This Kid's Too Cool for Fascism
And so we return and begin again. We close out our third year of this blog and this renovation with some major aesthetic and architectural transformations. We've gone through a few cycles of the moon in three years and this blog entry falls during a full moon phase, making this a time of high emotions, a time for celebration, and a time that grants the energy for change.
As Jim Valvano said in his speech at the 1993 ESPY's when addressing the key things in life, you need to know "where you started, where you are, and where you’re going to be." Now it may seem that I, a simple caveman, am mis-applying the words of a man months away from succumbing to cancer to scaffold the introduction to a renovation blog...which is exactly what I'm doing.
Anywho, here's where we were 3 years ago. The untouched front of house, February 2022.
So much of that first year involved basic interior safety upgrades and water solutions for the property that it wasn't until last year that Brie and I really started to dream of how the house could start being the house we wanted, a place to meet our needs, and our community needs.
Below is a mockup we did speaking to the desire to re-sculpt the landscape, balance the visual weight of the house with a mid century wood fence, open the previously closed-up breezeway, and rebuild the front of the enclosed and "finished" carport with new architectural windows. We also pictured a breezeblock wall a few feet in front of it to hide trashcans and provide a grounding yard feature.
I'll quickly walk you through the major moves from the back half of this year and then give you an updated front of house reveal.
First we have the blue/white interior breezeway/foyer/mudroom/mildew-box as it was when we first moved in. It looked like this until late Spring when we opened up the back wall (see last blog post) and leaned into it as an outdoor space (second picture). The 3rd picture is the old front door as of the last update, for a 'before' look at the sight lines.
We had to leave the upper framing in place due to mysterious electrical (This house has 3 kinds of electrical 1) original and correct 2) dangerous, and 3) mysterious). And Cesar eventually made a follow-up visit to address the dedicated line for the minisplit in The Room, which prompted the full removal of both the front and back walls. The mysterious wiring on the back wall was the low voltage line for the thermostat sensor, some previously disconnected power running to The Room, and the main power running to The Room.
Cesar ran both the main power and the minisplit power (separate breaker) through a metal conduit from the box under the eaves. All to code, safe, and, after some paint, invisible.
The original 1966 build included a porch light by the front door (see below on right side of picture). This porch light is wired to a switch on the 4-switch panel just inside and to the right of the original front door. The other three switches on this panel control 1) a wall sconce in the dining room 2) the interior outlet directly below the light switch panel, and 4) ???. We also know from trial and error that all these power sources and the remainder of the outlets on this wall in both the front and dining room are all on the same breaker in the breaker box.
See, the big brains that imagineered this house expansion decided 1) we need a coat closet in the breezeway/foyer/mudroom/mildew-box, 2) that coat closet needs a light and outlets, and 3) the enclosed carport will need outlets and ceiling lights. Pictured below are some jank pictures taken from an early video of the house showing the closet door in the breezeway and the extent that the closet intruded into the carport room along with a dope globe lamp that moved into the guest room long ago.
The real issue isn't powering the old carport, the issue is that instead of running it from the breaker box (assigned to unique breakers), contained in protective conduits, they ran lines off of 3-4 pre-existing outlets and light fixtures from the front of the house, running the lines through the ceiling and through both the front and back framed walls to this new construction, while not labelling anything. The good news is that it's all safe now, and the room is all on its own breakers, but there are still some lines we haven't been able to track back yet (we'll eventually open up the outside wall prior to re-siding the house and deal with it then).
We opened the front of the breezeway just like the back. Brie cleared up some concrete from the base of the front wall and the original concrete is in great shape.
We opened the front of the breezeway just like the back. Brie cleared up some concrete from the base of the front wall and the original concrete is in great shape.
And from an aesthetic perspective, the open breezeway looks and feels amazing.
We're extremely happy with where we've taken the house so far.
Siding and exterior paint are maybe a 2025 task, maybe 2026 depending on cost. And we're still dedicated to installing a gate/panel as shown in the last update.
Until then we're using a wooden dog gate to indicate a stop point and damned if all delivery people (and the dogs) don't respect the hell out of it.
Before we move to the interior progress and the back yard, lets settle in on some more house inspiration. From 1951-1974 approximately 2700 Eichler homes were built in Palo Alto, California.
I've written on how the proposed gate/panel design was taken from the courtyard homes of Joseph Eichler, but now that the exterior of the house is coming together I wanted to revisit other elements of specifically the Palo Alto Eichlers and how elements of them were present in the original house design, but also how we're bringing in further elements.
This first house is a good example of the components we're trying to embrace and deploy. 1) First off are the eaves. These Californian Eichlers have deep eaves which are often paired with large picture windows. This allows the indoor/outdoor flow of the large windows while limiting the harsh direct midday sunlight. On the east coast they serve as wonderful protection from inclement weather as well.
2) Pretty typical of many mid century designs, we have a row of small clerestory windows to allow for extra natural light. These often mirror the slope of the roof line, so our windows in The Room are angled rather than square. 3) The Palo Alto homes are closer to bungalows in their footprint while we have a rambler, so our door is on the side of the house rather than facing front, but in both designs the front door is set back, often at the end of a breezeway or courtyard. 4) The landscaping takes its cues from both the California heat and the shadows cast by the deep eaves, meaning that flower beds around these houses are out of place. Instead you can expect to see hardscaping, sand, aggregate stone, or some form of poured concrete, often combined with larger bushes and climate appropriate grasses. 5) Though this house isn't my favorite example, you can see that the house has a 2-tone paint scheme (here is base brown with a few white trim elements, and an often colorful or decorative door. Below are a few more examples marked with the same 1-5 legend.
This red front door actually leads to a small exterior courtyard and then the real front door beyond.
Moving indoors, things get a bit more prosaic, but still exciting in their progress. First big move was running CAT cable from the router through baseboards and walls to my office and now I've been in my office for a few months, opening up space in the bonus room off of the primary bedroom. This allowed for the mission sofa we picked up over the Summer and the remaining flooring to live comfortably out of sight.
Bing bang boom, a floored hallway and our first opportunity to roll out this hallway runner we bought 2 years ago. We haven't installed the transition pieces that connect the rooms to the hallway yet. Someday.
The hallway 1) proved an incredibly easy task (we're very good at flooring by now) and 2) necessitated the removal of part of the vinyl kitchen floor to get a reasonable line. The yadda yadda is that the previous owners had a diagonal line separating the kitchen from the dining area which rendered both spaces effectively smaller since a thin triangular space isn't good for dining chairs nor for cooking on.
So up came all the dining room carpet and then came the kinda gross, kinda fascinating task of excavating 60 years of stacked vinyl flooring (I've saved some core samples for you to see below). Then down went some more underlayment and suddenly the dining room was also floored.
 |
| (Rug isn't final) |
We also picked up some new IKEA dressers for the bedroom closets allowing us to move this older chest of drawers into the front room for now, where it actually looks quite nice. It's storing dog paraphernalia.
***
Before we hop over to The Room, let's talk about our social happenings! We continue to host clubhouse days, which are sort of an open house for hangouts; games, crafts, tv, and shared meals and of course some great friends (We continue our good fortune in that arena). There have also been more Strange Tapes movie viewings and we have a fun weekly holiday movie night running throughout December.
In an acceptable form of madness, multiple people in our friend group decided to buy adult Heelies, especially when they discovered they could pay $20 for a mystery box style. The rainbow pair went to our friend Lindsay, Brie kept the streetwear style on the right. No one has taken the leap to actually risk rolling around on them yet, so I think they may all just be chickenshits.
Walt had a very very very successful trip to the vet where he was controlled enough for us to inject him with a knockout shot and get his checkup and blood work. As a result he's been back on his prozac for a few months and its taken him from well behaved but with an occasional edge, to incredibly reasonable and chill without him ceasing to be Walt. This was an important development because with Ramona having been gone a year, Brie and I were ready to get registered as dog fosters for the Charles Humane Society (where we got Ramona).
We're been fostering a young pit mix named Camryn for 5 weeks now. Lots of puppy energy; honestly a good reminder why we've never yearned for a puppy. But she needs a safe home to build her confidence and responsible humans to train her. Walt is being a great older brother and modeling proper behaviors. He's also loving having a dog to run around the yard with. Below are pics of the fence we set up in the side yard for her to run around off leash and then lots of dog pics.
***
We soft launched The Room with a Clubhouse Day / cook out/ Strange Tapes viewing back in May when Mada and April were staying with us. The major takeaway was the need for increased seating, better integration between the different areas, and a need to ratchet up the cozy. before we could get to that though, Brie finished installing the baseboards and, facia, and nosing for the dais step. It looks great in person.
Here you can see the new view from the picture window with the old front door gone and also the giant IKEA delivery of the new chaise couch unit.
As you may have gathered from all of these pictures, the built in bookcases are painted and filled (though not properly organized), and we've applied an amazing bright and poppy crane wallpaper from Milton & King to the dais area. The addition of the new green corduroy couch has helped achieve the balance of textures and colors we had hoped for.
Art needs to go up on the walls and there's trim and wood cladding yet to do, but The Room has really solidified into its best self.
***
As a brief denouement, let's return outside to the back yard. A few tough end of Summer storms brought a huge limb down on the neighbors fence. The fence section is fully gone now, but Walt understands boundaries, which makes this a Spring problem. On the workshop front, Brie has built and installed a French cleat system on the front wall. Tools are affixed with hooks and stored anywhere along the wall and just as quickly retrieved.
The real treat out back was thanks to both Brandon and especially Owen who came over and helped get these outdoor lights hung. It makes the backyard so much more navigable and are far more attractive than flood lights. A couple more strands are forthcoming.
And that's how we head into the darkest part of the year: well girded with comfort and light, structured and ordered, and properly ready to open our doors to everyone and anyone who needs it.
S.
Comments
Post a Comment