now… let’s switch gears for a minute. I want to show you what the cottage looks like if you come in through the back door.
Back at the back of the house, the plans call for a garage which we opted not to build to save money. If you come in through this door, you’ll find a little “L” shaped hallway that leads two ways.
When you turn right, you’ll walk down the hall and into the laundry room.
When you walk straight, the pantry will be on your right, and the primary suite will be on your left.
Keep walking and you’ll be in the kitchen. Then go a little further and you’ll be in the living room.
One change we made in the back entry hallway is eliminating the built-in lockers shown on the house plans.
This let us push the wall over a little bit, maybe a foot, where the lockers would have gone. Doing that made the pantry slightly bigger.
I’m so glad we made this little change because the hallway still feels plenty spacious. And you can always use extra pantry space!
The Laundry Room
Now when you came in through the back door… if you turned right, you’d notice another pretty salvaged door we found!
We bought this old 5-panel door from The Glass Cloche in Burgaw, NC and it was an almost perfect fit for the laundry room!
We’ll have to order a door knob to fit it, but it’s beautiful and it adds so much character to an often overlooked space.
Now back down the hallway we go… next up is the primary suite and I can’t wait to show you how that space is shaping up!
The Primary Bedroom
I still can’t get over these pretty Facebook Marketplace doors. We added one to the entryway of the primary suite and it was another perfect fit!
No major changes were made to this space from what is shown on the plans. Though we did have our electrician wire for two sconce lights that will go on that back wall on either side of the bed.
Across from the bed, there are two doors that lead to the primary bathroom and closet.
These old doors were salvaged from our farmhouse! They would have been the two bedroom doors on my mom’s old bedroom. And now they’re hung up in the cottage in her new bedroom!
The character in these doors is unmatched, but it’s the sentimental touch and the story behind them that makes having them in the cottage all the more special.
The door on the right leads to the walk-in closet.
It’s actually a very good sized closet and will provide tons of storage for clothes, shoes, etc.
Now about the door on the left, that one leads to the primary bathroom!
The Primary Bathroom
This bathroom is going to be full of vintage cottage charm. From the antique door, to the classic black and white penny tile floors.
I did all the tile work in this space too, and I’m in love with the pattern and how it all turned out so far! I still need to grout the tile in here but that will be coming up soon.
Then we can paint and move in the vanity.
The vanity we found for this bathroom is actually an antique buffet we found at The Burgaw Antique Place. We’ll be converting the buffet into a bathroom vanity by adding a countertop and a vessel sink to the top of it.
We opted for a smaller vanity for this space (the buffet is about 5 feet long – but the plans call for a 7 foot vanity).
This will leave us enough space to add in another antique find.
An antique pie safe that will function as extra storage for linens, toilet paper, and more for this bathroom. The pie safe will go between the vanity and the toilet.
And remember how I told you we’re adding beadboard in the guest bathroom? We’re doing that in the primary bathroom too! Along with a little shelf on top and peg hooks for hanging towels too.
I couldn’t be more excited to see our visions for this bathroom and the rest of the cottage finally come to life little by little!
Answering Your FAQ’s about the Cottage:
Now that you’ve seen all through the cottage, let’s answer a few of your most frequently asked questions… things I might not have covered yet in the post.
If you have questions, feel free to leave a comment or DM me on Instagram @whiteandwoodgrain and I’ll add them to the post!
who is your builder?
Randy Miller of Randy A. Miller Construction is our builder.
He has been great to work with, so if you’re looking to build and you’re local to Eastern, NC we highly recommend him!
what will the cottage interior look like?
The cottage interior will be full of vintage charm and old house character!
We’ve been collecting lots of antiques and vintage pieces to incorporate into the home. And you might be surprised to see a little more color in the cottage than you’re used to seeing in our farmhouse.
Head to this post -> for a preview of what the cottage will look like once construction is complete! I shared photos of some of the antique finds we’ll be using and all the cottage mood boards I curated to show you the vision we’re going for in each space.
when will construction be done?
We broke ground late October, and as of right now, our builder says construction should be done sometime in May. Won’t be too much longer and I’ll be able to share a finished cottage tour!
#10 House Plans with New Old House Potential
We absolutely love the house plans we chose for our new old cottage!
But back when we were “house plan hunting” at the beginning of our construction journey, I found so many house plans (for homes of all different sizes and styles) that I absolutely loved.
I hand-picked a few of my favorite plans from America’s Best House Plans’ website… and I came up with a list of my top 10 house plans to share with you at the end of today’s post!
These 10 house plans are one’s I felt really have that new old house potential. So if you’re thinking of building a new old house, here are a few floor plans you might want to check out!
2 – story modern farmhouse
This one really reminds me of our farmhouse (the 1800’s family farmhouse we re-built). I love the symmetry and the two fireplaces!
country home with a carport
Oftentimes garages make a home feel more new than old – I think the carport really gives this floor plan that new old house feel!
dutch colonial with attached garage
The roof line of this home is what caught my eye – It’s so pretty and has so much character!
central hall colonial
The symmetry & that central hallway screams new old house to me! This one’s a must see if you love historic homes.
gables & gingerbread trim
Picture this home with intricate gingerbread trim and pointed arched windows… Especially with the roof line and the steep pitched gables, this home could totally be built to look like a Carpenter Gothic style home!
ranch with a wraparound
The “L-shaped” footprint of these floorplans could be a big story-teller of a home that has been added onto over time as the family needed more space.
farmhouse with detached garage
I love the garage on these plans, but my favorite thing about this home has to be the porch. You could build a 2 sided fireplace and enjoy it on the porch and in the living room!
2 – story cozy cottage
The renderings make this home feel farmhouse-y, but I see a quaint cottage with the perfect layout for a young family and lots of potential for old house character and charm!
grand southern charmer
If I were building this house plan, I’d simplify the roof lines by making the front porch straight across the front of the house. This layout would be so fun to design though – it’s full of charm!
low country cottage
This house gives me all the low country, Charleston, SC vibes with it’s tall shutters, symmetry, and that big shady porch.
I could have kept going and shared way more than 10 house plans. There are so many beautiful homes with new old house potential on America’s Best House Plan’s website!
And just to save you from having to scroll all the way back up, here is that link again for the house plans we chose. We’re building our new old cottage with Barn Plan 041-00348 from America’s Best House Plans.
I can’t wait to share more of our new old cottage with you soon! Next up is paint and flooring… then after that it’s all the finish work like hooking up plumbing, lights and electrical, installing countertops and hardware, etc.
In the meantime, I’d love to invite you to join my email list if you’re not already signed up!
Being a part of my email community is a great way to keep in touch and make sure you never miss a post. Especially as we have some very exciting posts coming up once we get a little closer to the wrapping up the construction at the cottage!
Thanks for stopping by the blog today and letting me talk your ears off about building our new old cottage! Until next time…
It’s it coming together so nicely! Glad you posted the link to the cottage plans, we have been looking for a 2 bed, one story plan -this could be it! The tile in the bathroom….swoon. And the cabinets in the kitchen – are they from a local company? – I like they are different than the usual shaker style.
Can’t wait to see it finished! You all have done a fantastic job!
Thank you so much Lyn!!! It really is such a well thought out layout. They fit a lot into it and we are excited to get it done and get my parents moved in! 🙂 The cabinets are from the Discount House in Carolina Beach, NC. They are very similar to the front of the island. Hoping to get that moved in soon once the floors are in!
Beautiful! What is the exterior paint color?
So the exterior is actually a vinyl siding! It’s made to look like board and batten siding, and is whatever white the manufacturer makes it in. But we will be painting the doors and the porch ceiling. So those paint colors will be coming soon…