-
IN 1630, WILD STRAWBERRIES GROWING IN GREAT ABUNDANCE on the shores of the tidal estuary known as the Piscataqua convinced a small British scouting party to settle there. Calling their little camp “Strawbery Banke,” the new residents began building homes from the towering white pines that surrounded...
BUILDERS WHO THINK branding matters only when you're selling coffee, cars, and sneakers haven't been paying attention, says Mark Stevens, a White Plains, N.Y.–based marketing expert and author of Your Marketing Sucks. The added value of a builder's brand can be summed up in one instantly recognizabl...
WHEN CHRIS AND Meghan Driggers of Athens, Ga., were shopping for their first house in the fall of 2004, they spent hours with their real estate agent looking at neighborhoods. One day, the agent mentioned a new community, Milford Hills, where one of the other agents from his firm was selling houses.
FOR MANY OF THE HOMES HE DESIGNS FOR THE SUN VALLEY RESORT area, Idaho architect Rich Childress is asked to find wood flooring that has been purposely (and recently) distressed to look old, presumably so that it conveys character and authenticity. “It would be more authentic to put in a new wood flo...
-
By any standard of measurement, green building is hot. Green building has now spilled over into the residential world as well. According to the NAHB, 14,600 green homes were built in 2004, up from 2,500 in 2000.
Meet the judges for the 2006 Buider's Choice Awards.
-
IT'S AN URBAN LIGHTHOUSE, a beacon of color and wonder smack dab in the middle of a gritty Rust Belt neighborhood.
-
ANCHORED ON NEW ENGLAND'S rocky coastline and oriented to maximize coastal vistas, this 10,000-square-foot retreat reads like a polished outgrowth of the terrain.
-
FOR ARCHITECT ERNEST Wong, designing a space to accommodate a wide range of neighborhood needs was no walk in the park.
-
SOMETIMES ROTE INGREDIENTS in the housing equation are worth a second thought. Such was the case when architect David Baker turned a critical eye on the notion of on-site parking at Curran House, a 67-unit, low-income apartment building in San Francisco's hardscrabble Tenderloin district.
-
COVERED PORCHES AND breezeways serve as connective tissue in this airy beachfront home, loosely bridging the otherwise discrete building blocks that make up the main house, master suite, guest cottage, and carriage house.
-
THE RENOVATION OF this 1928 Washington residence included the replacement of all the existing glass openings to help maximize the visual connection to the site.
-
THIS EXQUISITE LITTLE screened porch addition extends this home's dining room and does so without darkening the interior spaces.
-
AS ELEGANT AS THEY ARE utilitarian, these four-bedroom houses slip comfortably into the confines of their 45-foot-wide lots.
KELLER HOMES AND Scheurer Architects looked to European mountain villages for inspiration on this Rubik's Cube–like community, composed of 48 detached homes on 15 acres. The first cluster housing project in suburban Denver, each trio of rustically detailed homes is designed around a shared motor cou...
IT'S WHAT MARIE ANTOINETTE might have built had she lived in Southern California—a 10,000-square-foot, French-style farmhouse of hand-cut stone, detailed with steel windows and doors, plaster walls, and truss ceilings.
RED BARREL-TILE ROOFS and smooth white stucco exteriors speak of the Spanish inspiration behind this townhouse community geared to first-time buyers, couples, and small families. One of three floor plans, the 1,492-square-foot Medley offers a design that is distinctive and yet efficient to build. En...
ARCHITECT BOB MECHELS breathed new life into this century-old building in Ft. Collins, Colo.'s historic district with a fresh, modern façade and an updated, mixed-use purpose. The 32,000-square-foot structure now houses chic office space on the street level and three floors (17 units) of residential...
-
WASHINGTON'S ONCE industrial, now trendy 14th Street corridor is home to new restaurants and shopping, as well as a surge in upscale multi-family development.
-
THE MAKING OF ANY mixed-use community involves the usual hurdles of nervous neighbors, density requirements, and roadway access.
-
AS LAND PARCELS SHRINK near urban areas, builders face the proverbial puzzle: How to disguise multifamily housing in a single-family neighborhood.
-
COST CONTROLS WERE crucial in the remodel of this 10-story residence for low-income seniors.
-
HONORING REGIONAL SURROUNDINGS is a top priority for architect Bob Hidey and his team.
-
STRADDLING RESIDENTIAL and industrial areas, the Railroad Spur Block live/work project blends residential scale with materials such as metal and thick-walled stucco that reference the site's industrial lineage.
-
EVERYTHING ABOUT THESE New York–style brownstones rings authentic, what with their ruddy masonry, bay windows, cornice detailing, wrought iron rails, muscular walk-up stoops, and bronze gutters and downspouts. Except that they're not on the island of Manhattan or its environs.
-
METROPOLITAN LOFTS occupies a once-barren city block of mostly surface parking near the entertainment district and the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
-
THE MODULAR COMPONENTS of this production plan, created as an affordable alternative for vacant lots in Milwaukee's central city, include a cedar-clad box entryway, a larger stucco box containing the living spaces, and a concrete wall that defines a garden courtyard. A courtyard trellis, a balcony, ...
-
HOW DO YOU DESIGN AN outbuilding that doesn't clash with, or upstage, the house?
-
THIS 2,300-SQUARE-FOOT, ultra-modern sliver of a house in the arts district of Washington's Shaw neighborhood, lives large, thanks to an abundance of glass and natural light.
ARCHITECTS AND BUILDERS across the country encounter a similar problem: How do you introduce higher-density housing to an established single-family neighborhood? Better yet, how do you impart a shared identity on those new homes while avoiding a cookie-cutter sameness?
LAKESHORE COTTAGES IS located in an area known as the “Hamptons of the Midwest,” so it seems astonishing that it was once a decaying community only four blocks from Lake Michigan.
THIS WHOLE-HOUSE RENOVATION is a prime example of how simple yet precise gestures can bring clarity to chaos.
THIS CHICAGO HOME WAS built in the tradition of a 1900s Gold Coast mansion, but with all the modern amenities and conveniences a modern-day homeowner requires.
IN A NEIGHBORHOOD WHERE the houses all but rub against each other, a major question when designing an addition that nearly doubles the size of a house is: How do you let light in?
Sited on a 5,000-square-foot infill lot, the house was scaled to fit the neighborhood and is equipped with large windows to maximize views of Mt. Hood and an open floor plan to suit the Scott family's casual lifestyle.
IF ONLY ALL TEARDOWN projects looked so good, there'd be nary a whimper of NIMBY resistance to be heard. Land-wise, Equestrian Avenue Villas was an even trade—three old catalog homes in exchange for three new residences occupying the same 36-foot-wide lots. But in the aesthetics department, the impe...
WHEN WESSMAN Gonzalez decided on a European flavor for this luxury community of $3 million homes, no expense was spared to get it right.
TO INCORPORATE THE architectural language of Oakland's gentrifying Jack London Square, you have to speak factory. Take, as evidence, this project's neighbors, which include railroad tracks, a paper company, and a restaurant supply warehouse.
A BIG BUILDING ON A narrow lot on a small street in the funkiest section of Washington? Architects at Hickok Cole rose to the challenge, using variable setbacks and massing, brick masonry towers with metal overhangs, and punch windows to honor the neighborhood's eclecticism. The architecture reads a...
WITH THEIR WALL-SIZE windows, industrial details, and rock-solid construction, abandoned mills are romanticized as chic living quarters. The realities of adapting them for residential use, however, are quite different.
WITH ITS QUIET symmetry and subdued palette, this wooded retreat appears the epitome of simplicity.
WHEN MAKING THIS 250-year-old house livable for the 21st century, architect Stephen Vanze borrowed the familiar physician's dictum: Do no harm. He was fortunate to have a client with a generous budget and a passion for doing things right. That meant meticulously restoring the historic log structure ...
GREAT PLANNING PAYS off, and no one knows this better than developer Tony Green. Nearly a decade in the making, his Pinehills community was worth the wait.
LIFE ON A TROPICAL ISLAND offers some unexpected delights in this infill paradise. Proving that New Urbanism need not be synonymous with historic revival architecture, its geometric forms are completely modern.
LOW-INCOME HOUSING IS always a balancing act, the challenge being to keep costs down while maintaining high quality. “This is not throwaway architecture,” says Jeffrey Murphy, who designed these 13 tidy row houses across the street from a South Bronx park. “This is the stuff that comprises our citie...
THE PEPPERING OF quaint towns between Boston and Providence, R.I., are what many would consider the quintessence of New England. Rich in colonial history and succinct in their Shaker pragmatism, these villages have long been celebrated for their simple beauty.
THE RENAISSANCE OF any older downtown area needs a catalyst, and in the case of Fargo, N.D., it was the Hotel Donaldson.
SECURITY WAS NO SMALL matter in the redevelopment of this 22-acre site just north of Oakland's Coliseum Gardens BART station. In its previous incarnation, the parcel's gritty patchwork of vacant industrial lots and derelict public-housing projects had been a hotbed for illicit activity.
City officials had high expectations for the resurrection of an industrial site wedged between two well-known residential nodes in Minneapolis. As the first phase of a larger “urban village” concept, Midtown Lofts would set the tone for a string of contiguous infill projects along an old railway bed...
THE APPROACH TO THIS 139-unit urban condominium begins in the park across the street. “What's unique about Portland is the street grid makes for great pedestrian scale,” says architect Jim Bodoia. The designers envisioned a gradual transition from public to private space that begins with the adjacen...
ARCHITECTS WHO WORK in Washington know that historic preservation boards often dictate what buildings can and cannot be. Architect Suman Sorg managed to avoid this fate, but she still showed respect for the venerable church adjacent to this condo building.
THIS LOUDOUN COUNTY, Va., homestead was slated to have its farmland subdivided into 15 lots—that is, until it was purchased by a single owner who envisioned a more sympathetic restoration of the residence and its pastoral setting.
HERCULES IS A TOWN that never quite lived up to its namesake. The community north of Oakland had some history, but no real center.
PHOENIX ISN'T KNOWN as a pedestrian-friendly town, but that didn't stop developer Eric Brown and William Hezmalhalch Architects from introducing a walkable village to its urban arts district, where previously there was none.
A BUILDING THAT SPEAKS the language of its surroundings is always a worthy goal, but nowhere is it more important than in an assisted living facility, where familiar architecture is a source of comfort to residents.
-
TODD WALKER'S CLIENTS wanted a pool house for their second home in the bucolic Virginia countryside, and the architect responded with a 1,100-square-foot gem befitting the scenic location.
BARRIO METALICO'S developers originally envisioned the nine-unit project as a way to create momentum for a larger development they were planning nearby. Little did they know that the appetite for hip, urban-style housing would be as good as they had hoped and stronger than they imagined.
AT FIRST GLANCE, THIS house, nestled in a cove on the Connecticut River shoreline, looks like a classic shingle-style East Coast cottage. However, a closer look at its robust symmetry, its upside-down floor plan, and its broad double decks supported by big wood posts also reveals a metaphorical conn...
ALEXANDRIA, VA.'S OLD Town, with its historic architecture, quaint gardens, and European-styled streets, boasts some of the most coveted real estate just outside Washington. So when the city proposed the transformation of a crumbling, 100-unit public housing project into a mixed-income neighborhood ...
-
AUSTIN, TEXAS, HAS APPOINTED A TASK FORCE to study the feasibility of a change in the building code that would require all new single-family homes in the city to be zero-energy–capable by 2015.