A brightly painted door on the home pictured below clearly marks the entrance while the covered porch provides protection from the elements and a small transitional shelter.

Photo by Mark Weinberg

The glass doors and sidelights of this covered porch suggest a graceful entry spot and provide a glimpse of activity inside.

Photo by Mark Weinberg

The full-width porch on the house pictured below creates an important visual element of composition while also providing an outdoor room with views to the street.

The front door of this mountainside home beckons from a distance. The pathway crosses over a bridge and leads to the front steps which accommodate a grade change. A glass roof covering the porch maximizes light into the home’s entry foyer. Lush plantings and the sounds of the creek below create a sensory experience for visitors to the home.

Trees and planting beds frame a diagonal stone entry approach to a simple but elegant porch on this 1940s brick rambler.

Photo by Mark Weinberg

A large sycamore tree anchors the front of the home pictured below. A stone masonry porch and broad door distinctly mark the entrance.

photo by Mark Weinberg

Wide steps, gas lanterns and plantings delineate the formal entry experience to the front door. (Note the visual trick here: the door visible from the steps is not actually the front door, but rather a side door.)

photo by Mark Weinberg

Several elements combine to create a whimsical entry in the photos below: the oversized steel door, a framed eye chart, the George Nakashima bench, and a Downton Abbey-like doorbell that announces the arrival of guests.

This beach house project on Puget Sound has no entry at all from the street side.  Instead, a side-entry path with stone pavers leads to the “back” of the house where a front door faces the water, a custom of waterfront houses.

Visit our Welcome Home pinterest board to see more examples of inviting front entries.

to this:

Undertaking a home remodel or new construction project is a daunting task, but there are many resources available that help clarify the entire process.  Several informative posts from around the blogosphere have caught our attention in recent months.   As we move into a new year, we’d like to share several of them.

We love Build LLC’s blog.  They’ve taken the time to document details of construction and several of their posts last year have focused on specifics, like demolition, everything you ever wanted to know about a concrete pour, and notes on what to watch for when using an existing foundation. (Admittedly for most of us, none of this is terribly interesting until it’s your concrete pour and your dime.)  To see all of their technical posts, visit here.  Perhaps a little more fun to dream about–especially as we are enveloped in a winter wonderland here in Utah–is how to create a landscape plan.  (One of my favorite discoveries when we moved to Utah from Seattle a decade ago was Red Butte Garden. Visit their website for information on native Utah plants.)  And the reality check? Construction IS expensive, though a potentially great investment if done right that will yield priceless benefits for years to come. For the grand finale of the year, Build Blog posted an evaluation of a case study home they wrapped up, complete with costs and timeline.

We recently learned of this blog, an online photo library of construction details with an equally extensive index to browse, i.e. cedar shingles, radiant flooring, and even a green wall is documented. Because this blog is out of the Northwest, some construction practices will be different due to the climate, but it’s still a very helpful resource in understanding the level of detail in a well designed construction project.

Houzz.com also has several idea books and articles on topics of interest to homeowners.  Their photo library continues to grow, now approaching 1 million, up from 250,000 earlier this year.  We’ve blogged about them before, but are including a few links here that may be of interest to our residential clients, including contractor tips, elements of green building, and tips on how to work with an architect.

Residential Architect recently published an article on the color forecast for 2013 and top design trends of the past year–fun to browse through.  A couple of other color resources we’ve discovered in recent months, both from Sherwin-Williams: chip it that allows you to take any photo from around the web and create a color palette from it,  and this color tool app. Though colors often look different on a computer monitor, it’s at least a starting point.

And a little food for thought if launching into a residential project.  Though we missed the Wall Street Journal’s article about a recent study of how families live in their homes, Dan Gregory  blogged about it here.  Seriously worth considering before drafting up a wish list for a new home.

In November, we heard a seminar from these Canadian architects at the Residential Architect symposium in Chicago. They are producing an entire video library with advice on just about everything to do with home design. We love their “slow home” design philosophy in response to the mass produced “fast homes” of the past few decades.  Pretty entertaining stuff and we’re amazed (and grateful) at their stamina and commitment to educating the general public about basic design principles.  Kudos to them.

If you have any favorite online resources related to home remodeling and construction, we’d love to know about them.

Happy New Year!

From Anna:  ”To the left is a sketch I drew of the Egyptian Theater. In this half-day sketching course, we learned that there are four key ingredients in a drawing: edges, form, value, and color. We didn’t get into the color portion during our short course, but my sketch shows a 20-minute attempt at defining edges, form and value. 
The lecturer for this course, Dave Cassil of Architectural Nexus, discussed how drawing is being taught today and drew comparisons with the masters of the past such as Rembrandt, Degas and da Vinci. Cassil’s greatest concern is that young architects today rely too heavily on computer generated images, and are losing the craft of sketching. While I feel that computer renderings are necessary to keep pace with the demands on architecture in the modern world, I also feel that they will eventually become dated when a good hand sketch will never lose its charm. With the time constraints in today’s fast-paced world we may never develop drawing skills to rival the masters, but I truly hope that the hand sketch will always have a place in architectural design.”

From Rebecca:

“Those who never make mistakes lose a great many chances to learn something” (John Luther).

“The lecturer, Dave Cassil, critiqued several sketches done by Degas, da Vinci, and Rembrandt.  Some of the images displayed on the screen were simply uninspiring.  In showing us these sketches, he emphasized the importance of the process.  He pointed out that although some of the sketches may not have been impressive to look at, they were important to the artist and to their journey from beginning to end.  This left me thinking about mistakes, which can be a positive learning tool. . . . After the lecture we spent some time sketching. I had nearly finished the sketch I was working on when Cassil asked if he might take a look at my drawing.  The mistakes I had made led him to teach me.  I learned more that day from my mistakes than I could have ever learned by doing everything right. Below are 3 sketches, representing my first attempt, the instructor’s sketch, and my final sketch after his observations.”

From Tom:

“Our hands and entire bodies possess embodied skills and wisdom” (Juhani Pallasmaa, The Thinking Hand).

“It is good for the soul to hunker down with the purpose to sketch with graphite on paper.  Most of the time we are drafting and modeling with a mouse. Digital technology is a valuable tool but it is just one of our tools.  I benefited from an exercise in remembering that the eye is connected to the hand and whole body.”

From Warren:

“I ventured outside and after a few false starts came across this framed view of the Wasatch from 25th Street. Below is my 3-minute sketch.”

Huge windows capture pristine views of the farm and the changing seasons:

Clerestory windows in the main hall flood the room with natural light, even on a cloudy day.

Wood detailing throughout (thanks to an on-site woodworking shop) provide warmth and interest.

Exterior spaces were just as beautiful as the interiors. An arbor of London Planes is reflected in a mirrored panel at the end of a walkway.  We heard that this particular panel was a test panel for Cloud Gate (“The Bean”) in Millennium Park.

There were so many intriguing buildings on the estate.  Visit Vinci Hamp’s website to see more projects they’ve completed there. Here are a few more of our photos from around the farm:

For our second stop we visited the Claremont House, belonging to an architect who is a partner at Brininstool + Lynch.  What struck us first was the use of red brick siding for a contemporary home. Notes Warren: “On each visit to Chicago, I am reminded of the great tradition of brick and masonry construction and the Claremont House functions both as a clear simple idea, but with materials that seem to belong in Chicago and that neighborhood. The beauty of modernism is at its best when a simple cubic form reveals depth, in this case with the elegant craft of the  brick detail, a 1/3-running bond, which looks like a zipper up the wall.”

The main floor houses the kitchen/living areas and features a dramatic floor-to-ceiling window that frames the view to the street.  The massively scaled window reflects the outdoors while also capturing a view of the neighboring late Victorian houses seen through the living space into the alley block behind.

To see more photos and learn about the housing tour, visit Residential Architect’s slideshow.

“Have you ever wondered if you could generate enough solar to power your household needs? Or how much food you could produce in your backyard if you took the time to garden? Come hear Kevin Bell, Salt Lake City’s GIS Coordinator, discuss how Salt Lake City has quantified the sun-shed and the food-shed by developing a new technology that can be applied to sustainability in many ways.  The tool he has created allows Salt Lake City residents to quantify how much food they can grow in their yards and the size and placement of a solar array on their property.”

Well, we wondered.  So we learned more about The Solar Salt Lake Project. Utilizing initial data collected by the NSA prior to the 2002 Olympics (for security measures) that was further developed by environmental number crunchers from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Kevin Bell and SLC Geographic Information Systems developed a tool for analyzing solar potential for individual properties and neighborhoods within the city. We used this online tool recently to help guide sustainability decisions on a potential LEED H project in the Avenues neighborhood and found it informative and easy to navigate. Whether your interests are quantifying how much sunlight your garden plot has or where the best solar thermal orientation is in your neighborhood, this resource is invaluable for the urban homesteader or anyone seeking to maximize the solar potential of their property.

The challenge was to create “an original design of a home in the California mid-century modern style and construct a model of it using Lego bricks and elements.”  The contest was sponsored by Dwell and Pacific Standard Time.  After a decade of buying Legos for our kids, we had a fair number to contribute to the evening (though we did learn of a guy on Craig’s List who lives in Provo and sells Legos by the pound out of his apartment).  One adventure later we had upped our supply a bit and were ready to start building.

A couple of the projects made the final cut and are now part of the official contest (here and here).  [You can view the 5 finalists here.]  All in all, it was a fun visual feast if you love Legos and admire mid-century modern architecture.

(PS–Check out this mid-century modern exhibit featured on Pacific Standard Time and this inventive use of Legos.)

Here’s a sampling from the evening:

As we’re gearing up for 2012 and making plans, we can’t help but look back at the past year, reflect, and note a few milestones:

1.  The year 2011 marked a time of working with existing space: every project completed during the past year was either a renovation or addition to an existing building or house. This may be a commentary on the recession and financing crunch of 2009-2010 where existing building projects had more luck finding financing than new construction. Or it may have just been the chance we had to work in some of Salt Lake’s more interesting historic neighborhoods and old buildings.

On Edison Avenue,  one of downtown Salt Lake’s re-emerging mid-block streets, we had fun working on the adaptive reuse of an old warehouse space for the wildly creative Super Top Secret, an interactive ad agency based here in Salt Lake City.  It’s not every office renovation program that includes a skateboard ramp and elevated work lounge…

In December we wrapped up work on the Keyser Building, a warehouse building in the Granary district that is the new home for a dynamic growing business relocating to Salt Lake City, the US Translation Company. The 24,000 s.f. three-story building is both a historic renovation and a sustainable re-use of an existing concrete frame and brick structure.  I noted in an article published last fall on USGBC’s website: “Truly the greenest building is one that has already been built…. This building has a great history and we can return it to its original roots while adding all the amenities of a modern office space without the impact of constructing a whole new structure.” (US Translation blogged a bit about the remodeling process of the historic building here.)

2. Lloyd Architects headed to Seattle for its first ever full office retreat in April. For the Lloyd Architect team, this was more than a chance to see some buildings and catch a Mariners game. Aaron, Justin and Tom each selected a notable building type which we sketched, photographed or analyzed, (and we did spend a chilly evening at Safeco field).We also had a great visit with Bob Hull and David Miller at the office of Miller/Hull, where I worked while attending graduate school at the UW (now over 20 years ago). Their sustained passion for the power of architecture to communicate ideas and seeing the consistency of the tectonic quality of their work were inspiring. I was also reminded by Bob about their practice of more than 30 years of weekly scheduled design reviews within their office. I recommitted to  make that happen at Lloyd Architects.

I also re-connected with my friend and mentor Tom Bosworth, who continues to guide the architecture studio Bosworth Hoedemaker, and remains a steady influence in the design dialog of residential architecture in the Pacific Northwest.

We did have our own design charette for a high bank waterfront patio  with our hosts out at Richmond Beach. Many thanks to Rick & Julie Stevenson!

3. In May we headed to New Orleans and the National AIA Convention, where we reconnected with friends and colleagues of CRAN, the Custom Residential Architects Network, comparing notes on emerging practices of building information modelling (BIM) and design build practices…

and where Jennie & I logged a number of miles walking the city, noting neighborhood patterns and streetscapes of the Garden District. In December we were in Phoenix at Reinvention, Residential Architect Magazine’s annual conference. Visting and discussing design ideas with the best practicing residential architects was an encouraging reminder that the distressed US housing market remains a poignant backdrop for some very interesting design transformations taking place in cities and neighborhoods throughout the West and beyond.

Reviewing the extent and diversity of our experiences and projects as well as looking at what we have “on the boards” are cause enough for me to keep, if not starry eyed optimism, at least a sense of gratitude for the opportunity to be an architect and work with great clients, bright young architects in training, and contribute in some way to the quality of the built environment of the Wasatch Front and beyond.

Warren sketched two designs for the gingerbread house project, one modern and the other traditional, both designs based loosely on current projects on the boards. Rebecca made some models and then we got busy baking and building. We learned a lot about gingerbread houses in the process and could write a pretty comprehensive list of dos and don’ts. Suffice it to say that we got much more efficient with experience.

The invitations gave attendees a choice between decorating a traditional or modern house.  (It turns out this particular group was about 50/50.)

An assortment of candies, nuts, dried fruits, and cereals created the decorating palette for the bare houses and a few whimsical signs (made by a talented friend) provided a little inspiration.

And then we got down to business.

We loved the creative uses of materials.  (Note the different uses of dried pineapple rings alone.)    Do these qualify as eye candy?

All were remarkable; two homes in particular stood out for me.  Both had quiet facades in the streetscape but hidden within were elements of drama and surprise, jewels to be discovered.  The first was the Cedar Street Residence designed by colab studio in Tempe.

The husband and wife are both architects and he admitted that they almost had to hire an architect to design their home for lack of agreement between them.  They had purchased the 1954 bungalow several years ago and tight budget constraints demanded a design that was simple and efficient.  I’m glad they were able to come to a consensus, because the resulting product is beautiful.  The first surprise here was the oasis of an interior courtyard flanked by the original home on one side (completely gutted, but now used for bedrooms) and a new structure on the opposite side (where their office and kitchen/living area are located).

The second surprise was the use of millwork on castors to create flexibility in room sizes.  Millwork separates the dining room and office area and can be moved to accommodate a larger dining area when entertaining guests for dinner or a larger office space when hosting a client meeting.  Interestingly, they designed the project in phases, initially creating outdoor pods for bedroom spaces.  Dwell magazine wrote about that here.  And for beautiful photos of this project on their own website, visit here.

Will Bruder + Partners designed the Hill/Shepard Residence years ago and it remains one of Bruder’s favorite projects.

As he spoke to us in the driveway upon our arrival in front of the unassuming facade, I’ll admit that I had no idea what was in store for us.  Designed for a family that likes to entertain and has an extensive art collection, the home is full of surprises, both indoors and out.

I really appreciated the restraint of the front design; there were so many “aha” moments as we toured the home, from the canyon-like climb up the stairs to the crow’s nest on top of the house.The house was full of nooks and cozy spaces designed on a human scale. The homeowners love to entertain and it was apparent that this home is a cherished gathering spot for friends and family.  Our photos only begin to capture some of the color and detail of the home.  Visit Will Bruder’s website for the professional set of photos.

Tip for young architects:  Attend architectural conferences as soon as you possibly can.  In the early days, we couldn’t afford to travel to them, but Warren always made an effort to attend local AIA offerings when we lived in Seattle.  (Attending one such conference led to a job in northern Japan where we lived for a year.) Conferences provide a chance to network, get inspired, and reinvent how we do things.  It’s one of the best things we’ve done to stay inspired.