Our most popular bungalow house plan features a comfortable lanai and porch and a covered front porch. This enchanting fairytale style house plan has beautiful curb appeal and is a wonderful place to entertain friends in a cozy atmosphere.

Depending on where you live, the word bungalow was used differently. From about 1905 to 1930 Americans used the term bungalow for any house that used space efficiently. In the United States however, the interior of a bungalow house plan often features a living room at the center, connected rooms without hallways and built in cabinets, shelves and seats. The space efficiency in a bungalow style house plan is believed to have originated from army tents and rural English cottages. The idea was to cluster the kitchen, dining area, bedrooms and bathroom around a central dining area. What we think of today as an open floor plan.

Another popular bungalow house plan is this small cottage. With an entertainment space downstairs and a private master suite, it is the perfect living space for a small family with the opportunity for future expansion upstairs.

While many different styles of bungalow house plans developed based on materials available in the area, the first bungalow house plans were built during the Arts and Crafts movement. Bungalows often feature natural woodwork such as exposed rafters and built in cabinetry or bookcases. These bungalows are known as craftsman bungalows and were heralded for their cozy appeal.

Additionally, these homes are popular for their heat reducing features. Its roots in India and warm climates explain why these homes are such great heat reducers. Since a large foundation is needed for this single floor house, the roof has a vast surface area, allowing the attic to trap most of the summer heat and making a bungalow the perfect solution for a warmer climate.

Our third most popular bungalow house plan is this piece of Americana. This bungalow rests on 1,380 square feet and packs a whole lot of value into its space. This three bedroom and two bathroom home also features a great room, sunny porch and recreation and media rooms.

Bungalows are a house plan style that sits at the heart of American architecture. With its simple, cozy, homeliness these houses are sure to delight home buyers and builders who want a lot of bang for their buck.

This issue of Her Dream Home features a step-by-step guide to building your new home from creating a home building budget to knowing what to expect during each building stage. Preview new house plans and our most popular Craftsman house plans.

The newest issue of Her Dream Home magazine from Direct from the Designers House Plans features a step-by-step guide to building your new home. This guide includes important information consumers need to know before they begin this exciting project.

From creating a home building budget to knowing what to expect during each building stage, 10 Steps to Building A New Home is a “must read” article that will assist homeowners every step of the way.

This issue also features a small sampling of Direct from the Designers most popular house plans, which combine the latest in green building techniques and products. These designs also feature open floor plans, large gourmet kitchens, luxurious master suites and comfortable outdoor living spaces to accommodate the demands of homeowners.

One of the most popular architectural styles is the Craftsman House Plan. DFD House Plans extensive collection features homes in a wide range of sizes with classic Craftsman styling touches like front porches, dormers, plenty of interior woodwork and warm earth tones to create a charming design inside and out. To view the entire collection, click here.

Enjoy fabulous photography of two brand-new home plans: the Riverside House Plan is a sleek, one-story contemporary design, and the Randolph House Plan is a two-story classic with lots of natural light featured on the magazine cover.

Direct from the Designers House Plans recently created their DFD House Plans boards on Pinterest to showcase photographs of their best-selling house plans, as well as added the “Pin It” button to all their house plan images to make it easy to add to your own boards.

Stay connected by signing up for Dream Green, a free weekly newsletter where consumers and builders can learn about the latest sustainable interior and exterior home building products and design trends and tips to build a new home. Click here to sign up.

The general sense of home design for the upper classes during the Industrial Revolution and the Victorian eras were completely opposite of everything the craftsman movement embodied.  It was common to see large opulent homes often made from mass produced materials for the upper classes.  Small home plans built by hand, using natural materials were popular for laborers, farmers and other common professionals, and this sense of handcrafted simplicity carries on today.  People used their own hands and their own creativity to put together craftsman house plans that were unique, comfortable and quaint.

Now it’s possible to purchase modern house plans that are influenced by the craftsman spirit.  These are small home plans compared to the average Victorian home, which would have also had separate kitchens and servants’ quarters, since the separation of classes was very prevalent in this era.  The craftsman home design typically has a very open floor plan where the kitchen, dining room and living room sort of blend into one another with only partial walls or bars to separate them, so everyone is involved in preparing and enjoying meals.  This design also makes it possible for caregivers to feed and care for children more easily, so whomever is doing the cooking can also watch the children as they play in the living room.  The house designs typically include cleaner lines, using only natural materials and unique artisan features that celebrate the homebuilder.

More than a century after the craftsman movement, people are still building homes that are inspired by this simple and natural style of this era.  With open floor plans, unique woodwork and living areas that blend together for family and friends to enjoy one another’s company and watch out for each other, it is a type of home plan that should stand the test of time.

There are many things that distinguish the home design of the arts and crafts movement from the designs of other eras.  Home plans will often include wrap-around porches, for starters, although this is not a requisite of the style.  Craftsman homes also tend to have a great deal of wood trim and decorative elements, and they are always designed to be more informal and inviting than the homes of other eras.  The homes also tend to be mid-sized, but you can find house plans that range from smaller sized bungalows to large two-story homes.

The craftsman home design became popular and stayed popular for many reasons.  The style came about thanks to the homes built by the working class and middle class during the Industrial Revolution.  This was when the wealthy would build very large and expansive estates with mostly mass produced materials, and the common folks that worked in various professions tended to have hand-built homes made from natural materials.  The overly decorated homes of the Victorian era inspired the craftsman architectural movement in England and the United States, where people started building their homes with cleaner lines using only the natural materials that came from local artisans.  The house plans were also designed around the idea of the mother doing the cooking, cleaning and child-rearing rather than servants, which is why homes started to become more open.

The new home plans that came out of the arts and crafts movement incorporated simplicity and functionality into the design and even in the materials that were used.  Natural and hand-crafted materials such as wood, stone and glass became commonplace.  Floor plans with low-pitched roof lines, gabled or hipped roofs, deep overhanging eaves, exposed rafters and front porches built under extensions of the main roofs typified these homes.  It is easy to see why this style became popular, and why so many people still want these floor plans today.