My Victoria's Cottage will sit downslope of my driveway and the roadway access. When I drive around and look at most homes, I notice that there is a step up to a front porch, not a step down. I imagine this is because one does not want water flowing in a front door. But assuming the ground would be below a walkway to the front entrance, how odd would it be not to have a step up and possibly even have a step down?
If this does not make sense, I will post a picture and attempt to show what I mean.
mt
I once built a home situated in a similar way in order to take advantage of both tree shade, and southern exposure on the property.
We also built a front porch that was used as a stage (X husband was a bluegrass guitar picker), and the front lawn, sloping towards the house was used as an audience sitting place.
Anyway, the step up onto the porch was gentle at first, and quite often muddy, so we dug out a patio in front of it with a drainage ditch around the outer wall to divert the water flow and layed brick, and it stayed under water a lot too. Then, we built an elevated treated lumber deck (read bridge) over the brick patio and just called it a moat. I sold the house years ago, and don't know if the new owners were bothered by the entrance or not.
The house was built on a peer foundation so it didn't cause water in the front door, but it was not the best position for the front door. I learned from it and won't ever repeat that mess.
The stage, however got a lot of use and was really fun.
Christina
You do want to make sure that water coming down slope is diverted around the foundation with either grading or a French drain.
That said, a wood or concrete walkway could come down to a platform at the door. This porch, deck, platform or whatever you want to call it needs to be big enough that several guests are comfortable standing there. This is where you will be greeting and saying goodbye to folks so don't make it too tight.
This platform still needs to be at least an inch or two below the door threshold in order to avoid water problems.
We are required to have at least 5 feet sloping down from the house then it can go up at 2 to 1 if I recall correctly, or there can be a retainining wall - elevated slope back and down then up the 2 to 1 if that makes sense.