Inspirational Design Site

Finding a good site for inspiring designs and ideas is like uncovering a little bit of gold. Ross Chapin Architects is filled full of great house plans and images. The style is very "Northwest Cottage", which what we are basing our remodeling and decorating on.

Here are a few images from the site...





I really like the plans section, which provides floor plans as well as images.

My DW's "Away Place"

A reoccuring theme in many of the design books / blogs I read: Create "away spaces" that allow for personal quite time. This is also common sense, in that it's nice to have your own spot in the house to relax and think. Here is picture of what we came up with for my DW...


This is simply in the corner of our master bedroom, which is not a large space (14' x 14'). Sorry - picture quality isn't the best here.

It incorporates the folowing design elements:
- Natural light on two sides
- Overlooks a forest area
- Has a lowered ceiling (soffit)
- A space for devotional books
- Is private location

We are planning on creating at least one, maybe two more of these types of spaces in the house as we complete the remodel.

Ultra-modern in Amsterdam

I'm traveling again, diverted away from working on the house. I spent the evening in Amsterdam, staying in the new ultra-modern
CitizenM Capsule Hotel. Someone set off an IKEA bomb and this picture shows the result...


Kidding aside, there are a lot of nice design elements to the room. You have a comfortable room in just about as small of footprint as you could manage, yet it doesn't feel cramped. Also, the cost is 30% to 40% less than just about anything else around the area. I will definately use this for overnight stops in the future.

I am not personally a fan of cutting-edge design, our own home being much more cottage / french country in style, but I do appreciate what the Dutch come up with. They are not afraid to experiment and do some serious forward thinking. Also, in some senses, modernism is just an overlay on top of the basic design that can be applied in various cases, including work with more rustic elements. If you only expose yourself to Pottery Barn, then that's all you are ever going get...

A very interesting blog that mixes modern design and rustic materials is Pacific Northwest Regional Architecture. This shows true mixes of traditional materials and new design.



Finally, if you track any of the newer design blogs (Inhabitat for example) you can see a lot of the featured items in the lobby of the hotel. If you are going through Amsterdam's airport (Schiphol) and you have an extra hour to kill, take a quick walk down to the hotel and check it out.

Taking a Break

We have not gotten a whole lot remodeling done this past few weeks, since skiing has taken a priority. The conditions on Mt. Hood here in Oregon are the best on record for spring skiing.

That being said, there is a lot of home design inspiration that can come from hanging out at Timberline Lodge. It's a national historic landmark that was built in the 1930's.


You can easily spend a few hours looking at all the design details. The main materials are timber-frame wood, stone and wrought iron. There are also a lot of textiles from the Northwest region. My favorite spot is near the central fireplace.



It doesn't get much better than spending Saturday morning skiing with the family, and then stopping into the lodge to get a dose of great rustic architecture. If you are in the Portland area, its worth the hour drive to spend some time there.

Here is a link to a pretty comprehensive set of photos on the design elements:
http://www.umich.edu/~hartspc/umsdp/TL/

Home Theater #1 - Floor Plan

We decided to do most of the basement remodel at one time, so we only get a huge mess one time, and part of the remodel is the home theater.

The 500 sq ft space under our garage is finished and is currently being used as our theater room. This consists of a projector, inexpensive home theater receiver (the DVD player on it is broken) and some cables strung along the walls. We don't have a screen yet, so we project directly on the wall. The space is wide open to the rest of the basement, so sound is somewhat of a problem. All this being said, it still makes a great place for watching movies and sports.

The first phase is to some additional framing to close the theater area in a bit. In general, we want to keep the house as open and multi-purpose as possible, but this area is currently too open. Here is the before layout:



The after layout shows the change to the walls (in orange). These two "boxes" create a doorway to the theater room and allow for a lot storage. They will also block a lot of the sound that travels up the stairs when the TV volume is loud, some of the light that comes from the back of the house.



This floor plan gives a 19 x 28 foot space, allowing for a full three rows of seating if we want.

Book Table Finished

My DW finished painting the book table I made for her. She chose a black semi-gloss paint, and the finish turned out well as shown in the picture.


Here is the inspiration piece I used to desgin this table (sold by Ballard Designs)




Obviously this piece is much larger and open. I used the "X" pattern and edge details, on a smaller scale. I decided to make the sides solid, since the tipped-back shelf was not at the same angle as the "X", and wouldn't have looked good.

[Link to previous post]

Basement Remodel Plan

The diagrams below show the changes to the basement we are planning. The top picture is the "before" floor plan. This shows about 1/2 actual floor space we have downstairs.


Things we don't like about the basement:

• The soffit shown above hangs down about 12 inches from the ceiling. Part of it is camouflaged by the hallway to the kids' bedrooms, and the rest "hangs" in space.
• The hallway is long, narrow and - a perfect throwback to the 1970's. The outer wall is also the central load-bearing wall for the floor joists above, so removing it out of the question.
• No storage - none, nil, kein, geen, arimasen ...

Here is the "after" plan, currently in process:

Changes that require major structual modification are expensive, so we devised a plan that is built around what is there.

Changes we are making:

• Adding a walk-in closet and a storage closet at the left end of the bonus room.
• Changing the access to the bedrooms and getting rid of the hallway
• Turning the hallway and much of the area under the soffit into storage. Some of the hallway will become one of the bedrom closets. This will allow us to use the existing closet in that room for expanding a cramped and akward bathroom (later phase of the remodel)
• "Hiding" the soffit, by putting walls in (shown in orange). This also make a landing area at the bottom of the stairs, creating a much better transition space into the basement.
• Adding a sewing closet for my DW. This will be a space where she can leave her machines set up and have the main stuff always available. It will hold a desk-top and have outlets.
• Adding built-in bookselves (7" x 8")
• Adding central vacuum plumbing and inlets

This requires that only two short headers be installed, plus a modest amount of framing.

Symmetry

I am facinated with how design and layout effect the feel of a living space...

We decided we did not want the entrance to our master beadroom to be at the end of a long, dark hallway, but diretly off our living room. We saw this design on a number of newer floor plans. The window to the right in the picture was already in place (four feet wide), so we made the french doors the same size.


This design choice has symmetry to it, giving the door balance against the window.

When we put the window in the end of our master bedroom, we made it the same size as the doorway, so there would be a framing effect. I think a wider window would off-balance. Finally, both windows give a nice view outside, working together to bring the outdoor feeling inside.


Here is a picture of the window next to the larger window on the adjacent wall.

All of this comes together to give a great view and comfortable feeling.