Scandinavian-Style House Floor Plans
Like the more minimalist home design? Check out these Scandinavian style house plans.
Like the more minimalist home design? Check out these Scandinavian style house plans.
The sleek, minimalist lines of Scandinavian style houses lend themselves to satisfying small footprints. A 200-square foot Scandinavian style tiny house might have a “hygge” (cozy) feeling and cost as little as $39,000 prefabricated, or $195 per square foot without considering the cost of its lot and connections. Swedish manufacturer Sommarnöjen offers the 160-square foot Mini House 2.0 as a kit in a flat package. It can be configured for a kitchen, a sleeping area, a living area, and a bathroom. But a new, site-built Scandinavian style home with a basement or on a concrete slab is likely to cost between $100 and $155 per square foot, exclusive of the cost of the lot, driveway, and utility connections.
It’s not hard to find Scandinavian style garage plans that are compatible with your Scandinavian style house plan. It’s even possible to buy all the parts for your Scandinavian style garage in a kit for easy construction after you pour the slab for the floor. These kits come complete with electrical and plumbing connections, and save homeowners money over the long run because detached garages are less expensive to insure than attached garages.
All but Scandinavian style tiny houses usually come with a garage. It’s more often an attached garage than a detached garage.
Scandinavian style is understated. It’s the opposite of ostentatious. Scandinavian style homes offer beautiful, uncluttered spaces with attractive lines and calming colors. They emphasize coziness, especially for winter living. Scandinavian style isn’t really compatible with grand houses for luxury living. Scandinavian style offers manageable houses for comfortable living.
Many people have spent a weekend afternoon, or two, or more, assembling furniture from IKEA. Now IKEA offers a flat-packed “house in a box” with everything you need to build your Scandinavian style tiny house except the land to put in on and electrical, water, gas, and sewer connections. The minimalism of Scandinavian style makes it perfect for tiny homes.
Scandinavian countries get cold in the winter, and winters last for months. The tradition has always been for families to gather around a single fire for warmth, keeping everybody snug and warm without using lots of fuel. That tradition is translated into open interior spaces that allow the residents of a house to congregate naturally in modern Scandinavian style. Uncluttered, minimalist living in shared open spaces is the heart of Scandinavian style.
If you were to drive from Copenhagen through the tunnel and over the Øresund Bridge to Sweden and then north to Stockholm and the Arctic Circle, you would see lots of houses painted in colors that stand out against the snow but look beautiful in the summer sun. In Scandinavia, darker shades of red are extremely popular for exterior painting. In warmer climates, Scandinavian style houses tend to be painted in soft amber, soft pinks, darker blues, icy blues, putty, and moss tones, depending on the landscape. Scandinavian style houses tend to stand out against winter colors but blend in with summer colors.
It’s not hard to find building plans for a simple, single-story Scandinavian style house built on a narrow lot. It won’t have an attached garage, but if the lot is deep enough, it might be possible to put a detached garage at the back of the property at the end of a narrow driveway.
Scandinavian style homes with large windows and sharp lines are a natural fit to a wide lot. In the Scandinavian style, the most important consideration is how the house fits in with the nature around it. Wide lot, more nature. Some building plans for Scandinavian style homes on wide lots have an L-shaped design with the attached garage behind the house for better integration with the street side of the house with the landscaping.
Sloping lots give builders an opportunity to build additional floors with smaller footprints. Those extra rooms can be made snug and cozy in Scandinavian style.
Unless a Scandinavian style house has additional floors to accommodate a sloping lot, it’s more usual for a home in this style to have just one floor. But you won’t have any trouble finding plans for building a Scandinavian style house with two floors and attic space.
Scandinavian style easily extends to the basement. The sleek lines and uncluttered look of higher living spaces can carry over to the basement. But no basement used primarily for storage can really be said to be in the Scandinavian style.
In Scandinavian style, every room has a clear purpose. But if you want a bonus room, just look for a building plan with one more bedroom than you think you’ll need. We’ll repeat ourselves, however, Scandinavian style is an uncluttered look.
In Scandinavia, windows have double or even triple panes and every house is well-insulated. The sleek lines of a Scandinavian style house accommodate a glass-walled sunroom for passive heating in the summer or a screened porch for cooler indoor temperatures in the summer. Big windows that let in lots of light also save on electricity, as long as they are of sufficient thickness.
Scandinavian style houses in Scandinavia often have a back porch for summer use. The porch offers protection from sun and insects while preserving the view. It’s easy to find building plans for Scandinavian style houses with back and side porches. A front porch is not common in this style.
An authentic, historic Scandinavian house might have a sod roof, with grass and flowers planted over a sloping roof made from multiple layers of birch planks. There are houses with roofs built and then planted in this style being built even today, although they are rare. More commonly, Scandinavian style houses have roofs with wood planks exposed in awning and overhangs.
Scandinavian style works well with a “Scandinavian” interior. Think IKEA for your starting point. Rustic wood works in a Scandinavian style if pieces have sharp lines. But you will get a better overall look if you work with light-colored floors, warm textile accessories, wood and metal finishes, and neutral colors for the walls and ceilings.
