Your house layout and square footage of the living room, dining room, and kitchen is almost a carbon copy of mine, right down to the French doors (though mine are pocket doors instead). Difference is that I don't have a 2nd floor, and the bedrooms and bathrooms are off the back. Total square footage is 1250 square feet.
In a Central NY climate (8000+ degree days/year), my Lopi Answer (1.6 cu ft firebox) with the blower provides plenty of heat for the kitchen, dining room, den (off the living room) and living room until the temperature gets below 20 degrees. These four rooms are about 700 square feet. My house has insulation blown into the walls, attic insulation, and good windows with storm windows. If I'm patient with the warmup in the mornings on weekends and holidays, I don't have to turn the oil heat on at all. The back rooms are a little cooler - by about 10 degrees - but since they are the bedrooms, we don't mind. The living room is about 75 degrees, dining room about 72 degrees, and kitchen about 68-70 degrees. If the temperature goes down to 0 degrees, I am still good to go - everything is cooler by about 3-5 degrees, which my wife and I are good with since this usually happens during overnights. Days are warmer, so the house gets warmer when we are running the stove.
So, just to try to extrapolate - you have a milder climate than I do, but you will probably be burning softwoods instead of hardwoods, so that will probably balance out. If you like your upstairs pretty warm, or if you don't want to load the stove every ~4 hours, then a slightly larger stove might be for you. But I would not go with anything much much larger than I have. Your upstairs will probably be warmer than my back area since heat rises, so that is working in your favor. This is all assuming your walls are insulated as well as mine, and your windows are as good as mine.
I can have still have overnight coals in my stove when using hardwoods, but this is probably not realistic with softwoods.
If you aren't going to burn continuously, then a medium size stove might be better for better "pick up" if you don't have your backup heating on. Still, I don't think that you'll really need it.
If you really want to lounge around in your living room in your shorts in the wintertime, then maybe you'd want the medium sized stove.
There are many who will advocate for the biggest stove. The biggest stove may be the best, but I just want to balance out the feedback on this and give you the viewpoint of what a smaller stove will do in a house that is similar in size and layout to what you have. I would advocate for getting the "right-sized" stove and not trying to plan for the 5 coldest days of the winter - you can always turn your backup heat on those days.
In a Central NY climate (8000+ degree days/year), my Lopi Answer (1.6 cu ft firebox) with the blower provides plenty of heat for the kitchen, dining room, den (off the living room) and living room until the temperature gets below 20 degrees. These four rooms are about 700 square feet. My house has insulation blown into the walls, attic insulation, and good windows with storm windows. If I'm patient with the warmup in the mornings on weekends and holidays, I don't have to turn the oil heat on at all. The back rooms are a little cooler - by about 10 degrees - but since they are the bedrooms, we don't mind. The living room is about 75 degrees, dining room about 72 degrees, and kitchen about 68-70 degrees. If the temperature goes down to 0 degrees, I am still good to go - everything is cooler by about 3-5 degrees, which my wife and I are good with since this usually happens during overnights. Days are warmer, so the house gets warmer when we are running the stove.
So, just to try to extrapolate - you have a milder climate than I do, but you will probably be burning softwoods instead of hardwoods, so that will probably balance out. If you like your upstairs pretty warm, or if you don't want to load the stove every ~4 hours, then a slightly larger stove might be for you. But I would not go with anything much much larger than I have. Your upstairs will probably be warmer than my back area since heat rises, so that is working in your favor. This is all assuming your walls are insulated as well as mine, and your windows are as good as mine.
I can have still have overnight coals in my stove when using hardwoods, but this is probably not realistic with softwoods.
If you aren't going to burn continuously, then a medium size stove might be better for better "pick up" if you don't have your backup heating on. Still, I don't think that you'll really need it.
If you really want to lounge around in your living room in your shorts in the wintertime, then maybe you'd want the medium sized stove.
There are many who will advocate for the biggest stove. The biggest stove may be the best, but I just want to balance out the feedback on this and give you the viewpoint of what a smaller stove will do in a house that is similar in size and layout to what you have. I would advocate for getting the "right-sized" stove and not trying to plan for the 5 coldest days of the winter - you can always turn your backup heat on those days.
