Removing 'mystery box' from sitting room

o1s1n

Hi guys,

We bought a new house recently (3 bed semi D, circa 1977) and I'm just looking into different ways of maximizing space.

One thing I've noticed is a 3 foot by 3 foot floor to ceiling square section in the corner of the sitting room which is boxed off. I thought there might be something to do with the old water heating system inside of it (the house is all oil heated now but did have a way of heating the house from the fireplace)

It eats up a lot of the sitting room so would love to get rid of it and turn the room back into a proper rectangle.

There's a little service hatch in the hallway to this boxed off area and I've noticed that there's very little in there.

The main thing taking up the space is the back end of a unit from the kitchen. (this could easily be removed and walled off) - excuse the cobwebs, looks like the previous owners never cleared this out .



In front of that are two pipes which go from the floor all the way up to the ceiling. The hot press is over this area so I take it they go up to that.





The house had one of those water heating pumps which would run off the fire, I'm hoping it's just to do with that. It's all oil now, so maybe the lot could be removed? There is some piping coming out of this boxed off area, two come out in the kitchen, but none of them look to be in use (they all have valve stops on them)

So both the walls you can see in that photo are three foot long and 'in' the sitting room. I was hoping they'd both be board, but you can see one is cavity blocks. (wouldn't be load bearing would it?). I've noticed some of my neighbours have it removed.

An estimation as to a price would be great!