Front Elevation Designs for Small Houses (including A-frame houses)

One thing I regret with the last house I built was that I didn’t give more consideration to the Front Elevation Design and aesthetic of the Farmhouse. I was so focused on the floor plans that I often skipped over the elevation designs of the home. However, with my small A-frame house, I feel like I have two opportunities to make the Front Elevation Designs for our small house amazing. It’s kind of hard to tell the difference between the front and back of the house.

*** You can see how the front elevation of our A-frame exterior turned out and all of the details in this post.

What are building Elevation Designs?

If you have never had the pleasure of working on a set of blueprints for a new home you may not know the difference between floor plans and Elevation Designs. Sometimes a draftsman just starts with floor plans in the beginning stages. However, when you receive a full set of architectural drawings it will include; floors plans, front, side, and rear elevations, and electrical layouts.

Floor Plans are the drawings you view if you were to peel off the roof of your home and look down on it. When we built our dream Farmhouse in Sundre I felt like I created the ultimate, functional floor layout. I loved the layout of those home plans so much. My husband still reminds me weekly that we left a perfectly laid out home. No pressure as I design our small house plans for the A-frame that is one-quarter the size.

Elevation designs are drawings that show the outside perspective of your home. The elevation of the front of the house often receives the most attention. For both our Farmhouse in Sundre and our A-frame cabin they are located in Rural areas. When you are building in a rural setting you don’t have that one perfect view of your home life you do when a house is situated with houses on either side. People are not driving by your home as frequently so in my mind it received less attention. However, after our Farmhouse was finished I regretted not taking more time to go over these drawings of our home.

Why I am paying more attention to the Front Elevation of our A-frame house

The location of our A-frame in Revelstoke, British Columbia definitely has more exposure than our home in Sundre because we are on a busier road and also closer to the road. I wanted to give more attention to the way our home would feel when you drive up our driveway. I want to point out that creating a beautiful front elevation does not mean it needs to be bigger, more expensive, or more complicated. It just needs to be thoughtful and designed with intention.

Tips for planning the design of the Front Elevation of your home

At this point, we have just started building our A-frame house so there will be future posts showing how I made these front elevations come to reality. So many of you are building or renovating your own homes right now. I wanted to chat about why you should definitely take the time to plan out the design of the front elevations. 

Also, I wanted to give some tips and advice for planning out the exterior of your home if you are not able to have 3D elevation drawings done. Those fancy 3D renderings you see on TV are expensive. I am working on low budget ideas for this home. Investing money in detailed plans is not in the cards. I know it can be hard to visualize the exterior of your home. Working with interior designers early on can play a big advantage in creating a cohesive vibe for your entire home. And while designers can be an added cost upfront it may save you in the end if you make too many changes.

Small A-frame Front Elevations

The beauty of the classic A-frame is that you have a symmetrical structure. The front and back of the home are opportunities to create beautiful designs. While some A-frame cabins have build-outs on the side of the home for mudrooms or to create more space, we are building a traditional triangle A-frame. 

Check out this beautiful symmetrical A-frame from The Hemlock Hollow.

The way our A-frame sits on our property is that when you come up our driveway you will see the back elevation of our A-frame (which will be our patio). However, our family and guests will enter the front of the house. So we wanted to make sure that we didn’t make this side of our home an afterthought. Also, the parking area will face the front view of our shop so we are making that a priority as well.

Front elevation designs for small houses

This post will specifically be covering small house design elements (under 1000 sq ft house plans). This has been what my research and focus have been on over the last year. Even though small homes tend to have simple house elevation designs that doesn’t mean that they can’t leave a LARGE impact. These are what I feel are the most important things to consider as you look at different architectural styles you may be considering for your house.

Three main points when designing the elevations of the front and back of your house: 

1. Front Door
2. Lighting
3. Stone or Feature Walls

You can look at thousands of beautiful houses and I guarantee all of them will include a thoughtful design of these elements. And whether this is a dream house or a builder-grade home with a small budget there is still a way to make the most of this space.

The best way to start working on your home elevation designs is to figure out what style you are trying to achieve. Do you love Scandinavian minimalist (MEEEE) style homes, a classic traditional home, old houses with intricate architectural designs, contemporary designs … and the list is limitless. But I always tell design clients that every style can be beautiful. It is staying true to the elements of that overall style throughout your house that creates a beautiful home. While some styles easily blend together there are some styles and colour combinations that JUST DON’T WORK … yes I said it!

The Door Says it All on Small Houses

When working on your front elevation designs choosing an amazing front door is a great place to start! There are so many beautiful front doors out there that it would be a shame to not make this the feature of your main entrance. There are multiple factors to consider when selecting your door:

1. Size
2. Solid Door or Door with glass panels (and then is the glass transparent or not?)
3. Door Material – Wood, Metal, Composite (Fiberglass)
4. Color

Front Door Size Matters

When choosing the size of your door consider the total area of the exterior wall that the front door is on. Even though our A-frame is only 900 square feet the wall the front door is on is a huge wall. In fact, the wall on our small home is way bigger than our 3400 sq ft home. This is why I picked a taller front door. It isn’t wider, but just taller to flow with the design and lines of the windows as well.

At the same time inserting a door too large into a small space can look just as awkward. It can be tempting to love a grande, oversized, extravagant door. You need to remind yourself that 1 item doesn’t create a beautiful space. It’s the combination of all features playing harmoniously together!

Do you Need Natural Light?

A factor I never considered when we built our farmhouse was how the front door also impacted the inside of our home. Our front entrance area had the least natural light in the home. I originally had a large solid dark-colored composite door.

When I swapped the door out for the white oak door with large panes of glass it completely changed the exterior and interior design of our home. Living in rural areas also makes it easier to have clear glass on our front doors, however in urban areas privacy can be an issue.

Look at the unique design of this pivoting double front door from my friend Taylour @thekholecollective. Her family builds wood doors and I am completely blown away by the beauty of these Hemlock wood doors!

Front Door Materials

For the back elevation of the A-frame, we are installing a black metal door with 4 window panes. However, to create a slight change for the front elevation design for our small A-frame we will be installing a wood door.

By utilizing 2 different door styles on an A-frame cabin I can create 2 beautiful designs that complement each other. 

On our last home we built, we installed a composite door and it always felt a bit blah. I changed the door out for a white oak door with windows and it completely changed the entire vibe of our home!

Check out some of these gorgeous doors to make the front elevations of these small homes stand out:

This small blue house has done an amazing job and creating symmetry with an asymmetrical door. By then adding the wicker chairs it balances the natural wood color of the beautiful front door. Please message me if you know the source of this gorgeous home.

This amazing A-frame chose a fun exterior siding color and then kept the door color neutral. This cool A-frame belongs to @triangleaframe. I love the simple house front design they have achieved by intentionally mixing only a few elements.

Choosing a Front Door Color

After you have picked the material for your front door you then have to decide what color or stain you will put on the door. The color of the door can completely change the front architectural elevation design. You can go bold and create a beautiful contrasting color combination. Or you can keep the color simple, natural and more complimentary. The beauty of most doors is that you can usually repaint or restain the color over the years. So try not to stress over making a perfect choice the first time. Picking the style, material and glass panes should take priority.

Specifically talking about small and tiny homes the front door color can be so impactful. Normally with a smaller home you can go bold and incorporate some fun, quirky elements. The front door color is a great way to achieve this. Its also a way to show the style that guests may find in the interior of the home.

I have a few friends on Instagram who change up the color of their front doors every season! One of my pet peeves is when I see people paint doors without taking off doorknobs and locks. Check out my video of how easy it is to take off the doorknob to make painting so much easier and achieve a better paint finish.

Don’t forget the Light Fixtures in your front elevation design

Again I feel like lighting can be an “afterthought.” Lighting is expensive and as an Interior Designer, lighting can make a huge difference in achieving the style you are after.

A tip I often recommend to clients is that they install cheap lighting in the beginning and then invest in high-quality amazing pieces over a few years. When we built our farmhouse I stressed over the lighting and spent A LOT of money to have amazing lighting when we moved in. After a few years, I felt like so many of the lights didn’t work with my style of the space. Within 5 years I had replaced about 50% of the light fixtures in our home. 

One of the light fixtures that made the biggest changes was adding a wall sconce beside our front door. There was no wiring to this light so it doesn’t actually work haha but it sure made the front elevation design WAY BETTER! Plus there were a bunch of pot lights in this area so lighting wasn’t a necessity. 

Lighting plans for our A-frame cabin

For the A-frame, we will be installing lighting along the roofline. I am debating between the patio-style lights seen on so many A-frames. Or these invisible style lights that get installed in the soffit. But I also have plans to add a wall sconce overtop of the front door if my first plan doesn’t work out.

Pot lights are OVER recommended in my opinion. I really try to limit them in my designs. Lighting gives you so many opportunities to be creative and make a space stand out. I often see Modern houses with very few or even no actual light fixtures. Did you know stores make light fixtures with modern designs (wink wink … that was a bit sarcastic).

For small house designs, I don’t think having 2 lights (one on each side of the door) is a good option. I think this can be too busy. 

Check out this front entrance with a gorgeous rounded front door and 2 oversized light fixtures. I would be willing to bet this is a larger house. Can you imagine having this many bold features on a tiny home … it definitely wouldn’t have the same beautiful effect.

I have always loved this A-frame front elevation with a tiny covered porch and the sconce to the side.

Should you add Stone?

A very popular design trend is to add stone to certain areas of your home to make them feature areas. Loving the Scandinavian minimalist style I tend to shy away from this trend. While I think adding stone can be done in beautiful ways I do not recommend spending money on this for your small house front elevation. First, the stone is expensive! I think investing more in a front door or a nicer light fixture will improve the design of your front elevation rather than stone.

Especially on small homes if you were to break up the design of the siding with a different material it just makes the house look “choppy” and non-cohesive. I love to maintain clean, simple lines and invest MORE in FEWER products. 

Instead of Stone invest in this for your Front Elevation Designs

I think this house could have created a more beautiful front elevation design. By taking the money they spent on stone veneer and investing in a better garage door and nicer lighting.

Another idea instead of adding stone feature areas is to add natural materials like cedar, fir or even large climbing vines to your home. I will be adding cedar to the soffit area of our home. At our farmhouse, I added cedar shiplap to the pillars and they were so pretty.

For our shop, my goal is to grow wisteria up and around the shop door… I am so excited to live in a climate where I believe wisteria can actually grow! Fingers crossed this design actually works out.

If you have time I would love to have you share this blog post! You can hit the image below that is meant to be shared on Pinterest or Facebook. Having my work shared is one of the biggest compliments! 

What do you think leaves the biggest impact on creating a beautiful front elevation on a small home? Leave a comment below because I love to chat with you all on the blog!