Tag Archives for design

One Step Closer

We have a big chunk of messy indoor work to do here at the Hammershack before we can close that pesky permit we opened in 2014. The upstairs bath and laundry and hall will undoubtedly take many months and a good chunk of moola to complete, and though we have made progress on our design concepts and clearing the way by getting rid of large objects, we just are not quite ready to dive in.

There are a few smaller and more immediately achievable pieces we can peel off in the meantime, and last week Morgan finished these beautiful steel and gravel stairs connecting our front door to the upper driveway.

So elemental- steel, stone, gravel.
The slippery slope of before, and process

It took 4.5 yards of gravel to fill, much of which I shoveled- oof, rocks are heavy, y’all. That said, I was very glad to contribute what I could after Morgan did all of the truly hard work.

Not shown- the step lights that pop on when you approach, and the sweet little under-boulder lights that he’s been playing with. You’ll have to come visit to see those!

Next up- handrails? Stay tuned…

The Plan

I have been holding back on publishing the Plan. We have been through so many dramatic changes with our plan that it didn’t feel right to put them out there officially until they were official. We are submitting the whole package with corrections today to the DPD, and (please, oh please!) I believe that this is what we will be permitting. Hopefully very soon.

Here are the Elevations, showing our basement as the new entry level on the west with a wall of glass on the south side facing the yard. The Floor Plan shows the new floor as a big room that encompasses living, dining, kitchen, and craft area, with a powder room under the new stairs. Upstairs you can see the original layout on the left, and that what is now the kitchen will become a bathroom with laundry, the current bathroom becomes the hallway connecting to the new stairs and back door, and the living room becomes a new bedroom. If I can convince Morgan to give up the little porch, it is supposed to become a closet for that bedroom.

Less evident on the plans are the new storage shed attached to the garage/shop and the replacement decking that goes with it. We realized at some last-minute point that it would have to be added to the plan because we wouldn’t have anywhere to put our bikes or yard tools unless we did. That added time and hassle to the plan, including invoking a drainage plan that is a real pain in the butt.

This plan has untold hours of work behind it. We went from pie-in-the-sky to something more grounded to having to completely abandon that so we could work around our neighbor’s side sewer. I’m not even going to go into the neighbor thing on here, but despite all of the incredible frustration of that process I think it ultimately forced us to hone our plan to something more elegant we could maybe actually afford to do. Huge thanks go to Barbara Busetti for sticking with us through this endless process.

I like what we have come to, and I look forward to living in it!