01/12/2025
Floorplans of Jessica Fletcher's house in Cabot Cove from the TV series "Murder, She Wrote".
The ground floor is a complete set and was fairly easy to fit in since it matches the exterior quite well, although it's slightly larger on the inside than it appears on the outside.
I only had to make a couple of adjustments:
- I slightly modified the toilet, which is sometimes visible from the kitchen, to make it fit with the window on that side of the house.
- We never saw what was in that small room behind the sliding glass doors at the foot of the stairs. Thinking about Jessica's husband's profession, I imagined a private office and reading room that she prefers not to use, which is why she writes in the kitchen.
The upper floor is another story...
I had to make a decision and prioritize the master bedroom, the one we see in the episode "Crossed Up" where Jessica doesn't get out of bed.
I tried to reflect it exactly as it appears on screen, adjusting it to the actual space so that the ground floor and upper floor match.
That absurd horizontal wall at the head of the bed dictates the entire layout.
For the exterior shots with the gale, they used a house from the Universal Studios backlot with the same siding as Mendocino's house, but it doesn't match the interior of the bedroom.
That octagonal turret in the corner... what were they thinking?
The rest is practically invented; both the ensuite bathroom and dressing room, as well as the other rooms on this floor.
In the series, we see 3 different guest bedrooms... but there isn't room for that many upstairs, especially considering the enormous size of the master bedroom.
1. The main one would be the one occupied by his nephew Grady, which we see mainly in the episode "The Szechuan Dragon."
Aside from the absurd closet in the corner, this room is impossible to place. According to the transition images, the lights being on suggest that this bedroom is located above the living room, and that's where I've placed it.
The problem is that when we see the interior of the bedroom, it doesn't correspond to the exterior. The set has windows on two of the walls, and neither of them corresponds to the windows on the facade.
So I had to reinterpret it using the same elements we see on the set.
2. We previously saw another guest bedroom occupied by Anne Meara in the episode "Who Threw the Barbitals in Mrs. Fletcher's Chowder?". Here they cheated, since what we see is the modified master bedroom, reduced in size by adding a wall and refurnished to pass it off as a smaller guest room. It's easily recognizable by the angled fireplace with a wooden front and the window with a green upholstered seat to its left. As usual, they used furniture from other spaces to furnish this guest bedroom.
I haven't taken this set into account.
3. We also see a third, very simple and basic guest room (basically four walls in a square space) occupied by Jonathan Brandis in the episode "If the Shoe Fits".
This bedroom looks like it was put together haphazardly, as it's furnished with items borrowed from other sets. We have the bed and the cabinet with the washbasin and pitcher from Grady's bedroom, the quilt stand from the master bedroom, the nightstand from another bedroom, the fireplace, and so on.
I've used these items for this other bedroom above the office.
Both the small sitting area above the hall and the shared bathroom are completely made up, as we never saw them in the show.
I hope the fans of the series will be forgiving and accept these changes and additions to fill in the gaps, and that, with a bit of luck, they'll like the final result.
