I am an Etsy.com fan. I sure hope you are. My new fav find is Zeds Zombie Ranch- t-shirts-metal work and leather. I sure would like to have a drink with this guy…you can get a custom-made Big Foot Garden Stake or Zombie on a Stick Stake for $12.00 and free shipping! That and so much more… A riot!
There are a lot of flat roofs out there, on urban and suburban dwellings and, more commonly, on commercial buildings. There is a “growing” trend (couldn’t resist) to create “live roof”systems that not only look so much better than huge expanses of black rubber, but also help the environment, and decrease energy costs.
Hospitals have been a bit of a leader here. Hospitals seem to be always adding buildings, which so often gives patients and visitors unfortunate views of rooftops. How much healthier to look out upon an expanse of green from your recovery bed! Visitors and family members surely get a lift from seeing living, growing things instead of asphalt and rubber.
Commercial buildings have an advantage that residential buildings usually don’t have–the ability to sustain some weight on the rooftops. An 8 inch live roof system- soil, plant material- can weigh quite a bit per sq. ft. (don’t ask me to tell you–i will include a link that might help) Live Roof offers patented systems( of course) with various depth availabilities based on your roof construction/capacity–ranging from 8 inches to 2.5 inchs. Obviously, the deeper the system (8 inches) the less maintenance.
BUT the Live Roof System Lite (2.5) inches is a great retr0-fit option for some residential properties with flat roofs! Attached here is a link to their website. If interested, have a structural engineer assess your load bearing capacity on your flat expanse of blackness and see if a live roof system is in your future. But you might need a ladder and a watering can….
Looking for unique, hand-crafted decor items NOT made in China for house and home? If you are attracted to the clean lines of mid-century design, as i am, then seek out Heath Ceramics. Heath is located is Sausalito CA and has been in existence since 1948–so it comes by it’s mid-century honestly!
So many wonderful things to look at: “Eames” style house numbers to guide visitors to your door, linens, desk accessories, dishes, of course, in luscious colors. They also seem to offer new designs/colors somewhat seasonally, visit the site often. Great virtual tours of their facility. Sign up to receive their newsletter or peak at their blog.
A feast for the design eye!
Check it out! http://www.heathceramics.com/
If you are having a home built, or buying a brand spankin new house, a lot of convenient design elements, building and code requirements should be in place, but knowing some things to look for, or to make sure your new home has, can save you future headaches. I especially like the “doors opening the right way” (see below). This isn’t about aesthetics but functionality. You are building a pretty house i’m sure, and you want to enjoy it for a number of years without worry– at least until you have to start updating.
Are you always too hot or cold? Ensure your walls are properly insulated.
“Have someone do a good, thorough insulation inspection before you cover everything up,” says Tim Carter, co-owner of Idaho Mountain Builders in Ketchum, Idaho. “Then you can find and repair mistakes of missing insulation really easily.” Proper insulation installation is expected from the insulation contractor’s bid. But some spots, such as rim joists between the first and second floor, are easily missed.
Cost of a retrofit: Thousands of dollars to rip apart walls and add insulation, Carter says.
As flat-screen televisions become ubiquitous, homes are changing to accommodate sleek, high-tech models. Often, that means hanging TVs on the wall. But who wants to see electrical and cable cords running down the wall to the entertainment system?
If you want to avoid another costly wall project, plan for where cords and outlets will sit. A conduit is a pipe in the wall that lets homeowners keep cords out of sight. If you want to add solar panels down the road, similar cable conduits running up the roof are a wise investment, Carter says.
Cost of a retrofit: “That’s a couple-hundred-dollar expense during construction when you have the walls open,” he says, “and it can be thousands of dollars after the fact.”
Laundry is a chore, but people are beginning to wake up to ways to make the chore less painful. One solution is placing the laundry room near bedrooms, where most laundry piles up.
“We wedge (laundry rooms) into all kinds of nooks and crannies, whatever the floor plan will allow, to get them close to the bedrooms,” says Rob Pankow, owner of Pankow Construction in Phoenix. Laundry rooms often are located near water pipes and ducts, which is why so many of them are in basements or garages. Locating one near a second-floor bedroom requires access to that plumbing infrastructure. If you don’t build that in the first time, you may be in for a large project.
Cost of a retrofit: A few hundred dollars when the walls are open, Carter says. But if the retrofit requires tearing up the floor, it can run into the thousands, Pankow says.
Which way is a door supposed to swing? If it’s opening the wrong way, it may mean more than a headache to the owners. Incorrectly hung doors can block essential components such as other doors, cabinets or refrigerators. Badly installed doors can also hit your pocketbook – they may leak air or water and increase your energy bills. “When it comes to doors, you’ll get incredible cost savings if you do (them) right upfront,” said Rick Bertolani, an owner of JB Sash & Door of Chelsea, Mass. “If you put in a quality product from the beginning, you’ll save in energy efficiency and maintenance.” A door can cost $200 to $300 in labor to install correctly the first time, Bertolani says.
Cost of a retrofit: Simply reversing the hinges and changing the latch location on an interior door can be a headache. A standard exterior door can be even more difficult and costly, Bertolani says. “We’re looking at $800 (to) $1,100 simply for labor,” he says. “If you have to pull out the trim, casing (and) shingles or repaint, installation is dramatically more expensive.”
Heating, ventilation and air conditioning are essential to comfort in your home. If built right the first time, with an eye toward energy-efficiency, it can be a boon to your wallet, as well. Badly or incorrectly installed HVAC may mean, at least, a chilly house in the winter and an inconsistently cooled house in the summer. At worst, it may mean high energy bills, carbon dioxide being pulled into your home or worse. It’s tough to adjust it after the fact, says Chris Robl of Robl Design Build Inc. in Bellevue, Wash. “Depending on how your house was built, retrofitting a central heating system could become cost-prohibitive very quickly,” he says. “Aesthetic compromises also almost always have to be made in the form of dropped-down chases and lowered hall ceilings, things like that.” For a standard 2,500-foot house, initial installation might cost about $15,000 to $20,000, he says.
Cost of a retrofit: This could exceed $20,000 if your house doesn’t have a large-enough gas meter, the correct electrical panel or an easy way to route utilities and ducts. “It could get pricey,” Robl says.
Many new homes are open and airy, with roomy hallways and stairwells. But not all are, at least not throughout the entire house. Most local building codes require hallways to be 3 feet wide. Many modern designers prefer a width of 4 feet, however, especially for homes larger than 2,000 square feet. This helps more than one person pass through the hall at once and in moving large furniture through the home, in addition to adding bookcases or other design elements to the side. Unsatisfied with your halls? The punch to the pocketbook “depends entirely on how the house was built,” Carter says.
Cost of a retrofit: If the load of the roof is spread to the exterior walls, then it’s as simple as knocking down the interior ones, which costs a few hundred dollars. But if there’s a post in the center of the home that provides load support, the project can cost tens of thousands of dollars to add support beams and posts to carry the load, without the wall.
Drains that don’t work can make a wreck of a house. From slow-draining tubs and showers to stopped-up sinks, incorrect drainage can hit the owner in the wallet. “It’s important to make sure (plumbers are) licensed and insured when they put in their work,” says Paul Abrams, public-relations manager of Roto-Rooter Group Inc. “If you have a handyman who just happens to do plumbing, be wary.” Roto-Rooter often uses a tool to checks that drains are working correctly before the owner moves in. “Right after plumbing is installed, we’ll go in with cameras on tubes and inspect the lines to make sure there is no construction debris inside blocking the lines. You’d be surprised at what we find,” says Abrams, noting that the company has found drywall mud, lumber and trash blocking lines in the past. Owners can spot problems by themselves, as well. Make sure the drain lines flow with gravity and that outdoor drains are more than shallow holes with drain covers on them.
Cost of a retrofit: It may be as little as $100, Abrams says. “If it’s accessible, it may be easy for the plumber to fix, like in a wall.” But watch out if the plumbing issue is in the foundation or floors, he says: “It could be very costly — in the many thousands (of dollars).”
Stuff: Some people lack space in which to put it all. When planning your home, look for framing pockets that are wasted space and put in a door to create a storage nook or utility closet, Carter says. These spaces can be under stairways, between bedrooms and in closets with vaulted ceilings. In the kitchen, it’s important to have space for large kitchen appliances such as food processors, stand mixers and bread machines, so they don’t have to live on the counter.
Cost of a retrofit: It can cost a few hundred dollars to relocate the systems and reroute plumbing and ducts to open more space. Be careful, though, Carter says: Moving a duct can restrict air flow in the house. “The expense isn’t necessarily the money,” he says. “It is the performance of your (HVAC) system.”
Electricity can be important for a backyard, for entertaining in the summer and for holiday lights in the winter. Exterior outlets also come in handy for corded tools to keep your backyard looking great. Access to water is essential, as well. You must place hose spigots away from the main walking path, so no one trips over loose hoses. One option is a water hydrant that sits flush against the wall, Pankow says. “Once you are flush, you can stick a spigot right on your patio where you need it,” he says, adding that this makes it easier to turn on the hose and sprinklers.
Cost of a retrofit: Adding outdoor outlets can cost as much as $500, Pankow says. Installing a wall hydrant will range from about $300 to $500, depending on the model and wall work.
You’re outside gardening and all sweaty and dirty. Nature calls, and you need to pop in to use the loo. How far will you have to track mud through your house? A half-bathroom near the exterior door can remedy this issue, in addition to being convenient for guests. It’s extra handy for families with kids who are always running in and out of the house. All a half-bath needs is a toilet, sink and mirror. “If it’s part of the original thought process, then it could be as little as $5,000 to $6,000,” Robl says. “If it’s near the supply and waste lines, the cost could be minimal.”
Cost of a retrofit: Adding a half-bath to a completed project can cost $10,000 or more, especially if it requires moving plumbing or waste lines, Robl says.
( reprinted from MSN Real Estate)
…That sounds all-knowing doesn’t it? Well, a home is YOUR home so all things are taste specifc, but dare to dream. Here is a delighfuly decadent list of kitchen, bathroom, color and space home design buyer want-to-haves by writer Elizabeth Weintraub from About.com. Read below for Elizabeth’s suggestions…
Who wouldn’t want all of this? If only we all had an unlimited budget. It is a good idea, though, if you are thinking of selling your home to insert a spot of decadence somewhere in your home, either kitchen or master bath, depending on budget. Paint too goes a long way also to update tired room.
Here are essential items buyers demand in kitchens:
Bathrooms
Colors
Earth-tone, soft colors. Lots of blues, greens, browns — bringing the outdoors inside. Sharp contrasts with brilliant hues of red or orange accent walls.
Specialty Room Trends
Trends in Floors, Walls and Windows
Buyers are moving away from carpeting, even in the bedrooms. If carpeting is used at all, it’s used sparingly. Walls are either plaster, trowel textured or completely smooth. There is a purist movement to retain original windows from pre-WWII homes, refinishing, reglazing and replacing counter-weights or sash cords. Otherwise, the windows are dual pane. Here are popular flooring types:
Forget dry stats on housing market trends. Martha Stewart has proven, after many years in the “elegant home improvement” business that she knows what people want in their homes, be it furnishings, decor or food. So welcome Martha Stewart homes.
Even though Martha Stewart went to prison, we can’t discount what she gave to the world –a glimpse of how gracious living could be; if you had a lot of acreage, lots of hired help and an unlimited budget for foodstuffs.
But, even though we couldn’t have her fancy kitchen and cooking utensils, we COULD make that pie recipe that we saw coming out of her pristine Viking oven. She was the first “home maven”, giving us not only food advice (which we had with the likes of the always inspiring and humorous Julia Child) but home advice. How to plant herbs, fold napkins, artfully arrange flowers and how to shop at flea markets. She pioneered the idea of putting her name on home related items: paint, linens, housewares to name a few. We may not admire her ability to take stock advice BUT we sure seem to like what she picks out for us.
She went into the slammer and the home entertaining void was filled by a host of Food Network and HGTV stars and wannabes. She has survived because she knows what people want–and she is now applying that to home design. Surprised? Not really right?
The blurb below is taken from the Martha Stewart + KB Homes website (http://www.kbhome.com/martha/) and introduces the concept they are going for. Check it out to see if the developments are happening in a town near you! Again the message: you too can live like Martha (not the prison years.)
Our Martha Stewart communities feature premier locations and wonderful amenities. Inside and out, you’ll find unique Martha touches like wainscoting, picture-frame molding, open shelving, landscaping packages designed by Martha’s personal gardener, and so much more. And as with any KB home, you’ll select your favorite design, homesite, floor plan and customizing design options.
Come tour our stunning model homes and see how easy we’ve made it to design and decorate your ideal home. With more communities on the way, there’s sure to be one near you soon.
I am in love with the Cricket camper! This ingenious slightly off-kilter space-saving travel dream mobile is the work of George Finney, former “habitation modular designer” (awesome job description) for NASA. A guy used to designing for people who have to live in teeny tiny spaces in zero gravity!
Super cute, green, and reasonably priced–especially considering the style and thoughtful design. It makes ME want to go camping! Check out all photos and features in Dwell Magazine’s “Snug as a Bug” article on-line–http://www.dwell.com/articles/snug-as-a-bug.html?utm_source=thisweekfromdwell&utm_content=090211&utm_campaign=newsletter
Alchemy Architects have grown from just “wee” to Wow! Modern pre-fab with ec0-conscious flair and innovative style. The designs, in particular the Bungalow Loft, are crazy fun. No box here but “design alchemy”!
WeeHouse grows up!
Check it out: www.weehouse.com
Sigh. You know my affection for modular green construction. Finding a realistic and affordable modular design is difficult–going green is not inexpensive. Clayton Homes has the “i” series, and, I gotta say, it has appeal.
Currently available are two options: the i-house I and i-house II that can be combined with a “flex” module. The flex module is a separate bedroom/studio/office or whatever your needs are space, with a bathroom–roof deck above. Lots of outdoor space involved here, which is awesome, and highly customizable interior space in both i-house models (clayton homes assures).
When i was poking around “building” my i-house II, the proposed cost with shipping and add-ons, including solar panels, was $168,000 and change. Would the cost likely be more when it is all said and done? Of course. But realistically, and this does not include land or site prep, which is site specific, the home cost should be well under $200,000. If you have any familiarity with modular contemporary construction–that is a pretty good number. Make sure when you click on the link below that you check out the i-house 2.0 video. The 2.0 version is more style-defined and incorporates some changes requested by consumers interested in the i-house concept. Really awesome.
Check it out! http://www.claytonihouse.com/
place to hang art 