Home Trends for 2011

Posted on March 4, 2011 by BeatingUpwind

I just got a promo e-mail from Marvin Windows and they did a survey of architects to figure out the home trends for 2011 – we’re actually doing quite a few of them…

#1 – New life for old materials

We’re repurposing the the non-rotten floor joists in our place and making them into a screen between the stairwell and the hallway. Other than recycling bricks from new openings when we close old openings (not really “new life”) we’re not doing much with old materials because we don’t have much in the way of old materials to work with. Unless you count the fact that we’re giving new life to an old shell…

#2 – Designing for yourself

This one we’re definitely doing. We’re doing 2 family instead of 3 because we want to use the back yard and we’d only have a roof deck if we did 3 family. And Dan’s getting two “bedrooms” for his art studio – which is a rather extravagant use of space in Manhattan. We’re also doing things like putting the kitchen in the front of the building (which isn’t very popular), because we like it that way… All in all we’re liking the fact that we’re working with a shell – we can do anything we want – there are no walls or staircases we have to work around.

#3 – Natural Materials

This is the one we’re not doing so much. Yeah, there will be wood floors, doors and windows. But that’s not all that out of the ordinary. The few places where we’re having solid wood doors are dictated by FDNY (they’re fire doors), and the all wood windows are dictated by historic preservation and budget (the aluminum clad windows were more expensive).

#4 – “Trad-Mod”

“Traditional-Modern” style sorta describes our aesthetic. We do mix traditional elements into a generally modern décor – but that’s nothing new for us.

#5 – Relaxed outdoor living

This is definitely a big thing for us. We wanted a garden – that’s one of the major points of getting a townhouse. Dan wants to be able to barbecue, etc. A roof deck just wouldn’t have been the same. We’ll have both – it’ll be interesting to see which we use more.

#6 – Energy efficiency & sustainability

We take a rather Republican view about energy efficiency and sustainability – we do it because it saves us money. Sure, we don’t want to kill polar bears, but honestly we don’t really care how “green” our renovation is. Recycled materials don’t save us money, but we will have great insulation, energy efficient windows, efficient zoned HVAC, dual-flush toilets, etc. So energy efficiency – yes. Sustainability – not so much.

Since we hit at least partially on all 6 trends, does that make us “trendy”? lol

How We’re Configuring Our Townhouse

Posted on September 10, 2010 by BeatingUpwind

I thought I’d share how we finally decided to (re)configure our townhouse… It’s a 5 story brownstone. We’ll have a 4 story owner’s quadraplex over a duplex rental unit (that has “accessory” space in the cellar)…

Starting at the top… There will be a roof deck on the rear of the building. We only learned after buying the building that we had views of the midtown skyline (off in the distance). Mind you, climbing up all those stairs to get there won’t be a lot of fun, which means we’ll need some sorta buzzer system for the front door. We’ll eventually mount a retractable awning on the bulkhead for shade. We opted for bulkhead windows instead of a skylight because they let in more light in the winter and less in the summer.

There is some dispute on the proper width of the bulkhead. The architect has a 3 foot passage to the side of it, the plan examiner says it’s a “side yard” and should have an 8 foot passage OR be the entire width of the building with a ladder over it. The architect noted that if he encloses the walkway it becomes interior space and 3 feet is appropriate. We’re still trying to figure out which solution we want to go with.

The next floor down, the 4th floor of our unit (8-9′ ceilings), will be art studio space for Dan. He’ll have a clean studio / office in the front of the building, and a dirty studio in the rear of the building. The small utility room in the middle will be his wet area. The floors in all his studio space will be commercial grade vinyl flooring (inexpensive and practical). There will be clerestory windows letting lighting from the stairwell into the front room (which is on the North side of the building). We’ve configured it in a way where the next owner could turn the utility room into a bathroom and then have two additional bedrooms / playrooms, etc.

The 3rd floor of our unit (9′ ceilings) will have the master bedroom in the rear and a spare room in the front. The spare room will most likely be a den / exercise room – have a treadmill, a couch and a TV. Like the clean studio above it, the den will have clerestory windows letting in light from the stairwell. We wanted the bedrooms in the back since the back of the building should be quieter.

The 2nd floor of our unit (one floor up from parlor, 10′ ceilings) will have the spare bedroom in the back and a home office in the front. Having the office in the front achieves two goals… First, the office isn’t noise sensitive, so it’s on the noisy side of the building. And second, it’s used during the day, so air conditioning bills will be lower since there’s far less heat gain on the North side of the building. (We’re using a mini split ductless system where each room is a separate zone). On this floor, attached to the bathroom is the laundry room. Having been in apartments for the past 20 years, we can’t wait to have a washer/dryer in our unit! Oddly it’s one of the things we are most looking forward to.

Our original plans had the 2nd and 3rd floor swapped, then we realized that we’ll be going up and down stairs to the office a lot more than we would be going up and down to the master bedroom, so we put the master bedroom up higher and the office down lower. Swapping the floors also lets us have a laundry chute from the master bedroom closet directly into the laundry room. We’re going to love that feature!

The parlor floor (10.5′ ceilings) will have the living room, dining room and kitchen. This is where we had to get a special reconsideration to have an open floor plan since code would otherwise require having 1 hour fire rated walls around the staircase and from the staircase to the front door. I know some people hate having front doors open into kitchens, but we saw so many narrow unusable living rooms that we decided to put the living room in the rear where it could be more spacious. But it does mean that the kitchen design needs to be pretty flawless since it will be people’s first impression of the house. One thing we have noticed is that the living/dining/kitchen space is nearly identical to our old apartment. This is a 15′ wide townhouse – we may have 6 bedrooms, but some things are more on the modest side.

There will be a narrow 4′ wide deck with a pergola off the living room. We kept it narrow so the tenant’s window would still get plenty of sunlight, and we added the pergola (which we’ll have vines growing on) to give us some shade in the summer. Here’s a diagram showing how it will look…

Rear deck with pergola on Harlem Townhouse

From the beginning of our process we knew that we didn’t have the biggest townhouse and as a result our design choices were a bit limited. There just wasn’t the space (or budget) to be all that extravagant. Where we were a bit extravagant was with the staircase. It will have a 3′ x 6.5′ lightwell running down the middle of it that will help get light deeper into the core of the building. We’re also going with open risers to help let light bounce around. From the beginning I knew the stairs would be the dominant design element in the building. To that end our architect really stepped up and has given us an incredible staircase design. You can see a bit of it in this diagram…

Stair layout in a Harlem townhouse

Basically there will be swoopy translucent plastic (or fiberglass) panels that will be attached to simple metal framing. Because it’s reducing metal work it should be a fairly economical solution. It’s also changeable. I had thought the staircase would permanently define the space, but because the panels can be redesigned and executed in different materials, there’s nothing permanent about it. Not shown in the diagram is the architect’s solution for the “railing” along the hallway. We’ll be taking the existing floor joists cutting them down into thin strips and creating a “screen” (wall) with vertical strips of old floor joists. That will be our version of “original details” and should look pretty incredible if we get the right balance of colors and textures in the space.

Continuing down the building… The rental unit will have smaller rooms that are still a decen size (i.e. the bedroom will be 175 sq. ft. and the living/dining room 260 sq. ft.). We’ll be putting in a decent Ikea kitchen (not bare bones, but still Ikea). One of the things we’re debating currently is the appropriate level of security for the rental unit. Our options are metal gates/bars on the doors/windows -or- laminated security glass with a security break sensors in lieu of gates/bars. Gates and bars will feel more secure, but it may seem like you’re in a prison.

The rental will be a bit of a duplex. I say “bit of” because it incorporates cellar space which can’t legally be a bedroom. It can be a media room, a workspace for an artist or craftsman, or a home office. Because that’s the south-facing wall, there should be plenty of light down there so it won’t feel too much like being in a cellar. What this means is is that it’ll be far more than a 1 bedroom, but not really a two bedroom. The tenant will also have their own laundry room in the cellar.

The cellar will also have the mechanical room and storage space for us. There’s this incredible arched brick ceiling in the “vault” under the “front yard” which we’ll be repairing/restoring. This townhouse is rather unusual in that it has a separate entrance for the cellar under the stoop, so we don’t have to go through the tenant’s space to get to the cellar.

In terms of utilities we’ll only be providing heat for the tenant. We’re separating all the other utilities – gas, electric, even water. Given how the boiler will work if we were to put in separate heating for the tenant the heating system wouldn’t run at optimal efficiency. So it won’t cost that much more to give the tenant heat. We don’t want to have the typical over heated New York apartment. Instead, we’ll keep it at a temperature where we’re comfortable in a light sweater but not so cool that our hands get cold. That will be lower than the minimum heat required by NYC, so the A/C units in the rental unit will be “mini PTAC” thru-wall units which can also provide supplemental heat as needed to keep the tenant comfortable. That means we’ll need to have the tenant sign something saying they understand they aren’t getting full heat for their unit.

I know Julia Angwin had mentioned on her blog at the Wall Street Journal that she had a tough time trying to figure out if she still wanted telephone jacks. Our strategy for voice and data is fairly aggressive, but also a bit conservative. Half of the closet in our home office will be a mini “server room” complete with rack mounted servers, cool air intake and warm air exhaust. (Dan and I do web projects for a living – we need all that sorta stuff). All voice, data and security will “home run” to that closet. We’re assuming we’ll continue to have a Vonage VoIP system, so we see won’t have a dedicated phone line coming into the building. Other than in the server closet there will be only two voice jacks – one in the office for the fax machine and one in the living room for a phone. We’ll also have Ethernet jacks throughout the house even though wireless will be our main form of connectivity. Primarily we’re putting Ethernet jacks next to cable TV jacks because we believe video and entertainment over the Internet will be common in the near future and the video/entertainment boxes may not support wireless. The Ethernet jacks will also be used for wireless routers – we assume we’ll need several to properly cover the entire house.

There’s a lot more detail I could go into, but that covers the basics… It’ll be fun to see it all come together…

Eggersmann Gives Lower Price Option For Kitchen

Posted on September 5, 2010 by BeatingUpwind

A while back we discovered Eggersmann at the A&D building and really liked them. In fact we liked them better than Poliform which is saying a lot – our last kitchen was by Poliform and Poliform’s sense of design resonates with us, but Eggersman is even better (in our opinion). When we first talked to them, Eggersmann was nice enough to mock up a kitchen for our space and quote us a price, but the price didn’t really work with our budget.

Well, months passed and then someone at Eggersmann found my previous blog post mentioning them. They contacted us and asked if we had made a choice yet. Thanks to problems with DOB, we hadn’t. They noticed that I had mentioned that their last price was too high, and offered to design a lower cost kitchen. Our kitchen design and layout had changed somewhat since their last proposal. The biggest change was moving the coat closet further into the building – across from the stairs rather than across from the kitchen. The other change was getting rid of the upper cabinets and taking the cabinets at each end to the ceiling (which is 10.5′ tall). The net result was a 1/3rd savings in cost. We need to see where the other numbers come in, but we’re thinking we just might be able to afford an Eggersmann kitchen, which is quite exciting…

Dan and I had gone through several rounds of kitchen designs but hadn’t been 100% happy with anything we came up with. Many of the designs reminded us of our last kitchen and we really wanted this one to be different. Finally I proposed a layout one day and Dan liked it. That’s the layout Eggersmann laid out (and improved slightly). Here are some 3D renderings Eggersmann did for us…

3D Rendering of Harlem brownstone kitchen

Instead of having coat closets across from the kitchen, we’re going to have a bench where people can sit and talk. This will essentially be the view from the bench. The door to the right is the front door. The upper panels in that door will be glass. The column to the left will house a Sub Zero 736 TCI fridge. At over $6,000 it’s our one huge extravagance in the kitchen, but we loved the 700 TCI we had in our last kitchen… The shelves in the center island will be used for wine and cookbooks. Dog leashes and the like will go in the cabinets below.

3D Rendering of Harlem brownstone kitchen

This shows a few of the details more clearly. We’re envisioning Corian (white) counter tops, a stainless back splash. The range is a compromise. We’re going with a 30″ Electrolux when Dan would really love a 36″ Wolf, but it costs nearly $4,000 more. The range hood was one of our challenges. The shape of it will probably be a bit different than what you see, but luckily we can exhaust directly out the wall, so no chimney is needed. We’re also thinking of put lighting on the top of the shelf as well as the bottom so the wall isn’t so dark.

3D Rendering of Harlem brownstone kitchen

Seen from a different perspective… The wall to the right will be exposed brick, and the front doors will have glass in the top panels. The window looks huge as it is, but looking at it now I realize it wasn’t drawn big enough. It’s 4 feet wide, 7 1/2 feet tall, so it will be another foot higher (at least). It won’t be one huge piece of glass. Instead it will look a bit like a french door (two vertical casement windows).

3D Rendering of Harlem brownstone kitchen

This last one shows how we’re hiding the microwave in a nook with additional cabinets. Up by the ceiling, above the cabinets, will be the A/C. We’re going with a “mini-spit ductless” system and that location gives us a nice place to hide the unit. (Not going with concealed units is another budgetary concession). The large wall will be exposed brick, so while the cabinets will be white / off-white, there will be plenty of color and warmth in the kitchen.

The other thing I’ve realized looking at these renderings is that the radiator we were going to put under the window will conflict with opening the cabinets. Dan and I are debating where the radiator should go.

So we’re crossing our fingers hoping we can get the Eggersmann kitchen. It’ll be really wonderful. Their sense of design is really special and their fit and finish is incredible.

NYC DOB Rejects Our Plans For No Good Reason

Posted on June 7, 2010 by BeatingUpwind

Well, today was plan review day and we got rejected, AGAIN. The reasons this time were just bizarre…

The first thing that was rejected was the energy review. Our architect did this complex analysis using a web-based program provided by the federal government where you enter all the characteristics of the building including wall types, window types, light fixtures, etc. and it confirms compliance with the 2010 standards that are in effect for New York State. But the plan examiner rejected it because NYC is still on 2007 energy standards and the 2010 standards aren’t being phased in until later this year. They literally told us to come back in 24 days, on July 1, since they’ll accept our architect’s energy analysis on that date. So we got rejected for showing compliance with a more demanding standard that they’re going to use in less than a month. Go figure.

Second major item was the sprinkler system (again). This time the plan examiner wanted documentation that there was sufficient pressure in the water main to support the sprinklers being on the domestic water supply despite the fact that the code specifically states that sprinkler systems with 30 or fewer heads can feed off the domestic water supply. He also wanted all the pipe sizes and sprinkler heads specified, but that’s typically done when the sprinkler system is certified – it doesn’t need to be done at this point and requiring it now is just being difficult.

The biggest issue that he raised is that he’s insisting we do a pressure test on the water main to do the calculations to determine the sizes of pipes that are required for the sprinkler system. It takes 4 to 6 weeks to get DEP to do a flow test, so that means we can’t go in for a plan review until that’s done. Again, the flow test is typically done after DOB approves the overall plan – he’s just being obstructionist IMHO.

At one point the plan examiner insisted that we needed 2 hour fire rated walls around the stairwell, not 1 hour walls. Our expediter stuck to his guns and then it took the plan examiner 10 minutes of searching the code to realize we were right and he was wrong. Why do they have people doing plan exams who don’t know the code? If the code is just horribly complicated then why not have plan examiners specialize in certain building types? If we had someone who really knew the code issues for townhouses then maybe they’d know the code well enough to do their job properly.

Then the plan examiner was telling our expediter that he saw errors in the “I-Cards” for the building. I-Cards were the predecessor to Certificates of Occupancy, which came out in 1938. So in other words, he was holding us responsible for errors previous building owners made dating back to 1938 or before. I mean please… The whole point of our rehabbing the building is to bring it up to code and get a C of O. How can inaccuracies on the old I-Cards matter when the point of the exercise is to make them obsolete by getting a C of O?

Next time Dan and I will go to the plan review to prove the point that we’re not some nefarious slumlord trying to build a crappy substandard building. We’re just regular guys. Plus, with the enormous workload that DOB is under right now I just don’t understand how it’s productive for them to keep having us come back over and over again for stupid little things.

Now imagine if we were trying to purchase the place with a rehab loan and needed to get approved plans to close the loan. Obstructions like this can really hamper redevelopment of blighted buildings – for no good reason because they can tank deals. And it’s the reason why it can take FOREVER to close when the buyer needs financing to purchase. I’m sure more than a few deals have gone bad because DOB took too long and the contracts expired.

The Kitchen Starts To Take Shape…

Posted on April 7, 2010 by BeatingUpwind

Early last week we went to Ikea in Paramus. We were having fantasies that we’d like high end of Ikea well enough to live with it for 5-10 years before we replaced it with what we really wanted – a high-end European modular system. But we didn’t see any Ikea kitchens we’d want to live with (we should have known that would be the case). We did find a great one for the rental unit, but nothing for us. On the way home from there we were driving past Poggenpohl so we stopped in. We know we can’t afford a high end modular Euorpean kitchen, but we wondered if we could afford a basic one. All the stuff we liked at Poggenpohl was at the upper end of their price range and the rest of it didn’t really resonate with us.

On Good Friday we headed over to the A&D building to do two things – 1) try to get inspiration and ideas for what we can and should be doing in terms of finishing details, and 2) to understand the price points. We started at Poliform since our old kitchen had been a Poliform kitchen. The Poliform showroom is now massive – takes up a whole floor – but everything was being ripped out and redone in preparation for a May relaunch of their showroom just before ICFF. Long story short Poliform blew us off and told us a few days later that they weren’t going to bother to do a proposal for us because they expected prices to fluctuate before we would be buying (a completely lame excuse, IMHO).

We stopped at a number of other kitchen places but our favorite was Eggersmann – a German company that’s only just started selling in the US. Their stuff was INCREDIBLE (take a look at their website), and the sales person who was helping us was not only nice and helpful, but she also knew her product backwards and forwards and so she was extremely informative. And kudos to them for being the first ones to get back to us with a proposal. And the proposal wasn’t just a sales sheet – there was a whole 3D mockup… These guys are GOOD!

Here’s what they came up with – realize this is just a first draft…

The ceiling height is wrong – it’s 10 1/2 feet and they don’t show the stairs and the doors will have glass panels in them, but it’s great first shot…

As they should, the renderings got us wondering about the layout of our kitchen. For starters, notice the similarity of the layout with our old kitchen…

Both have a tall vertical (the fridge) to the left, then the range in the center and the sink off to the left. As much as we loved our old kitchen, we want something new… To that end we’re thinking the sink or possibly a cooktop could go in the island to change things up.

The first rendering also made us realize that we don’t really want the closet right inside the front door. It makes the space too narrow. So we’re going to move it down where it’s opposite the stairs and then put a long bench across from the kitchen and narrow the island and remove the stools. That will give a wider walkway with a lot more shoulder room, but we’ll still have a place to sit to put on and take off our shoes and a place guests can hang out while Dan’s making dinner.

Unfortunately, while we love Eggersmann, we may not be able to afford them. The price they came back with was double what we paid for our Poliform kitchen 5 years ago. Even if we cut back on how much they do (not do the entry closet, etc.) their price may still not fit into our budget – we’ll see… But if you’re doing a renovation and like a modernist aesthetic, we highly recommend them – their stuff is possibly the best we’ve seen.

We’re also having Siematic spec a “lower end” kitchen (by their standards). If that doesn’t come in at a price we can afford and we can’t afford Eggermann then we’ll probably give up doing a European modular system and go with a “custom kitchen”. The problem is local craftsman don’t have the same abilities as the European factories. That means we have to be careful to design the kitchen in a way they can execute properly. That’s a lot more work for us, but it is what it is…