@soberg: on the toilet entry we thought we could have a 2 way access to the corner most toilet - one from the closet side and another from bedroom 3. @ eagledzines. Thank you for the sketches! On the high ceiling do you think we could juggle the entire layout of 1st floor a bit to accomodate a small family room (hall) where the staircase opens along with 2 other bedrooms. We are ok to compromise on the room sizes a bit and toilet / closet positions can be changed too as long as pillars are not affected.. The kitchen changes sound good. I was also wondering if it would be ok to have the sink right below the window. Thereby freeing up more cooking or prep space.

No. If you really want a shower fixture, make sure there's a drain and a sloping floor (so no glass door or shower pan) and just hang a fixture on a reasonable sized piece of wall. And consider the costs, how long you planned on living there, will you use it for more than spraying plants or washing the dog, etc.

Suvarchala, I am presuming that you do not want the doors to face each other due to privacy concerns. If that's right you wouldn't also want the guest/visitors to go to a bath in one of your rooms. Have you considered that before dropping off a common bath from the plan. If your neighbour has a door facing yours then you can also think about doing a mirror image of what respected member suggested above. I.e. door on the pooja room corner instead of the guest room corner. Thanks, Nitin CORNERSTONE DESIGNS Bangalore

Hi...NE is preferred as 1st option for pooja room. Construction shud be such that, keep god idols/photos facing EAST. Your sitting position shud face WEST. Door shud open towards EAST (right hand side). Once u enter, U turn left towards WEST and sit. This is best and gives better results.