DRW ARCHITECTURE BLOG

Cable Hill House Photo Update

We recently commissioned some photos of our Cable Hill House, and are really pleased with how they turned out. Photos by Scott Larsen.

Fairmount Blvd House Cabinets

We recently got started on construction of a new kitchen / pantry / mudroom / office at a house off Fairmount Blvd, near Council Crest. Our cabinet makers, Skyline Fine Cabinets of Eugene, sent us some progress photos of the cabinets. The cabinet construction is a traditional face-frame style construction, with flush inset doors and drawers, which suits the traditional form house they are being installed in.

These walnut-faced cabinets will form part of the kitchen island.

These cabinets will form part of the pantry and the office file-drawers, and are due to go to the paint shop soon to receive their finish.

Skyline Residence Wood Floors

Since the last update on our progress at the Skyline Residence, we have finished the sheetrock work, and are now busy installing the hardwood floors throughout the main level of the house. The homeowners chose a rustic hickory, with a naturally large degree of variation in its color and tone.

Humphrey Residence Guest Suite

We're delighted to have recently completed a small remodel of a guest suite in a house located on Portland's SW Humphrey Boulevard. Designed in 1932 by architect Roscoe Hemenway, the house is one of Portland's classic residences. The guest suite is on the second floor, at the end of what was originally as a service wing, with its own entrance from an exterior staircase. Prior to our work, the space had been used as a live-at-home care suite and had quite an institutional feel to it. Our clients approached us with the task of turning it into a guest suite, while retaining what we could of the existing building fabric. We began by dividing the existing "L" shaped space into two rooms, separated by a pair of glass pocket doors. The larger of the two rooms will be kept as a bedroom, while the smaller becomes a more intimate sitting room with a new wood burning stove and a dutch door onto the exterior stair. We removed the carpet in both spaces and refinished the existing fir floor that lay underneath. We placed a new pocket door between the bathroom and sitting room, which required building out a new wall adjacent to the existing wall to avoid disturbing the plumbing stacks. In the bathroom we added a new sink, toilet, bathtub and shower head, while keeping the existing tile in place.

We would like to thank our clients for giving us the opportunity to work on such a beautiful house, and hope that our work make it even more liveable as a home.

Walsh Residence

Staircase at the Walsh Residence.

Skyline Residence Progress

Construction is ongoing at the Skyline Residence, which we last blogged about when we were beginning demolition. Since then, we have completed all the new framing, rough plumbing, electrical, and insulation. There is still a lot to do, but the difference in the quality of the spaces is already apparent.

Living Room

In the living room, we have removed the dropped ceiling, a legacy of a remodel in the 1980s. This gives us an extra 15" of ceiling height, as well as creating a cleaner, more defined space. We decided to keep the fireplace in the same location, so that we could reuse the existing structure and flue. The stone cladding has been removed, revealing the concrete block structure underneath, which we can now re-clad in a more contemporary manner.

Kitchen

The existing kitchen dated from the 1970s, and looked like it. While the kitchen will occupy roughly the same location, we're starting from scratch with the layout, which required changing the location of some of the openings on the wall to the right hand side. The dropped beam has been pushed up into the ceiling, allowing for a continuous flush ceiling. New can lights have been installed in a neatly ordered grid.

The next steps are to sheetrock all the walls, begin installation of tile and wood floors, install new cabinetry, and begin finish carpentry. We're excited by how this project is turning out, and look forward to sharing more photos of it.

Corbett-Terwilliger progress

Since our last post about the Corbett Terwilliger residence, we have completed the roof framing for the building. It's now almost hard to remember what it used to look like.

Looking back at 2012

2012 has flown by for all of us at DRW. We've been working on a number of interesting projects, brought to us by new and repeat clients alike. Thinking back on the year, a lot has happened.

We started our blog with some photo galleries, showing both our traditional and modern work.
We returned to the Vista House for a kitchen remodel, a house that we always love working in. This nicely complements the work we did there back in 2010.
We completed our work on the Cable Hill House. We are especially happy with the interiors of the house, and the exterior lighting.
Construction started on the Corbett-Terwilliger remodel. The house had been extensively remodeled before, and our first step was deconstruction of the existing structure. Once we had the had the house stripped to its studs, we could begin re-framing.
We completed a mudroom and laundry room on Council Crest.
We began work at the Skyline Residence, which we're looking forward to showing more of on our blog as work progresses in 2013.
Our friends at Goodlife Brewery have spent a year in an interior we designed for them.
Other highlights included: the McShane Studio being featured in Oregon 1859 magazine; doing maintenance work at a wonderful Midcentury house near Forest Park; and completing a couple of modern kitchens.

We wish everybody a very happy New Year, and look forward to 2013.

Goodlife Brewing

Interior for our friends at Goodlife Brewing in Bend. They celebrated their first anniversary in business over the summer, and we can personally vouch for the quality of their ales.

Council Crest Mudroom

Remodel of an existing mudroom and pantry, completed earlier this year.

SW Vista House Kitchen Finished

Friday was our last day working on the Vista House Kitchen, which we previously wrote about just after the cabinets were delivered. The project was a complete remodel of the kitchen, which included the demolition of a bearing wall to allow the kitchen to expand into space previously used as a pantry. All the cabinets, tile, lighting, countertops and appliances are new, but were designed to compliment the 1925 house.

We would like to thank our clients, both for giving us the opportunity to work in their house, and for their patience while they were displaced from their kitchen. We're very pleased with how the project turned out, and hope that they will be equally happy as they use the kitchen for years to come.

Skyline Residence

Our latest project is a remodel of a house near Skyline Blvd. The house was built in 1970, and was given a very successful exterior remodel 5 years ago, but much of the original 1970s interior still remained. Our clients bought the house in the summer, with the intention of doing a complete remodel of the interior before they move in.

Our design seeks to preserve the modern, open layout of the house, while making selective improvements to the flow through the building. By removing a wall between the hallway and an existing storage area, we were able to create a new mudroom off of the garage. Changing the kitchen layout creates a more efficient use of space, and creates a more logical relationship between the kitchen and the dining area. An entry area was added as part of the previous remodel, and made the old entry area near the back of the house redundant. By removing one of the walls adjacent to the old entry, we were able to create a new games room, which would also function equally well as a formal dining room.

We received a building permit last week, and got started immediately with the task of removing the existing finishes.

View from the Corbett-Terwilliger house

For the past couple months at our Corbett-Terwilliger remodel, we have been busy demolishing existing structure, excavating soil, pouring new concrete and reframing walls at the basement and first floor. Now that this work is largely complete, our framers are able to move up to the second floor, and have just started building the walls that will support the roof. It was a rare late-November blue sky day when this photo was taken yesterday, with clear views out across the Willamette, to Mt Hood in the distance.

The progress since our last update is most visible from the back of the house, where the addition is being built.

And two days later, two of the gables are built.

Forest Park Midcentury Modern

Recently DRW Design Build had the opportunity to do some maintenance work on a wonderful mid-century modern house near Forest Park. The 1962 house has been sensitively remodeled over the years by our clients, a painter/designer and an architect, but after 50 years, elements of the building were in need of replacement.

Our work on the south elevation (pictured) included installing new windows, flashing and siding. The solar shading was originally supported by 18’ tall wooden posts, which had become buckled over time. One by one, we swapped out the existing for new galvanized steel columns. In addition, some of the exposed roof beams were experiencing rot, which required careful removal and replacement of the affected areas.

SW Vista House kitchen

We consider ourselves very lucky that a previous client of ours has invited us back into their house to build a new kitchen. In 2010, we completed a remodel of their previously unfinished basement, and put in a new master bathroom. Their house is always a pleasure to work at, and has beautifully proportioned rooms, but the existing kitchen didn't reflect the way the clients actually live. The layout of the kitchen hadn't changed since the house was built in 1925, and had a narrow galley style plan, and a separate pantry. By removing the wall between the kitchen and the pantry, we could create a more open and spacious layout, with a center island. While this is a more contemporary plan, we wanted to ensure that the new kitchen didn't feel like it belonged to another house. For the past month, Skyline Fine Cabinets in Eugene have been building the cabinets, which have a traditional American face-frame construction, with 3/8" overlay doors and drawers. Meanwhile in Portland, our team were busy demolishing the existing kitchen, inserting a new beam where we removed the bearing wall, and coordinating the plumbing, electrical, sheetrock and floor tiling.

Yesterday marked an important milestone, when the cabinets arrived. Right now, it's like a game of 'Tetris' as all the pieces come together. Once the cabinets are in place, we can install the appliances, and the final measurements can be taken before cutting the stone for the countertops.

Cable Hill House at Night

Cable Hill House Update

We recently had the opportunity to go back to our Cable Hill House project, which was completed earlier in the year. Since then, the landscaping had a chance to bed in, and the exterior has been painted in its final color; a dark brown-grey that nicely contrasts with the natural grain of the wood screens.

The light fixture in the last image was built by Gene, one of the carpenters at DRW. The custom metalwork was crafted by Brian Creany of Flux Design.

For comparison, the house prior to our work:

Corbett-Terwilliger demo progress

The demolition on our Corbett-Terwilliger project is progressing nicely, and we're now at a stage where we can start adding to the house rather than taking away.

We have removed all the exterior siding and interior finishes, and are left with only the basement, first floor joists & wall framing, and second floor joists.

Foundations for the new porch at the front of the house. The metal rods are reinforcing bar for the concrete stem wall, which has yet to be poured.

The existing front door, still in place.

The existing basement will step down three feet here, into a new artists' studio, with a nine foot high ceiling and views out to the river.

The house sits on a site with incredible views down to the Willamette, which the new house will make the most of. These photos were taken from the location of the future living and dining rooms, which will open out on a large back porch. On a clear day, both Mt Hood and Mt Saint Helens will be visible from the porch.

View from the second floor.

Corbett-Terwilliger demo

Demolition has begun on the Corbett-Terwilliger remodel, which we blogged about just after we submitted it for permit. Demolition is a major part of this project, and involves removing the existing roof, siding, exterior deck, insulation, plaster, and interior fixtures, as well as electrical, plumbing and mechanical systems. It's also the first real chance to verify the assumptions about the existing structure that were made during the design process. Once the building is stripped down to studs, we can start with the new concrete work and framing.

McShane Studio article

The McShane studio is featured in the current issue of 1859 magazine as part of a feature on small outbuildings. The article can be found on the magazine's website, or on page 118 of the July/August 2012 issue. For more information, see the main page of our website, where it is listed under "Projects".