Exposure and expression

One of the things we are excited about with the design of the house is that there are going to be several exposed construction elements. We will have 2 or 3 paralam beams that are exposed to some degree and our fireplace is going to feature an exposed concrete wall that will also serve as a shear wall and of course our floors on the first floor will be the concrete slab. We really like that parts of our house will be an expression of the things that built it.

We had to reschedule our architect meeting for this afternoon, which is why this week was light on updates. We're now off to the meeting to hopefully wrap things up and enter the construction documents phase of design.

Shaking my faith

I learned a little while ago that photos such as these...



...are about as real as these:


Why can't we have a little more of this?

Here's the slc202 promise: we will never touch up our house photos! (You'll be lucky if we even clean first.)

We didn't have an architect meeting this week, so we'll have to wait until next week to get another update. In the meantime, enjoy your spring — we're spending ours thinking of a yard.

Green

We've been all-house-design-all-the-time here for a while that I haven't mentioned anything specifically about the "green" elements we're incorporating into this place.

Here's a quick run down of what is planned at the moment (i.e. this will probably change) and how each element could be considered sustainable, energy efficient or just plain cool:

• Radiant heating: We'll run tubing through our concrete slab on the first floor, then run heated fluid through the tubing. The heat generated is highly energy efficient (and comfortable!) because you heat the concrete, and its substantial thermal mass warms the objects in the house instead of the air. Radiant heating responds much more quickly to heating needs than heated air and maintains a constant temperature better. The fewer "warm-up" periods (equivalent to when our current furnace kicks on) save on energy costs. We'll also run radiant on our second floor — attached to the underside of the floor — for the same effect. Radiant is also a healthier option because it does not blow contaminants and particulates around the house. Plus, Tai can't wait to help lay tubing like this:

(Knock yourself out, honey)

• Insulation: Framing the exterior walls with 6-inch studs will provide two additional inches of depth for wall insulation over traditional construction (the type of insulation is something we haven't decided yet, but we'd really like to do blown-in to fill all the nooks and crannies). Super insulation is a concept central to Passivhaus construction — we'll probably fall a notch or so below those European standards, but still be a great deal more than the average existing home (and even more than typical new home construction). 6-inch framing should allow us to achieve R-19 in the walls. The roof should be able to achieve R-30 just by insulating in-between the roof joists and with the foam for the membrane roofing material the final product should be around R-45 to R-50.

• Solar orientation and passive solar heating: This is a big, big reason that we were interested in an architect-designed home in the first place. Our home will take into account all the benefits and disadvantages of our site, with its strong southern orientation (not necessarily true with a stock plan bought from a builder or other outlet). We've already spent a fair bit of time talking about this in our meetings with Kenner and Matt — it's on everybody's radar.

• Low-e windows: Multiple panes, with an insulated, tight envelope construction and a low-e coating allow visible light to enter but reflect infrared radiation. In the summer this will keep much of the heat from the sun out, making it easier to maintain a comfortable temperature at lower energy consumption. In the winter, enough heat can get in to help warm the objects in the house, reducing the energy consumption required for heating.

• Ikea kitchen: We've said it before, but we'll say it again — Ikea products are among the most sustainable mass-produced stuff out there. They build their cabinets (and the million other MDF products they have) to stricter standards — no formaldahyde with lots of recycled and sustainably harvested content, such as wheatboard. The company's philosophy on product quality and safety touch on life cycle and efficiency, among other topics. Buying standard sizes of a flat-pack kitchen also means that more kitchen components can be shipped at once, lowering the per-item environmental impact. We're using easily accessible materials — not creating a custom solution that would require more waste to pull off.

• Climate-appropriate landscaping: Our initial budget will not have room for extensive landscaping, but we will have — eventually — front, side and backyards that make sense for Utah's hot, dry summers and cold winters by using native plants, drought-tolerant plants, grasses, etc.

• Energy-star appliances.

• Solar hot water heating: Budget permitting, this is something that we both really want to create. We'd run a hyper-efficient solar hot water system on the roof to take care of the bulk of our hot water needs. The sun's there, so why not use it?

• Use of renewable materials: We've had multiple love affairs with bamboo at this point (which grows very quickly), and we're interested in cork flooring as well for the second floor. Plus, I think it's gorgeous:

(Too lazy to edit their caption off...so at least now you know about the diversity of cork flooring options...)

• Low- or no-VOC paints.

• Designing in a way that makes good sense. This is harder to quantify, but it involves things like not over-sizing rooms, not over-sizing the house, etc. It also means adding a mud room for backyard entry from the detached garage and an entry vestibule for the front that will let us take off our shoes before coming inside so that we don't track outside muck/particulates all over the house, etc.

What don't you see on this list? A lot of gadgets and things like solar panels. Solar panels are still just too expensive for us. They require a substantial investment up front, which then takes a long time to recoup in saved energy costs, and this isn't the house we plan on living in for the rest of our lives. We hope that the price of solar systems will keep dropping and the technology will keep improving. Also, you won't hear us crowing about our righteous use of ceiling fans and swamp coolers — because we're getting an air conditioner. It will be a small and efficient one, but getting an efficient AC unit is sort of like getting an efficient dryer — you're sunk just by definition. (And we're owning up to it.)

We are trying to make logical building decisions that are efficient and sustainable, and we aren't interested in "green-washing" the project. We just don't have the budget to make it super outwardly "green" or "eco." But it is going to be a smart, responsible and efficient house.

Sharing

Things that our architects now know about us that our friends and family may not:

1. Closets need to have doors so that Things don't sneak out and get you in the middle of the night.

2. I don't like shower-only bathrooms because there is no place to rest my foot while I shave my leg(s).

3. Tai thinks the TV plays a bigger role in the living room than I do.

4. We believe in doors for bedrooms and bathrooms. As Kenner put it, "Sometimes in architecture, we have to talk about how you make noise when you have sex and going to the bathroom means making stinky smells." Well said.

5. The only space in my grandparents' house where my family and our out-sized personalities fit during the holidays is their large front room with a double-height ceiling. Many years of those memories are why I was thrilled when Kenner and Matt mentioned it might be possible to get a double-height space into our floor plan.

6. Master bedrooms are for sleeping. Not lounging, not entertaining, not doing laundry, not lazing about. We don't need a couch to fit in our master bedroom, and our bedroom is not a social space.

7. We prefer a wood-burning fireplace to a gas one.

8. I crave natural light so much that I will get out of bed after lights out at night and open our curtains so the morning light can come in.

9. We include the kitchen in our entertaining space.

10. I aspire to be a doddering old lady with a garden.

Meet the architects

Introducing our architects: Kenner Kingston (left) and Matt Nelson of Architectural Nexus.

We're thrilled to be working with Kenner and Matt, who caught our eye for Architectural Nexus' work on the Lucy Avenue house (those owners were guest bloggers on Grassroots Modern during their building process, here, here, and here). Arch Nexus is large firm with offices here, Logan and Tempe, Ariz., and they've done a lot of institutional, medical and commercial work. Kenner, a LEED-accredited partner, worked on the eye-catching University of Utah Orthopaedic Hospital in Research Park.

This is a much smaller project than this firm would normally take on, so we're grateful that they are committed enough to the idea of a small, modern house in Salt Lake to spend their Thursday nights with us. (Also, big thanks to their understanding families for loaning them out on the night of the week's best TV.)

We spent Thursday evening going over the basics of how to layout our home (I can say that! We're really building it now!!). It was a really fun evening, spent answering questions such as, "How do you feel about doors?", "Does the kitchen need to be part of entertaining?", and "What do you expect out of your outdoor space?" It was great to be part of a guided discussion about the priorities for our home. At the end of the night, Kenner and Matt had sketched out a basic layout for the two floors.

Next Thursday we'll take a look at a few basic designs, or massings (arch-speak for 3d renderings).

Q&A

We've been getting a few questions from people who are curious about our plans. Here are some answers.

Q: Is it a tear-down?

A: No. There has never been a home on the lot that we are purchasing. (We actually looked at a couple of tear-down candidates in our property search, but financing a tear-down and new-home build proved to be even trickier than a new construction loan.)

Q: Why build a new house?

A: We actually went back and forth for a while about whether to purchase an older home and remodel versus the hassle of finding land and building something. We settled on the latter for a couple of reasons. The first was the money equation that I laid out above -- we would have spent a lot of money getting an older home to a place where we wanted it, and the second is that we simply wanted something that was truly ours. We want something that reflects our aesthetics, our century (i.e. not cut-up little spaces, crawl-space "basements", etc.) and our personalities. So, after we got through that debate, it made a lot of sense for us to be patient on a land hunt to get what it was that we truly wanted.

Q: Why do you want to stay downtown? / Wouldn't it be easier to build further out?

A: Of course, it would be easier to build further away from downtown. We know several people (including family members) who have done so and are very, very happy with their decisions. We are also happy for them. But it's not for us.

We do our working/eating/shopping downtown. We like the personality of downtown and cities in general. We like living five minutes from our work. Plus, when I moved back to Salt Lake from New York City to marry Tai there was a deal struck — suburbs definitely were not part of that deal.

Q: There are still lots downtown??

A: Yes, but you have to look hard for them and be prepared for some weird dimensions.

Q: Will it cost you more or less than just purchasing a home in your area?

A: What we're doing will end up costing us more per square foot than just purchasing an older home in the neighborhood. We're ok with that, though, because if we were to purchase an older home in that area, we would likely end up doing expensive remodeling — major appliances, roof, plumbing, electrical, structural, reconfiguring floor plan, new kitchen, etc. — that would drastically add to the cost of a pre-built home.

Q: How will your financing work? / How is it different from a conventional house loan?

A: Financing lot and construction loans was always going to be different a bit trickier than a conventional house loan.

Short answer: it takes more up-front money to build than it does to buy a pre-built house, so we sold our old condo, banked the equity from that place and are using it now to build.

Long answer: Several years ago, we were watching a couple blogs about building modern houses in Salt Lake. Tai corresponded with those authors about the mechanics of the process, including financing. Each author recommended that we have something to bank on when we purchased a lot — to one of the authors, that meant having good equity in your current place; to another author, that meant a greater cash down payment. We did the math on refinancing our condo at the time (the original slc202), and realized that it would be too risky for us. By far the safer option would be to sell the condo, bank the equity and then look around for land. That's how slc202 was born. Since then, of course, we remodeled our current place, which we're planning on staying in throughout the building process. And since then, of course, the world economy has also entered the Great Recession/the Good Depression/Global Economy vs. Banana Peel, and financing has become, ahem, less available than it was when those other blogs were building. More than 18 months later, here we are — finally making good on that goal to build.

It has been immensely gratifying to move forward on this process that we started two years ago. It feels so good to be working toward this goal and seeing it actually happen.

Decision

It's been a while since we've updated. Sadly, the silence is mostly an indication of us not doing much on the home front. We've been insanely busy with work, but occasionally we have a moment to ponder how little we want to stay in this current condo long term!

With that in mind, we've made a bit of a decision. We're no longer eyeing lots in any type of historic preservation district, which includes our current neighborhood. It hit me one afternoon that I didn't want a board of strangers telling us what we could or could not do with a particular piece of property.* There are fewer things that make me grumpier faster than thinking about the Historic Landmarks Commission.

* And yes, I know that this grouchy libertarian rant doesn't take into account all the good things that zoning has brought this world, nor the positive achievements of cities — and Salt Lake City, in particular — such as the roads I drive, the power lines I use, the water lines that slake my thirst, et cetera, et cetera.

That's the short story.

The medium story is that I called a SLC planning employee to ask about a particular, reasonably-priced property in our neighborhood. This piece of property has a nearly condemned home on it, making it — so I thought — a ripe candidate for a tear-down. The planner stated in no uncertain terms that she would never try to tear down a building in a historic preservation district. She almost laughed when I pointed out that the building wasn't a contributing structure, that it was in really bad shape, hadn't been occupied, was nearing the point when you can call the city to request that it board up the home, etc. Evidently, even the planners in the city recognize that the HLC doesn't play that way.

The HLC has absolute power over tear-downs in historic preservation districts. In order to tear down anything in that district, you must prove economic hardship, which is a subjective term with jurisdiction for that decision residing solely with the HLC. In short, the HLC does not want you to tear down anything in a preservation district.

With the rest of what we've heard about the HLC, the variances that they would have to approve in order for us to build on any lot in this area, and the grumpiness I feel about these guys in general, something clicked. I just didn't want to deal with it any more. I didn't want to have to pep talk myself into the fight it would take to build modern in this area. I love this neighborhood, but...my love has its limits.

So, wherever you are, nameless planner in the depths of the City-County building, this post goes out to you. Thanks for setting me right. We're now looking at neighborhoods near Liberty Park, just south of downtown, safely outside Salt Lake's historic preservation zones and near a couple of streets where a few other modern homes have popped up in the last year or so.

Oh, and I promise to hound Tai to show you all what he's done with the fireplace, book shelf, and mantle.

Hey big talker

I've been doing some reading about home LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. (Link is here — scroll down to "LEED for homes pilot version 1.11a and download the .pdf if you've got the stamina for 184 pages.)

Quick recap: LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, and is a qualification system developed by the U.S. Green Building Council as a way to encourage energy-efficient, responsible development. Requirements for the certification run through everything from site selection for your project (is it near transit? is it near a grocery store?) to energy star heating systems to climate-appropriate landscaping to grey water recycling, and so on. For our dear Utah readers, the majority of LEED projects — if not all — in the state have been commercial, governmental or multi-family dwellings. Single-family LEED homes in Utah seem to be rare, if not entirely nonexistent.

From what I can tell, the USGBC has made no provisions for individual home owners/builders to obtain their own LEED certification. Their requirements seem to point to a system of builders in a few states and regions who have jumped through USGBC hoops in order to qualify as LEED builders. I saw no opportunity in their documents for people like us (lowly potential owner-builders) to take ourselves through the LEED process. This is how they put it: "Currently, the pilot LEED for Homes initiative is open to participation by builders in locations served by our 12 pilot LEED for Homes Providers. Home builders outside of these 12 service areas may contact their nearest LEED for Homes Provider to discuss participation in LEED for Homes. In the short-term, not every home builder will have local access to a Provider. However, in the coming year, USGBC plans to establish 10-20 new Providers in new markets."

That's a crying shame.

Innovation generally comes from a few individuals who decide to do something different. If the USGBC is truly concerned about spreading LEED certification (and it seems the council is – one of the components for becoming LEED certified is education about the process) then it needs to open up the process drastically. Why would the council allow only certain builders in certain areas to apply for LEED certification? Additionally, why would this system discriminate against owners-builders (cough, cough: us, *we hope*) who aren't going to look to an established builder for help with a home. We hope to use a family member as our general contractor, not Ivory Homes (shudder) or like ilk.

I like just about everything else I read about LEED home certification. But really, USGBC, really?!? I'm disappointed in you, and this is my disappointed face:

Huh

Our friend Todd pointed us the direction of the 100khouse project (it's now on our links bar). One of the posts on that site lead me to this article.

I guess that my first take on that article would be, well, we're not that stupid. Which is both true and false. False: we are stupid enough to think that we will be able to build a modern home on an urban(ish) infill lot near downtown Salt Lake City, possibly in the city's oldest neighborhood. Also false: we are stupid enough to think that this will be moderately easy — sure, we're expecting the usual hang-ups, but we're also expecting that this won't take 10 years and a million bucks.

But, true that we're not that stupid in that we are learning from experiences such as these. In talks with people who built a modern house in a Salt Lake neighborhood last year, the owner suggested that we be in an owned home while trying to build — he said the financing for building would be easier. We definitely took that into account this fall as we waited on building until we had bought and renovated the current place.

We also have learned and heard again and again that it's important to keep the house design as standard as possible. That usually means 4'x8' construction in order to capitalize on standard size materials that everyone needs — drywall, plywood, door openings, etc. That doesn't mean we want to build a box, though. The creative part of this process will be making something relatively standard seem exceptional. That may mean taking ordinary materials and using them in unusual ways (for example, the use of commercial glass in residential application). It will almost certainly mean getting creative with the design of the house since it will probably be on an oddly shaped, tiny lot because that's what infill lots usually are.

Also, that article is more than five years old. I'm not foolish enough to think that America has undergone a sea change in opinion about modern building since 2002, but I do suspect there has been some incremental easing of the pitchfork-and-torch mentality toward this style since then. Perhaps I should say that I hope that easing is a reality.

Given that we don't have a lot yet and are still unpacking in this place, it's fairly easy for me to predict what we will or won't be able to accomplish with this hypothetical house. But it's sure great to plan on being awesome...

The Home Show

Figuring that we ought to take advantage of the resources in our area, and also figuring that we needed an entertaining way to kill a few hours, Saturday we went to the home show in Sandy. The vast majority of the exhibits were entertaining in the way I think a renaissance fair might be entertaining — kind of a hoot once in a blue moon but really not my thing. For instance, this tile arrangement:


There were many more alarming examples of wildlife in home decor, such as this lamp base:


We also noticed a few too many exhibitors of coffins (I wish I had a picture of the white lacquer box with hot pink lining — nothing better to carry you into the afterlife). And etched granite designs featuring more wildlife.


I was a little snippy with one exhibitor who was displaying a binder of home plans for sale. I started flipping through the binder, looking at the different plans (ick and more ick, I'd say), and the exhibitor asked whether we were looking to build. I said yes, but we'll probably use an architect. He immediately said, do you have one already? Well, no, but we know of a few we'd like to talk to. Then he asked whether we were in the industry. Well, no, but we do have a few connections and are fairly optimistic. The undertone of his remarks felt a little like he was trying to convince us that it would be too difficult to retain an architect if we weren't in the industry. Eh, maybe. But we're still not purchasing one of these. Now, if he were talking about plumbers I might believe him... His house plans were full of gables and peaked roofs and extraneous columns and massive garages and turrets and windows in odd places and, and, and.

This particular home show was billing itself as an eco-expo; as far as I could tell, there were about 10-12 exhibitors who were advertising green products or services, a few Toyota hybrids on display and a speaker talking about compact fluorescent bulbs. Green washing, anyone?

Enough griping. We did run across a few gems, including a very interesting booth about insulated concrete forms. This particular brand of the product uses styrofoam blocks that look a lot like hollow Duplos. You stack the blocks in the dimensions of your house, reinforce with a little rebar and few joists for flooring/ceiling/etc. and pour concrete into the middle of the styrofoam. The mass of the concrete makes for a sky-high R value, major sound deadening capabilities and a nearly indestructible house. You save on drywall inside the house because normal construction requires drywall sheets to meet on a stud in order to secure them; that method can make for a lot of waste if you have to trim the drywall. ICF don't require the use of studs at all — they're built into the styrofoam and concrete. (If you read any of our sidebar links, check out the archives of Modern in Minnesota — they used ICF in that very cold climate.) ICF does have its downsides, notably that it makes for thicker walls, which decrease living space on a small lot. Concrete is also pricey, but the overall construction would be only slightly more than traditional building because of comparable rises in cost of lumber, siding, etc. Obviously, it piqued our interest.

We ran across a booth about solar electric and thermal panels (thermal for heating systems as opposed to electric for running, say, your vacuum cleaner). There we learned that the "starter" solar array system costs around $8,500 to $10,000, including installation and all energy company rebates. That same system provides an average of about 35 percent of a house's electricity; more if you are conscientious and conserve. Wow, that's a lot of money.

We learned about blown-in fiberglass insulation that fills nooks and crannies better than sheet insulation (without formaldehyde or similar chemicals). We also learned that it is made of recycled glass and sand, so it's fire-proof without chemical treatment (can't say the same for blown-in insulation made of recycled paper). And we met a very nice man who promised to help us out with radiant heat should we decide to go that route — and we would love to.

In all it was great to hit up a place that offered so much under one roof — the leaping wolves I need for my next table lamp as well as the solar panel contractor I wasn't sure existed in Utah. It was nice to see that all these wonderful things we read about happening in California or the northeast can also happen in Utah. With some work. And some cash.

Tell me about it

I like a lot of what I read in the Los Angeles Times. They tend to carry trend stories that resonate more with me in Salt Lake City than the New York Times can offer me from 2,000 miles away. Particularly, this.

Don't these people look angry? It seems that in California, as in Utah, you just can't mess with the bungalow without making enemies.

The story is more than a week old, but somehow I fear that it's timeless: modern aficionado picks a neighborhood based on its charm and liveability (translation: established, mature homes in an older style) and wants to update his property with a contemporary structure. Neighbors burst into flames.

Other than the details specific to this situation, the article does a good job summing up what Tai and I fear would happen when we try to pull a building permit anywhere near downtown Salt Lake City. Many of the city's best neighborhoods are that way because a developer bought large tracts of land decades ago and built hundreds of houses all in one or two styles. (Sidenote: wouldn't it be hilarious if 50 years from now new Draper was considered historically charming??) There are plenty of great reasons to preserve and restore significant historical buildings; there also are plenty of great reasons to allow a blend of new and old in established neighborhoods.

What's evolved in Salt Lake City since that developer of yore are historic landmark districts in many parts of the city. I cannot talk about these districts without first bursting into flames — or at least getting an expression not unlike the man's above — not because their stated purpose is to retain the historical charm of these neighborhoods, but rather because that purpose is often translated to and enacted as "No. New. Anything." sans discussion about compatibility, building for your era, etc.

This, and the monster home ordinance of early 2006, are two of a few very large reasons that we've been eying Summit Park more and more these days, despite all the other very large reasons not to (including our genuine love for Salt Lake City proper).

Chew it over while you enjoy your turkey. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

A modern home for a modern time

So what's so great about a modern house? Don't get us wrong — we find no offense with Tudors, Victorians, Cape Cods, cottages, bungalows or craftsman-style homes. In fact, many of the best examples of those styles are lovely homes. They're just not for us. (We do find offense with the mish-mash style so prevalent in the greater-Salt Lake area, but we'll save that rant for another day.)

We are not the type to write a modernist's manifesto — check out dwell.com or any number of architecture schools for better-articulated theories — but boyohboy are we ever opinionated folk. And we are very, very strongly of the opinion that modern design, building and living is the way to go.

For us, the core of modern living (that phrase sounds so 1950s! in a sputnik-era way! with new electronic kitchen implements! and gleaming teeth! and automatic coffee makers!), breaks down to the emphasis of function in the home. We love the emphasis on easy construction methods — simplify the construction, the thinking goes, and thus reduce your costs and thus increase your potential impact and audience. We love well-placed windows and the natural light they provide. We love open floor plans and their inherent love for entertaining and family gatherings. We love a site plan that just makes sense. We love efficient use of space. We love multi-purpose rooms. We love site-appropriate construction. We love the energy efficiency that comes with all of these things. We love climate-appropriate landscaping. And, we love the way it looks.

Just below Ensign Peak, Salt Lake City

Moreover, we believe in building for our time. I know no one who wants a 1920s kitchen. I don't want room dimensions or ceiling heights from 1906, either. I also think that the exterior of my house shouldn't look like it's stuck in a decade from another century. Show it for what it is, instead of disguising your contemporary interior in a faux-historical facade.

Top of F Street, Salt Lake City Avenues

So, yes, we want to build a modern house that we believe will be more comfortable, more energy efficient, and more fitting for its eventual (and currently hypothetical) location than any pre-approved plans from a builder or pseudo-historical new construction.

Any yays? Nays? Yawns?