GatesStudio

Indian Summer,

2010-11-06T10:17:00.000-07:00

We are fortunate to be having a beautiful Fall here in the Pacific Northwest, the leaves are turning, the days seem to be getting a little shorter but the sun has just kept shining. The Indian summer has let us paint the house in what should be the beginning of the rainy season. I’m happy to say that the guys just wrapped up today. They did a great job and I’m very pleased to see the house with a fresh coat of paint, they applied a first coat primer to all the bare wood areas then they applied two coats of paint to the entire house and trim. We used Benjamin Moore Paint they have a line called Ben, which is a premium paint that applies thick for great coverage and further has excellent color retention which is a concern whenever you paint with rich, saturated or dark colors. We love our color palette, which I know is not for everyone, but we wanted to do something that was distinctive. Our palette came from observations of reseeding landscapes and I think we were able to accomplish that in the color scheme. The field color is a very rich grey which picks up cues of blue and green depending on light conditions. The trim is a lighter tonal step that highlights the craftsman woodwork and detail without being too cookie cutter. We wanted the house to reseed and look forward to planting the landscape around the house to bring out some color. Check out the pictures.

go painters go and the salvaged tub

2010-10-26T18:36:00.000-07:00

D’ Painting has begun work at our house and it is very exciting. Zan and I focused on the surface prep of the siding but we both felt uncomfortable up at heights scraping the undersides of the soffits. But the guys have no hesitation, hanging off the ladders backwards the guys went after the last of the chipping paint. They have put in two days of prep work and have primed the west façade and garage, scraped much of the 2nd level dormer, started to fill nail holes and calked all of the joints between the door and window trim and the siding. We’re in a holding pattern as a storm blew in this weekend but we have our fingers crossed and hope for some fair weather this week so that progress can continue.
Having the painters take over the exterior, freed me up to work on the master bath. After fighting with the 300 lb beast that is our tub I am happy to say that I installed the claw foot tub trim. The hardest part was the tubs drain and over flow but after setting the trap adaptor below the finish tile, easier said than done, the tub drain was straight forward. The claw foot trim was much like a Lego box of parts but easily erected following the straightforward instructions. The shower looks great and we love having a master bath. We thoroughly tested it this weekend taking many showers. The shower head provides great pressure and feels amazing. We still need to resolve the master sink as we do not like the Ikea cabinet that we purchased. It just is too modern and does not go with the hex tile and claw foot tub. Further, the Duravat sink that we found as salvage from the rebuilding center has a crack in it that we fear will only grow as water works its way into it. I think I just going to build a custom cabinet. Off to Mr. Plywood were I hope to get the plywood for the kitchen carcasses. More to come, check out pictures below.

The house in her birthday suit.

2010-10-20T07:29:00.000-07:00

We started getting painting bids in mid august which is basically the height of the painting season here in Portland. All the painters that were highly recommended had more work than they could shake a stick at and were therefore passing along astronomical bids to paint our house. In addition, new EPA regulations state that house built before 1975 are assumed to be painted with lead base paint and there for extra precautions must be taken by the painter which again means more cost to us. We seemed to uncover a very expensive problem when we removed the vinyl siding. The north and east elevations, the ones with less direct sun and predominant weather where actually in good shape, there are a few minor touch ups but the bulk of the prep work was going to be in filling the nail and staple holes left from the vinyl siding. However, the west and the south elevations as well as the entire garage were in horrible shape. The paint was failing as it was delaminating from the wood. Zanna brother in law Alex Smith God bless him! Sent us a tool he had used to strip his own house when he recently painted. The tool, the paint shaver pro is basically a Makita grinder with an after market head attachment the turns the grinder into a portable planner made for siding. It has three carbide blades that removed paint from both the face as well as the under side of the clabbers. The tool has a built in dust extraction port and when hooked up to my HEPA vacuum meets the new EPA guidelines for controlled removal of lead based paint. The tool is amazing and is able to strip the siding of paint back to the bare wood. We focused on our problem areas the South and West elevations as well as the garage. It was a lot of work but was really satisfying to see the wood be brought back into shape. I further nailed off the loose siding and repaired or replaced the ones that were truly un repairable. Check out our progress. We were able to lower our paint bids by about 5000$ by doing this portion of prep work. This has brought the painting below our original budget which means we were able to hire a painter and hope to have the house painted in the coming weeks.

Summer Time

2010-10-17T07:57:00.000-07:00

I have taken a little break from the posts but want to get back into it. When I look back at the blog I realize that our last post was actually the day we moved in. I think for me the project became more personal once we moved in and the house really became our home. It is very different to see the house full of our belongings. We have made a lots of progress this summer so here’s an update.
Its been a great summer full of visits from family and friends, trips and weddings among it all we have made some progress with our renovation. Lisa’s visit was the great motivation to get us into the house and get a bathroom up and running. Andi and Rod came to visit and showed us the miracles of Windex and razor blades. The windows we had long wrote off as needing to be replaced were given new life with a little elbow grease and a whole lot of scraping. I have found the reflection from the nearly hundred year old wavy glass is one of my favorite attributes of this old bungalow. Zanna has even taken the shadows as a departure point for a new print pattern currently being developed.
Meanwhile in off hours we pulled all the nails and staples that littered the tight grain fir clabber siding. The siding that lay almost dormant beneath the vinyl was in great shape on the east and north faces, only scared by nails and staples holes used to install the haphazard vinyl. The south and west faces did show there years of exposure to the sun and is currently our primary project. More about our paint prep in the next post.
In addition, we have taken to tile work and have found it to be a beautiful finish. We also had a claw foot tub that we got tired of bumping into in the middle of our bed room so we have done a large push to get the master bathroom up and running. We laid cement board over the sub flooring and around the shower surround and used an paint on vapor barrier, much like the down stairs bathroom. Again we used the 1” hex tiles on the bathroom floor but this time we decide on a much darker grout for higher contrast with the small white tile. I also wanted to protect the walls around the tub/ shower so we decided to tile that with large 12 x 4-1/2” tiles; again we used an almost black grout to give the tile a high contrast finish.
I had salvaged a lot of random width knotty pine wall board and re-milled it to run as bead board around the bathroom. I capped the bead board with a vintage craftsman chair rail from Rejuvenation, a great local lighting, millwork and antiques store. Finally, we were able to get the claw foot tub out of our bedroom and it could live in its new home. The tub which we found second hand from the rebuilding center for a steal price had brass plated cast iron feet. We did not like the high gloss brass finish and used a brass ager to give the feet an older patina. Lastly, I set the toilet, a Flowise American Standard, which uses 1.28 gallons per flush as apposed to the typical 1.6 gallons which can save hundreds of gallons of water per year. We ordered the claw foot tub trim from Sunrise Specialty and hope to install it in the coming week.
In addition, I have become an amateur electrician and have built and wired all the houses lighting. We bought some beautiful fixtures for school house electric which is a Portland institution for period lighting but were shocked at how much fixtures and globes could be. So we hit the salvage stores and re-building center and were able to build the rest of the houses lights from old sconces, fixtures, wall mounts and globes. There is a local lighting supply store loving know to us as the light bulb lady who sells modern lighting parts. For the cost of a single school house globe we were able to outfit about twelve other complete fixtures.
One of our prerequisites when we were searching for a house was a place that would allow both of us to have studio space. We have converted the basement into Zanna’s Studio while my wood shop is out in the garage. Both the spaces are quite spacious and we have honed there layout to allow both of us to work at home while still having a true separation from our living space. I recently built zanna a second 4’ x 8’ print table which allows her to now print fabric yardage up to 16’. In my shop I was being inundated with salvaged wood and built a storage loft to clear the work space and provide more room.
Finally, the planning of our kitchen cabinetry is well underway and I have my cut sheet to build the first unit that will house the kitchen sink and dish washer, both additions will be welcomed by us as we are growing tired of busing our dishes down to the shop sink in the basement. Though our friend Rich told me he would surely do more dishes if he too had a garden hose to do them with. I’m excited to get going on the cabinetry but have been postponing while the weather has remained good. We have been prepping the house for painting and have focused on the truly beaten up walls, the south and west faces as well as our west facing 2nd level dormer and the garage. Our paint prep has been an arduous task and will go into it in further detail in the next post. Until then please see a slide show of our summer of family, friends and play and work. Thanks for checking back in.

Trunk Show

2010-07-27T23:48:00.000-07:00

I'm so happy for Zanna! Her trunk show opened today at modern domestic. Her stuff looked great in the space and it is so nice to show her work in a beautiful retail store. Wish her the best of luck and if your in Portland come in and see her show.

Modern Domestic
1408 NE Alberta St.
Portland, OR 97211

moderndomesticpdx.com

First post from the house!

2010-07-02T22:48:00.000-07:00

So we're in! Internet is up and this is the first post from the house. It has been crazy so sorry for the lack of updates, but here we go.
To get Zanna's studio space ready we wanted to white wash the walls and ceiling in the basement as well as paint the floor. We rented a paint sprayer because painting the joist cavities by hand would have been a nightmare and taken just too long. We sadly had to use an oil based primer because you can not paint over oil based paints with latex paint. You need to first apply an oil based primer, then you can paint with latex paints in the future. So we opened all the windows, put on our respirators and sprayed away. Again another project we a very happy with. By painting the walls and joist space white it greatly brightens the space. Now were ready to move all our stuff in to our clean storage n studio space.
We hired both a plumber and an electrician to do “ ruff in” electrical and plumbing which means that the water and electrical lines were run and angled out of the walls exactly where they need to be. However, for the past two days I have been doing the finish plumbing and electrical for the first floor bathroom and plugs and switches throughout the house. I have to say that I now have a new appreciation for plumbing. After fighting with a pee trap and the shower trim I am happy to say that we have a full working bathroom and it looks great. We also fired up the hot water heater yesterday and want to report we have running hot water. We're truly ready to move in, but now we have come to the point that we have been dreading for awhile; packing up and moving. I can’t wait to be in but I’m really not looking forward to moving… I hate moving. Check out the pictures.

Tiling

2010-06-27T08:45:00.000-07:00

Zan and I are moving into the house in the next week so we are working like crazy people over at the house. We are working hard to get a full working bathroom and have been tiling. This is our first tiling project but we have been doing great. We have laid our bathroom tiles over cement board with a vapor barrier applied to the surface. We used thin-set mortar to adhere the tiles to the cement board. The most difficult part of tiling are quantities estimation. The tiles are an expensive material so we did not want to buy a lot of tile that we would never use but we also needed enough for cut offs an mistakes. I did a cad drawing of the shower surround and was able to hone in on our quantities. We tiled the floor with 1” hex tiles and then the shower with 3” x 6” subway tiles. We are very happy with our tiling work and I can’t wait to test out the tub.

Refinish those old floors

2010-06-10T06:42:00.001-07:00

We just finished the floors the other day and wanted to show some images to share our progress. In my last post, I discussed our consideration of type of finish oil vs water. I am happy to say that we got a few samples of different products and tested them on off cuts of both the fir and oak flooring. This was very helpful because we could see that we were attracted to a more defined grain that resulted from the oil based products. However, we finally settled on an oil based sealer by Bona and a water bore urethane topcoat by Pullmann. I am so happy with the results and further very happy that we tested the finishes and did not simply pick a product because it was a marketed as green. See the images of our samples below. Zan and I worked together to spread the finishes. We first applied an oil based sealer which seals the wood and really brought out a beautiful grain. Then we applied two coats of the water based urethane. The application went really well, basically you work from the far extents of the house, in our case the two up stairs closets then work you way out; closet, bedroom, hallway, stairs, study, guest bedroom, kitchen, dinning room, living room and out. We let each of the three coats cure over night so all in all it took three days to apply the finish. We are really happy with the final product and learned a lot about refinishing old wood floors. See some images below. These were actually taken after the first top coat, which means the floors look even better now!

Sanding

2010-05-31T06:51:00.000-07:00

Only three more things to do before we can officially move in! The first and last truly messy step is the floors. We are spending this memorial day weekend sanding. I know not very fun but it has been exciting. In the last two days we have sanded the master bedroom, guest bedroom, living room, dining room and hallway. We still have a long day in front of us but I wanted to give a quick update and show our progress. It has brought so much life back to the house and has brightened each room and the house as a whole as we continue to go. We are doing three passes with a drum sander. The first at either a 20 or 36 grit, then a 60 grit, then finally 100. After which we use a buffer to screen the floor with a 150 grit screen. We are still up in the air what type of finish we will use. The big debate is Oil vs. Water based finishes. Oil tend to be more durable, last longer, but are more toxic to those applying the finish… us. Also they tend to yellow over time. But for old floors giving them a little honey color maybe not a bad thing? Water based finishes are not a durable, tend to be much less toxic having lower VOC’s than oil based finishes. VOC’s are volatile organic compounds and tend to describe the toxicity of a product. A lot of green products and verifications limit the use of VOC content in paints, solvents, thinners, stains and finishes. It begins to start an interesting debate. Do you use a green product that is better for the environment and the workers applying the finish if it compromises durability? We are doing our research and home work and I would love people to weight in if they have any recommendations of specific finishes that you have used and like? Check out our progress.

Priming and Patching

2010-05-31T06:15:00.001-07:00

Sorry it has been so long since my last post, we have been very busy. We are currently sanding the floors, ( more in our next post) but wanted to give a little description of all our prep work that has prepared the house to sand the floors.
Before Simon did his last pass with drywall compound, he suggested that we prime the walls since a white wall will show imperfections much more than raw drywall. Zanna did a prime coat and in some cases two coats for the entire first and second floor. It was truly amazing what a coat of paint has done for the house. It really makes the spaces feel finished and the whole house additionally feel cleaner. Also, Zanna has started priming and puttying the trim and window sills bring new life to some of the old woodwork. While Zan has been focused on the walls I have started to patch the floors.
There were large holes in the hardwood flooring where the existing chimney came through the kitchen and master bedroom, also there were places to patch where there used to be old floor registers that are no longer in use. Finally we gouged the floor quite a few times when we were removing the old mastic compound that held down the old synthetic tile flooring in the kitchen. We have two types of flooring in our house; white oak in the living room, dining room, hallway and master bedroom and red fir in the kitchen, bedroom and study on the first floor. To patch the oak we pull up the existing boards from the new master bath where we plan to place tile. This has given us plenty of stock for repairs. However, to repair the kitchen I had to find some red fir that would match the existing wood in the house. I found a guy in Scappoose, Oregon that is a hardwood salvager that has a couple warehouses full of old reclaimed flooring. He is a very eccentric guy and was able to provide old fir at a very affordable price. Patching the flooring is quite labor intensive but proved to be not so difficult. It is quite uncomfortable working on your hands and knees for days on end. In any event I have to say I’m a pretty good wood worker and the patches look good. Please see the pictures below.

Hot mud and rock

2010-05-04T20:53:00.000-07:00

Dry wall
We are not slowing down, lots to do before zans family shows up next weekend. We had a cover inspection a few days ago which allowed up to cover the exposed walls, hence electrical, plumbing, framing and finally insulation were done and inspected to code. We are working with wily ol Simon from oz and cranking out the dry wall. It is so nice to see it all covered and clean. Simon is taping the gyp board and skim coating the existing lath and plaster walls to give us a nice smooth finish through out. I have been working at laying the cement board on the floors of all the bath rooms and on the walls of the shower on level 1 around the tub on level 2. Also, I though it would be a good idea to use it for the first three feet of the basement bathroom; incase the basement ever gets wet as such things happen here in the pacific nw. A while back Zan and I had been discussing how to handle the ceiling of the living room. When we removed the existing acoustical tiles, what remained were glue globs or cow patties as we describe them. With great effort we found them very difficult to come off. Further, there were long cracks in the existing plaster where the wall of the master bedroom sits above. We decided to put up new ½” ceiling board all the way around leaving a 5” reveal were the ceiling steps up to meet the original crown molding. We were afraid to pull the molding and break it so we settled on this solution. It looks great! I still had to heat gun and scrape the cow patties off all the way around the perimeter but it was a lot better than doing the whole thing just to have massive cracks in the ceiling. We are very happy with how it turned out. Check out all the pictures. Its amazing to see the spaces change.

insulation

2010-05-04T19:18:00.001-07:00

Insulation
Adding insulation was required for any place that we exposed the exterior wall studs. We knew we were adding batt insulation to the kitchen, level one bath, stairwell, master bedroom and bath. We worked with a company called All Weather Home, who specializes in insulation. On the 2x4 stud walls we used R-15, on the back sides of the closets and the stairwell hallway, we had greater depth and we able to used R-21. On the level two ceiling we used R-38 expect on the vaulted areas we used a ridged board that gave us an R-20. For all the batt insulation we used a product called EcoBatt. Ecobatt is, “Based on rapidly renewable bio-based materials rather than non-renewable petroleum-based chemicals commonly used in other insulation products, ECOSE Technology reduces binder embodied energy by up to 70%, and does not contain phenol, formaldehyde, acrylics or artificial colors used to make traditional fiberglass insulation. EcoBatt Insulation combines sand, one of the world’s most abundant and renewable resources, post-consumer recycled bottle glass and ECOSE binder. Insulation saves 12 times more energy the first year in use than it takes to manufacture it—and it continues to save that much each year from then on.” We are so happy to tighten this old and cold house up. In addition, to the exposed areas were we could easily install batt insulation. We also pulled selected boards of the exterior siding to blow in fill the living and dinning room, guest bed room as well as the study. We did this because we are maintaining the existing lath and plaster in these rooms. The blow in insulation is finely shredded paper that is packed by its own weight. We also blew the floors above the living room and above the closets to provide a continues thermal envelop that acts as a jacket between the inside and the exterior. Check out the pictures below.

The oil tank.

2010-04-21T21:41:00.000-07:00

Zan’s been working on these photomontages of the back yard. I think they look great but we need lots of landscaping help. Calling all gardeners, Any suggestions! Before we can start landscaping we need to decommission the oil tank. We dug down to expose the oil tank today and cut a small hole it. We hired an oil recycling company to come pump out the tank. We had approximately 90 gallons of oil in the tank which was pumped out. Next, we cleaned the tank by the triple rinse process in which we basically spayed the insides of the tank with water and dish soap and pumped it out. This was repeated three times, after which the tank is sufficiently cleaned and now we can fill it with sand to finalize the decommissioning process. More pictures to come when we fill the tank and further as we begin to lay our new terrace. I’m also working on cleaning out the garage as I move to make it a functioning wood shop. We salvaged a ton of wood throughout our demo process and I starting sorting it today.

The Header Goes Up.

2010-04-08T19:18:00.000-07:00

Today was a fun day over at the house. Connecting the existing kitchen to the sun room by taking out a separating wall has been a project that Zanna and I have wanted to do since day one. However, since the separating wall was load bearing we had to make a few structural improvements to be able to remove the wall. We hired an engineer to help calculate the beam size and provide structural calculations and details for our permit drawings. The seemingly simple removal of the wall was in fact quite complex because the engineer specified that a post be placed on a new footing in the basement to support the span above. This footing will help transfer the load of the second level all the way down to the basement floor. Further, the footing had to be inspected prior to pouring the concrete which added an additional hoop to jump though. We called for our first inspections last week which included the footing. In addition, we also had our ruff-in plumbing and HVAC inspected, all of which passed. After the inspection we were allowed to pour the footing. While the concrete was setting up, I built temporary walls on either side of the header to support the floor joists of the second level. This was important because if we did not support the floor above, when we removed the load bearing wall our bedroom would have came crashing down into our kitchen. After two days the concrete had cured and we could proceed with the removal of the bearing wall. After all this preparation, our friend TJ came over to help with the finally installation of the header beam. We tore out the existing baring wall, cut back the joists, and inserted the header. It was very satisfying to see the space change so dramatically. It was a great day. See the pictures below.

We have Permits!

2010-03-31T16:46:00.000-07:00

It has been a little while since I last wrote and we have two major items to report. First of all, we have running water and a toilet! Yeah! Zanna doesn’t have to use the honey bucket anymore. Our only problem is that we don’t have walls around that bathroom, but anyhow these are just semantics. Atlas our plumbers have finished the ruff in and are drains are filled to the roof on test to insure the entire system is sealed tight. We are ready for both the mechanical and plumbing inspections but until today we did not have any permits! I have been drawing like mad for the last few days and today we went down to the city building. I have filed for permits while working with Works Partnership Architects but I have never done the process completely from start to finish. I am happy to say that my drawings were review and accepted and that we now have building permits for our renovation! See my drawings below.

Raise the roof!

2010-03-25T20:41:00.000-07:00

Zanna and I have been busy over at the house in the last few days. Our big project has been to raise the collar ties that span the second level ceiling. The rafters were supporting the existing second level ceiling but were not doing a whole lot but making the space feel very boxy. The existing ceiling height was approximately eight feet high. We spoke with our structural engineer and he told use we could raise the collar ties eighteen inches if we reconnected the existing collar ties with structural screws. This has been very exciting because it has made such a difference for the space. Zanna and I are also very happy to finally be doing carpentry rather than demo! Check out the pics of our master bed room. We are also very excited that the plumbers have almost completed the ruff-in of the master bathroom and hope to come tomorrow to finish the ruff plumbing in the entire house. Check out Zanna sporting her tool belt up on a ladder! Also going on in the last few days; we built raised beds for a vegetable garden and got a soil delivery. We found a cool nursery called Boskey Dell Natives which only sell plants that are native and indigenous to Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. This is important because native plants require less maintenance and water as well as being geographically unique and beautiful. We picked up a few things and planted our first plants around the property. We got a flowering currant, two huckleberries, a trillium and a few ferns. Zanna is really excited to plan the garden and transform our backyard mud pit.

Zanna drives the Bobcat!

2010-03-19T07:18:00.000-07:00

Today we overcame another big obstacle! Up until this afternoon about 1/3 of our yard was a concrete slab that spanned from the house to the garage. There were many reasons why we wanted to rip up the slab but the main reason was to give us access to the buried oil tank below. This oil tank was left empty in the ground beneath the slab in our back yard. During the inspection phase, before we closed on the house, we got soil samples to assess the health of the tank. We confirmed that it was not full of oil and more importantly is not leaking into the ground. While after receiving such favorable soil samples Oregon department of environmental quality do not require us to do anything to the tank. However, in a progressive and environmentally conscience state like Oregon we were recommended to do due diligence and decommission the oil tank once and for all. Since such obligations may only change in the future we did not want to send time and money to build a small patio only to be required to dig it up before we potentially sell the house many years from now.
We first thought that we would have to rent a jackhammer for days on end and haul pieces of the slab to a dumpster. All that changed when we found out about a local company called The Wall which reuses old concrete slabs to build new retaining walls. They subsidize the hauling fees because it is basically free material for them! Further, this again diverts construction debris from the landfill. Randy and Ryan from The Wall came in with a bobcat (which Zanna and I both got to drive!) and tore out the slab in about 2 hours! It was pretty incredible to watch. And now we have all this open space to plan our gardens!
Oh yeah check out the master bedroom with out the chimney and Zanna christening the honey bucket!

Tear the roof off the Motha!

2010-03-16T21:57:00.000-07:00

The first of our major projects is complete! The roofers came and blazed the main house in one day. We did a complete tare off. The existing roof had three layers of built up roofing, two layers of asphalt shingles on top of the original cedar shingles. Once they ripped off the existing shingles to the skip sheathing; wooden board that run across the rafters, we sheathed the entire house with ½” ply wood. The roofers then laid down 15lb tar paper for waterproofing and a thirty year asphalt shingle. It was incredible to see them work. They also tore off and replaced all the gutters and down spouts as well as re-flashed the chimney and dormer. Finally, they installed three more solar tubes, one in the stair way and two in the master bedroom. Oh, by the way, thanks for all that commented on our design dilemma. We decided to keep the overhang as is and it looks way better re-roofed and with a clean new gutter. Its fun to see the house move forward, we have made great progress in the last few weeks. Yesterday, we met with a structural engineer to review our structural questions. Specifically, we want to put in an eight foot header to open and enlarge kitchen. He told us that it not a problem structurally and that he would provide us with calculations and a few details to give to the city. Today, the muffin man came and helped us take down the old oil chimney! Lots of work and lots of fun. See more pictures below.

Sun Tunnels n HVAC

2010-03-13T09:15:00.000-08:00

Sun Tunnels & HVAC

So people have been telling me they can’t scroll down. Its my fault as a poor web-designer please double click here. Know you should be able to scroll down.

Lots going on over at the house in the last few days. We have completed hiring our four major subcontractors. Salyers Construction rolled out Wednesday afternoon and in five hours they tore off and re-roofed the garage. The Northwest reared her ugly head and it has been raining hard for the last two days. As a result, they have not begun the main house but all their equipment, shingles and sheathing are on site and ready to go for the next burst of clear skies. Zanna and I decided to put small 14” dome skylights called Velux sun tunnels into the house to employ greater day lighting. We wanted two in the garage and in three in the main house. The two in the garage were installed and it is remarkable how much light they let in. We placed them on the northern pitch of the roof to get even constant ambient light throughout the day. We can’t wait to see the rest installed and the house with a new thirty-year roof!
When we bought the house everybody agreed that the bones were good, but the rest of it was pretty ruff. When It came to the houses organs, the HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) the electrical and the plumbing all were very old inefficient and out dated. We hired Bridgetown heating to relocated and install a new 95% efficient variable speed forced air gas furnace. The unit is energy star and qualifies for a tax incentive. As a design idea, Zanna and I wanted to open the floor plan of the basement and keep the as much head room as possible. We relocated the furnace and hot water heater to the south wall. This opened the space greatly as it removed all the equipment that was previously centered in the room. The only remaining feature is an old chimney for the original oil heater that we plan to take down. This will open space in the master bedroom, kitchen and finally the basement. We hope to be able to use the old brick to lay a terrace. Trying to keep these post brief so more about the electrical and plumbing to come.

Design Dilemma

2010-03-07T20:18:00.000-08:00

Eric and I see eye to eye on most things. Our designs sensibilities are very compatible and we work well off each other. However, we have run into our first design dispute. On the back side of the house there is a roof overhang that is original to the house. One of us feels that while it is original to the house, the overhang looks out of place against what could be a nice clean roofline. The other feels that it is an original detail, while quirky, should remain as is. While we disagree on what the actual roofline should look like, we both agree that the construction and detail of the supports are well done and an interesting original accent to the house. We have toyed with the idea of tearing the supports down and reinstalling them, adding a trellis instead. When it comes down to it we need outside advice and opinions. I ask all friends and family who are taking the time to check out our blog to give us your honest opinion on this design dilemma. Take a look at the pictures and let us know your thoughts, but post quick. We have to make these decisions quick before we get a new roof!

Also, check out the gatesstudio prototype for our deck chair and ongoing progress in the kitchen. Currently we are trying to restore the fir floors and were beginning to expose the old oil chimney which we plan to take out.

Making friends in high places

2010-03-04T07:58:00.000-08:00

Zan and I have been working hard on the demolition. One of our first major projects is to get a new roof on the house. However, before we can put a roof on we had to pull all the vinyl siding. This is because the roofers need to flash the roof to wall transitions of the large back dormer when they put on the new roof. We have had friends helping us. Our friend Atha proved to be a great ladder man, showing no fear maxing out our twenty foot extension ladder. However, the house has gables that are twenty five feet high and additionally the large back dormer is difficult and dangerous to get to. That’s where new friends come in. We have made friends with a young couple across the street. They have two young children - Brice age five and Stella age two - both are a lot of fun and have been playing with Maggie. Josh, their dad, is a commercial electrical contractor and has taken an interest in our project. I walked him through this afternoon and he offered to help pull down the old TV antenna - circa 1984 - off the roof with his Cherry Picker! I told him I didn’t care about the antenna but really needed help with reaching the back gable. Josh drives a ladder truck and pulled it around back where he let me use the cherry picker to remove the siding. It was so much fun! Way better than an extension ladder. We got all the siding off the dormer and I got to use a cherry picker. So cool! Josh later took some pictures looking out from his fifty foot perch of our house, the neighborhood and downtown. Check it out.

Today we found a window !

2010-02-28T19:50:00.000-08:00

Old houses have lots of surprises. Today we found a window! Last night we were looking at a picture of the outside of the house and both of us looked at each other and said, “where is that window?” The kitchen is one of our major projects in the house. We plan on taking out a wall to enlarge the kitchen with the existing pantry/sun room. On the North elevation we saw there were three windows in the sunroom but inside we only had noticed two. Sure enough they had paneled over the window! Why? We are not so sure but check it out. Here are some pictures of our demolition progress. Vinyl siding on its way down, acoustical panels are dropping, plastic laminate floors are up exposing the hard woods and we’re opening up the basement ceilings to exposed the plumbing and electrical. Lots of work, but lots of fun too.

Sustainably Conscience Recycling

2010-02-25T23:40:00.000-08:00

Our house was built in 1924 in a craftsman bungalow style. There are some great details that we hope to restore. This house like many others that have had a long life, have years of finishes covering over the original details. When we first walked into this house we noticed laminate plastic flooring in the main living and dinning rooms, but knew there were the original oak hardwood floors below. Additionally, the house was covered in vinyl siding but we could see on the detached garage that the original Pacific Northwest cedar siding was in great shape. We are trying to do our renovation sustainably and know that the first step to a sustainable project is to divert construction debris from the land fill. We found a local company called, Sustainably Conscience Recycling here in Portland that is Oregon’s largest construction recycler. They were able to drop off a thirty cubic yard box that will be sorted at their facility. They are able to take recycle vinyl, plastics, masonry, concrete, acoustical tile, wood and even old appliances. This first step helps us recycle a very large portion of our construction debris. The only major system that we can not recycle is the built up roofing. More on our demolition to follow but today was a great start.

Bungalow Renovation

2010-02-25T23:07:00.000-08:00

Susanna and I bought a small house in Portland and are going to be using this blog to chronicle our experience with renovating the house. We are doing much of the work our selfs and hope to learn a great deal about construction, design and sustainability.

GatesStudio Web Site

2010-01-28T08:33:00.000-08:00

Revamped and better than ever. Our site was made with an open source free web application called indexhibit. It is very user friendly and there are extensive forums where a community of designers critique discuss and customize the simple web development software. check it out and build your own site. http://www.indexhibit.org/

Blog-a-sphere

2010-01-26T20:48:00.000-08:00

Founded in 2008, GatesStudio is a collaboration between two designers, Susanna Scott and Eric Gewirtz. The studio focuses on two disciplines, textile design and architecture. Zanna Printed Textiles focuses on sustainable hand printed textiles for you and your home. Honed Fabrication and Design looks to engage architecture, furniture and sustainability. We offer services that range from design consultation, architectural & fabrication services, and custom screen printing. We work in studios in Portland, Or. and Brooklyn, NY.