I Aint No Architect...

...but I did stay at a Red Roof Inn last night. Yeah, whatever.

Updates have been slow to come recently, which reflects the slow progress we've made. It's hard to believe, but people do have lives and important things they must tend do beyond working on my drawings. Additionally, I think we are becoming that nightmare client. Everyone who does custom work for others knows what I'm talking about -- the one where you just can't wait to get the project done because it's never going to be good enough. I don't think that's us, but...if the shoe fits... I do have some specific things in my mind's eye and so does Liane. We are very close.

To try to "help" I dropped a few lines on one of the old sketches, which was pretty much the first serious drawing we had.

As usual my lines gloss over a lot of details about how things will really fit together and work, but I liked how the garage fit in on it, and Liane liked the kitchen layout the best (although I wish we could have a bigger pantry). There have been a couple since then that I could have lived with, and I liked certain things about them better, but when Liane didn't like the kitchens on them it kind of blew them up. And in looking I realized there may be a way to do everything we want with the garage nestled up into the front of the house more. The big problem with that design had been the layout of the bathroom and trying to keep it all around 2400 square feet. Since then we've realized the 2400 number is not going to be attainable, so with that loosened there are other things we can do.

We'll see where it all goes.

It is difficult because not only do Liane and I not agree on everything, but we sometimes change our minds about the relative importance of various factors. So it is a bit of a moving target, and to some extent it changes depending on who you're listening to.

I wonder if anyone finds this humorous? I do. I am perfectly willing to step back and see how nutty we are at times. And that's the idea of the blog.

Patience of a Saint

We got some more ideas and drafts from Nicole the other day. Much of it was based on the last round of changes and input from us after stewing over the last drawing. We're still unsettled on the kitchen layout, master bath (though we're very close there, I think...), and the whole garage, laundry room, half bath area.

We talked to her today based on these drawings, and at one point I recall words being uttered that both annoy and amuse everyone I've known who's been in the business of creatively designing things, whether that's building projects or mixing records. Yes, at one point Liane actually said (in regards to an aspect of the kitchen) she wanted to go back to where we were on the first (serious) drawing. AAAAAAHHHHHHH! And Nicole, to her credit, didn't even blink. Well, maybe she did. This conversation was over the phone. Now that I think about it her eyes could have rolled out of her head, but if they did we didn't know. This kind of thing used to drive me nuts mixing records. Once the recording was complete I'd always start the mixing phase alone, spending time to clean everything up and get organized. I'd get the mix to a reasonably complete and good state, then I'd bring in the artist, which usually resulted in spending days zeroing in on the little details that would be in their mind's ear. And after two or three days of this they would sometimes declare that it sounded better when they first arrived. ARGH. Of course I agreed, because when they first arrived it was my mix and all my ideas we'd be listening to without their influence mucking it all up. Nowadays, with computers, it's pretty easy to get back there, but in the old days it was almost impossible to get all the way back.

So I laughed on the inside when Liane said that. Poor Nicole. She really has the patience of a saint.

For those who are following along here is a brief tour of the drawing updates.

This is a partial front elevation drawing. Not much detail yet. She's just trying to get a feel from us what we like. Of course the right half of the house is still up in the air so she (wisely) hasn't tackled it yet.

Rear elevation. This drawing, more than any other one I've seen, really starts to show how over the top it is. Holy cow. No, we don't really need this much room, but when we plug in our various wants and desires this is what we end up with. What can I say?

This is the upstairs loft area. Assuming we even do this at all, not much of the upstairs will be finished. Most of it will be storage; space that can be constructed and turned into living space later if anyone wants to. Part of my reasoning for even having an upstairs is to make the front facade look more stately. Imagine that front elevation drawing without the upper window and a lower roofline. The other big reason is that the upstairs area should provide a much better view of the lake at the back of the property...although I'm now gathering that the windows on the back of the house may not be high enough to allow this. Hmmm...I'll have to think about that.

New revision of garage area, with changes to laundry room, half bath, and master bath. Still not quite settled on this. I am deeply concerned about how far the garage sticks out in front of the house. At this point this is probably the only thing about the design that is "bugging" me. Other concerns are minor and I think can be dealt with pretty easily. Liane isn't bothered by it at all so this one is entirely my hang-up. We're going to try swapping the two car bay with the one car bay, and making a few other changes to see if we can push it back a little more. The master bath has been reworked again, and we like it even better. In this design the tub and shower would share a raised platform, not unlike the one we saw at the Parade of Homes. This alleviates the problem of having to have the bathroom share the same slab as the garage because of my no-step up or over anything criteria.

Kitchen variation. It turns out Liane couldn't get comfortable with how far the sink/dishwasher area protruded into the space in front of the dinette as it was in the last drawing. I liked it a lot, but she just couldn't get her head around it. So this is a variation that minimizes it some. We'd probably still have to make some changes to this, mainly because we can't see the oven/microwave area not having a counter next to it. Maybe swap fridge and ovens. Not sure. This drawing shows what I think is the winning idea for the master closet. We had to give up on the island, but I think I'll like this peninsula better in the long run.

Kitchen variation #2. Liane and I got the idea of putting the dishwasher at an angle from the sink at the Parade of Homes. Don't think it's going to work for us though. I think it causes more of an egress problem than the straight design did. This drawing shows the first idea for the master closet peninsula idea. We like the other one better though.

This is one of two basement ideas worked up (the other is nearly the same). Hard for me to even think about this while the upstairs is still in flux, and who knows how much of it we'd be able to afford to finish anyway. You'll notice the studio is carefully positioned under the spare bedroom upstairs, which should minimize sound transmission issues. That drives the position of the main TV to the opposite wall. My idea is to be able to see it through the studio doorway. Most of my best work on the computer is done with a sporting event on TV. The rest of the layout is pretty much in flux right now. The doors at the bottom of the steps may seem weird, and we probably do need to rework that area, but Liane and I agree that for the sake of sound transmission we want to be able to close the basement off from upstairs.

If we do end up with the master shower and tub on a platform together it means the retaining wall can be moved/simplified accordingly. So in this drawing it would move up to follow the contour of the garage, which will mean less backfill of dirt needed to support it, and should save a little money.

The ball is in our court. We've given Nicole our input on the kitchen and laundry/garage areas. But she wants more input on the basement so she can tackle it all at once. We need to sit down and think through that part a little more.

Whew, this is seriously hard work folks. Big, big decisions that we know we'll have to live with for a long time.