August 7, 2015

What's Next

Hi everyone,
Obviously I haven't written posts here for a bit.

My design firm Shelter& has morphed and grown larger. I'm using collaborative design in the service of the affordable housing that we so desperately need, for aging-in-place in the neighborhoods we love, and as a counter to displacement happening all around us. Living in shared well-designed places allows us to be more connected, resilient, and lets us live more lightly on this planet with authenticity and intention.

So my work as ZOdwellings has grown to include advising cities and Bay Area agencies about collaborative living policy, and advocating for broader definitons of  the "family household" for down payment assistance programs.

And, and and.... 

Right now, I'm trying to develop a PILOT program where homeowners who want these benefits can have your city foot the bulk of the design/building costs to rework your home for collaborative living. In return  you'd commit to keeping the rents you ask modest. Have distinct privacy, wonderful collaborative kitchens and functional Commons. Small homes. Large homes. Any household that wants to share can reap the rewards.


In the end, our cities get housing faster, and for less dollars than in large housing projects. They can appear in one's, two's and three's in every neighborhood, giving our small more nimble remodeling companies work, and making our neighborhoods hubs of local reinvestment.  By us and for us, you know?

And those of us who have ventured into collaborative living get some rental income, and possibly co-ownership with its shared costs if we find that right couple or family. And of course the gifts of collaborative ownership.

Because I'm focused on the pilot program and evolving it with my non-profit and public partners, I'm relying on my Linkedin website for now. Find my website goings-on here:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lonigray

Sound interesting? 

Then I want to hear from you! Would you want to be a part of the pilot if it comes to your city? Are you a homeowner, or a family looking to share? Tell me your circumstances.

Also, if you're a space designer wanting to learn the art of strong collaborative design, let me hear from you. Tell me about what you're doing and why this interests you.

Our Cities need to know the new faces of collaborative dwelling and how we want to redefine HOME.



Tell me your stories...I'm listening.

Loni 

loni@ZOdwellings.com

December 24, 2013

Christmas Musing 2013: The Stones Speak

It was well past midnight when Gehrtrood, our local contact, settled Marilyn and me into a small white bed together on the 5th floor of a Viennese pensione that she’d found for us... at last.


But the sound of a horse-drawn milk truck on the gray cobblestones woke us just before 4 am the next morning.  
Without a word to one another, we both leapt from the sheets to run to the window, peering over the flower boxes at the amazing early dawning light, the colors and bits of European life coming awake on the street below. It was the seventies, my first European city, and I felt like I'd stepped back through centuries as an invisible guest. 
On Sundays during the Viennese Summer Music Festival, the residents dressed up in antique, ornately beaded gowns with trains, and 19th Century tailored suits…and top hats. They walked through the parks arm in arm; parasols and slow saunterings. Seurat come alive!
Rats skittered along the edges of the cobblestone streets, adding to my disorientation of time and place. 

At the Bier Garten, I got to dress up as well, and dance! Aaaah. "Ich spreche kein Deutsch," but there were enough who spoke English, including a tall, soft blond 20-something. Hmmm.

Still, after all these years, it is the sounds of these Austrian experiences that stay most clear. I do remember the impression of the clothing and his face vaguely, but I can clearly hear how the air carried the horse's steps on the cobblestones, how laughter reflected off the hard stone of the streets and buildings, and the swish of beaded fabrics sounded in the grass. Even the sploosh of a rat diving into a park fountain. After growing up in a wooden framed suburban house, these new sounds of stone linger decades later.


We traveled to Greece next. It was too old for me to feel transported to another century as I had in Vienna. I wandered the Parthenon and for the first time discovered that timeworn was really sensual to touch. My hands responded to the wear my eyes sometimes could not see, and the subtle uneven textures felt as if they had a life of their own. Unlike my 20-year-old Levitt home, these steps carried something of those who had come before. And I came to understand back then, on some level, that when people inhabit places with great materials, something of their lives penetrates, becomes resident. Their stories stay. 



I would love to wander and see other places, and when my eyes tired, I know that my ears would take it all in as well… and remember.

 And I would hope that I would add to the stones in return, a little.

November 3, 2013

ABOUT PRIVACY: Part I: Making a Basic Bedroom More - a Suite of Spaces


Melissa has the smallest bedroom in our home, 11 x 15 feet. Not bad actually. Still it's just a basic rectangle-shaped bedroom. But as you'll see, it can be made into something more. 
(Click on any of the pictures for a larger view.)

It has lovely northern and western light. Melissa's moved her bed to the outer corner of the room so it's framed by the two large 4-foot-wide windows, and is farthest from the bathroom she shares with Stephen. They tend to use the bathroom about the same time in the mornings, so it doesn't disturb her sleep, but she likes the outer space for her bed.

She prefers a removed feel for her work area, so I suggested she place her desk  in the corner where it's also flooded diagonally by natural light, which happens to be northern light. The best. 

Below and in the plan, you see that the wall her door opens onto also leads to her closet and its door, so major furniture tends to be placed on the window side, making the room feel overly-weighted on the far end. But as is, if her door is ajar, you can see directly into her room from anywhere on the landing. So most people using this room will do exactly that. There's no sense of privacy if she wants her door open, which in our house is an invitation to say hello.

Essentially, you can add privacy to a box of a bedroom like this by creating an entry into the room. There are several ways to do this, and you get a bonus when you do - more activity niches for yourself!

You can create these spaces as easy temporary DIY additions which you'll see here. I'll talk about more permanent options in Part II.

THE TEMPORARY, EASY FIX

The simplest, most flexible fix can be done in any room (rented or owned) by creating an entry alcove with something vertical that acts as a visual divider. Be as creative as fits your soul! I'll work the principle here with a shelf-unit, but you could use ceiling-hung fabric, an art panel, a textural wood piece, or anything that appeals. I like shelves or cabinets because they offer additional storage.  So here's what happens if you use one 6-foot shelf:

Placing just one tall shelf facing the entrance just inches beyond the entry door's full open swing creates a new path of entry that requires a turn before they see into your room. (Also notice that since this is earthquake country, I have anchored the end of the shelf to the wall with a piano hinge. This secures the shelf, but allows it to be easily rotated against the wall for moving larger furnishings in and out.)



Interestingly enough, an open-backed shelving or a divider works just as well; either draws the eye as someone approaches, so the onlooker's vision is foreshortened. It depends on how private a feel you need, and how much light you'd like passing through this "wall" you've created.

Now decide if you want the stuff on the shelves facing the entry as decor to intrigue, or facing the space you've created behind the unit. (You can hang a picture on the back for visitors to see as they pass or enter.) Maybe find or make a unit that has some of each?

Plus, you have this new niche behind the shelf. There's enough space for a small upholstered chair where you might read by all the natural light of that large window. Maybe with a tiny ottoman. You also have balanced the room's furnishing better as well. 

People will tend to walk into the room straight towards the desk unless they plan to sit on the bed. If you're reading my posts, you'll note right now there's "wasted square footage," that could be put to use along that wall. We placed Melissa's hot water kettle and tea set-up on a small, low carved table just behind her within easy reach, with her favorite books on a series of wall-mounted shelves above. It creates a vertical element that's very special to her, and it feels quite delicate and intimate. She likes her space spare, and only wants a picture on the wall. So for her, that space is where she kneels to prepare tea as she works, or stands to scan her treasured books.














Okay, if creating a sitting niche right by your closet isn't appealing, you can move the shelf or divider further back as you see in this second iteration, to allow the space for a second shelf perpendicular to the entry door. See what this does:



These units should be just high enough to cover what you want covered. You do not need to go high on both, and want light moving easy around these walls you create. So you might make one 6-foot tall, while another is 3 or 4-foot  high. 

You now have a protected entry. Hang some pictures along the left wall? Put a changing display on the shelf? A photo montage or collection you own? You are drawing your visitor deeper into the room before they turn to see where you are. While doing so, you get to choose what they see along the way. There's also a nice feeling of entry here and waiting to be invited in.

In addition, you have created a large alcove behind the perpendicular shelf. If it wasn't against the bathroom wall, you could put your bed against that low shelf using it as a headboard,or make it a seating nook with a comfy chair, or a creative task area. Music listening/making corner and collection? Up to you.

If you draw a plan of your room on graph paper to scale, you can play with the width of these two pieces to find more alcove variations. The shelves or dividers are creating circulation paths into your room. Directing these paths lets you add an activity area, and their heights and transparency lets you choose how much visibility you want that activity to have.

So if, for example, you're comfortable letting someone see over the perpendicular unit, keep it low. Try shortening it to about half the length that I show above. Doing so moves your "entry" more into the room's center allowing you to push the larger unit facing the door closer in. That allows you to fit a hamper right next to the closet, hidden from view.  As long as you leave 36 inches as your entry opening, it should flow nicely. Play.

And what you choose to use, and put on any shelves becomes another expression of you. Nice.




August 8, 2013

I have a Black Thumb, but a Green Hammer


The whole question of becoming more resilient always seems to start with growing our own food. With good reason, since without water and food, everything else is eventually moot.

But I am not a gardener. And no matter how many times I have tried, I have not learned to enjoy growing plants, or gotten any better at it.

I often believe in a natural division of labor. It certainly worked for my late wife Trish and I: I built her gardens, she grew stuff in them, I cooked the stuff, and together we ate it. (And evaluated my experimental recipes for disposing of the inevitable garden excess, such as the Twenty Pounds of Green Tomatoes Salsa.)


We were both seriously satisfied, and grateful to each other. I still can see Trish bent over in between her rows of plants, happy, involved and grounded in a way I never understood. I enjoyed helping her harvest, but she was nourished by all the parts of gardening.


(So much so that I got Trish her own chipper shredder for an anniversary present, and she was deeply pleased. Now she could make her own mulch!)


Well, I am not nourished by gardening. It actually drives me a little crazy. Which is why it will not be one of my contributions to resilience.

Oxalis

Because I have realized that I work best in a 1:1 ratio of physical work and result. When I lift up a big rock and carry it across the yard, I am happy that it stays put until I choose to move it again. When I cut a board and nail it to another board, I am truly pleased that they stay together, unless I screwed up and need to redo the joint. When I demolish a wall, I am so satisfied that the drywall and lathe and plaster stay in the debris bags and don’t climb back onto the walls overnight.


My experience of gardening is that crook neck squash that you spend weeks growing, that look so healthy and perfect for picking tomorrow, can become shriveled gray blobs by dawn. That when you (naturally) fertilize and feed your soil, oxalis invites itself to the feast, turning your garden green--but not in a fun way.  That your hours of weeding are rendered useless as soon as you water your garden again, given the regenerative capabilities of oxalis. And that basically, nature loves a stockpile, so the more you grow, the more bugs and slugs and invader plants and fungus and deer and not-so-cute-bunnies come to eat it and undo all your work.


Please believe me. I know we need to grow our own food, and that gardening is a challenging, essential task for resilience.


But it isn’t going to be my challenging, essential task.


***


So as part of this project, I will be blogging about my search for how my passions and skills can be as effective and useful as growing food.


Because I can’t be the only terminally non-gardening person concerned about self-reliance and resilience.


Right?


July 24, 2013

The Water Test - Part II

Tim calls me this morning at 8:10. "Inspector said a man called in sick this morning,so now they're two men short, and he's trying to cover that guy's appointments today too. So there's no way to get over to your house today. He told me to call tomorrow at 8am again.There's really no point in me coming out there today."

"Yeah, okay Tim." Call us tomorrow. 

Damn! TJ and I need to feel productive today. Let's do something, please! We set up a painting area to strip doors we're reusing, and then after lunch we'll do the last bits of shopping -get the under-counter fridge and the last kitchen cabinet, right after lunch. Getting those doors and cabinet prepped and ready will make this day feel less wasted.

*****

At 1:40 the Inspector calls Tim:  "Can you be ready for the vent water test and inspection in 45 minutes? I can swing by."
 

"YES, OF COURSE! Thanks!"
Tim calls TJ and I: "I'm way out in Concord. Can you get the water up to the roof and into the vent now?

."OF COURSE we can....uhm, which vents do we need to fill?"......the ones back there on the roof? You got it.  Get here!"

I run outside and start unscrewing the longest hoses from side hose bibs to link them together to use on the other side of the house. My hands and sleeves are getting wet as I release each hose and screw them to one another.


I drag what is now 30 ft of twisted hose around to the other side of the house, disentangling it as I pull. Then I thread it through the railings and across our front porch, run it over a 6-foot wooden fence into a small side garden. TJ has climbed up on the roof and throws down a cord. I make a loop around the neck of the hose so he can drag it up to that second floor.


He carries a 12-foot ladder up the stairs and out to a flat roof in back by the roof ridge. That ridge leads to the two vents we need access to. Tim arrives  just as TJ gets the ladder positioned. We're 8 minutes ahead of the Inspector. 

Tim runs inside and tells me to get on the phone so he can tell TJ if he's filling the right vent. He's got his hand on the pipe we need to fill. I've got my mobile landline live to TJ hitched up to my other ear with my shoulder so my hands can turn on spigots.
"Water on!" ....one shouts.
"No!!! Water off, I'm not in place yet"...the other screams.

We get it coordinated...sort of. Water on ...filling. Inspector is running late. For once, a good thing. Tim finds he a small leak in air vent, no two- another one over here.

"Shut off the water!"
He cuts the new hole to release the water into a bucket in a swoosh that soaks his shirt.
He fixes the two leaks. He puts a new sleeve on the new joint.
"Run the water test again!" He commands. "Water on 'til I say stop!"
We coordinate the test again with phones and yelling. Tim's the
submarine captain yelling, "Load outer tubes!" that we repeat, echoing down the chain of command.

But everything is holding.
"Captain,he's holding still. He has not opened outer torpedo doors."

Looks good. and unlike us....dry.

Damn, wait! Tim forgot the inspector wants stainless screws on the toilet flange.

Quick get those in.

*Breathe*


Inspector arrives not 2 minutes later. Three dripping, happy people... smile.


All good. The corrections are all signed off.
 

After he's signed the paperwork, I ask "Hey did you get a lunch today? Want a bowl of rice and ham? I know you're running short of men."

"Hmmm, that sounds good, I shouldn't tell you I gulped a lunch, but I did. Wow, that really sounds good." I offer again, but he shakes his head and thanks me.


"John, can we keep the Monday original appointment for our Sheetrock inspection instead then?" He smiles and nods as he rushes to the front door, and next appointment. He really did squeeze us in!


I love it...we jumped up the schedule. Yes, I do love all this. It's now 3:45.... And we'll go fridge shopping tomorrow. 

Ahhh, the vaudeville!


July 23, 2013

The Water Test - Part I

I'm back up and running, at last! ( A pinched cervical nerve knocked Phase II out of the contractor's queue because I couldn't draw the permit drawings - or any writing or drawing for that matter! Beyond the pain, as a designer, it was more than a little scary.)

Then the new job placed ahead of us ran overtime by 8 weeks until just 12 days ago. So, we've just started Phase II.

Now, onward with a vengeance!....

Well......no. Seems the City Inspectors are running behind this month what with vacations and lean staffing. Still our contractor Tim grabbed back time by doing all three rough-in inspections at once - plumbing, construction and electrical. But rather than the usual next day appointment, when we called to schedule,we had to wait five days until today. And there are really only odds and ends he can do until these three "basic bones" inspections are done.


The inspector arrived this morning, and spent 28 minutes going through every single thing Tim did, permit card in hand. Unlike most inspectors, he crawled under the house. He got up on a ladder. He filled the new plumbing with water to check for leaks. "Thorough." Tim said. 

Everything Tim did was spot on, but damn if the inspector wants us to take a few more steps towards closing air holes (in the leakiest old house I've every lived in), and asked us to change out the screws that came with the toilet flange in the floor to stainless steel or brass screws instead. I appreciate that he insisted that I make my home more fire-safe even if it's in just this one inner room, but I admit I hate wasting another day, for another inspection to check these off. Plus, the inspector also insisted on seeing a second water test: our water line test passed with no leaks today, but he wants us to do a vent pipe water test too. (You know, the vents up from fixtures so the gases escape.) They will only have gases, and air in them.

Tim spent some time conjuring how to do that water test for him. Oh, it's easy enough getting water into a vent. You carefully climb up on the roof with a garden hose- or several, depending where the water bib is versus the vent--and fill the vent line. But how to get the water out of the vents once the test was done with the redirected lines in our 1908 old house? Hmm. Seems like our only option is to cut apart a major pipe after the test.

 "So..." I said slowly, "We have to cut a pipe to make a new joint after the test to prove that all the joints in the vent line don't leak?" But hey, inspector says, we do.

We just had to schedule a recheck for these "corrections." I actually jumped onto the computer seconds after he left, and damn if the next available day wasn't Monday the 29th, a week away. No!!!

But Tim has a plan: He told me to holler at him at 4 o'clock, and at that point he called the inspector and pleaded for time tomorrow:
"We got all your corrections completed today. Is there any way you could swing by tomorrow to just sign off on them, so we can move forward?"

"Got a man on vacation this week. Call me tomorrow, 8am. Dunno, but I' ll try."
As Tim headed out the door a few minutes ago, he promised he'd call right at 8 to get any slot possible..

Let you know how it goes tomorrow...



June 28, 2013

I am the Perfect Crash Test Dummy - Part 3





Moenkopi Hopi Wash and Lower Village, my home for two years.



For you to have an accurate picture of what this project feels like from the inside, I need to include my experiences of living powered down and more self-reliantly.



I spent two years living in a Hopi village that had no running water, no sewers, and no electricity. The old Mennonite mission buildings where we were housed had electricity and slowly running water, siphoned from the spring at the edge of the lower village and then stored in a water tank above the mission. (I used to say we had walking, not running, water.)  Heat was by woodstove. For my two years there, I split most of the wood, often with an old coughing chainsaw, but frequently by hand.



Living at the mission meant constant work on its systems, such as the roof, our water supply, our septic system and finishing out enough of the stone barn to house a thrift shop downstairs, and me upstairs. All the work was DIY, although sometimes a retired contractor and his sons came to work on our buildings as their way of supporting the unit. Until a brave entrepreneur built a mini-strip mall two miles away in Tuba City, the nearest useful hardware store was in Flagstaff. Flag was an hour-and-a-half drive when there were no sandstorms, thunderstorms, or blizzards. So if something was broken at the mission, we usually had to find a way to fix it with what was on hand.



Some people who came to the mission found this mode of living too challenging. But I loved it. I had no romantic visions of pioneer or rural life; I happen to relish the kind of mental and physical engagement this way of life requires.



For example, the mission was built into the rocky slope of the wash, and it was held in place by a series of terraces with high stone walls. We used to let lower village families garden in the terraces to help them grow extra food. But one night a village man went off drinking instead of turning off the crude irrigation system we had rigged for the gardens. We didn’t notice it running, because it was in the first terrace above the mission. But we certainly noticed a few nights later when fifty feet of stone retaining wall collapsed , just missing the main mission building.



Me, left, and an occasional helping hand.

I spent weeks rebuilding that wall using mud and the mound of rocks now conveniently close at hand. At first it was overwhelming—so many tumbled rocks, so much sandy earth spilling down from the terrace, and after one day of help from a friend, just me and a shovel and a wheelbarrow. And this on top of my regular daily work, too. 

Figuring out the most efficient process of rebuilding the wall started out as self-defense, but I came to really enjoy the problem solving challenge; how much water with how much earth makes the strongest mortar? The rocks that used to be at the base of the wall are now covered by all the higher rocks that fell onto them—how can I get at and use the heavy bottom rocks without moving every rock twice?



Living this way was certainly harder than using a contractor, or buying a pre-made solution. And there were many times when my reaction was more like, “Oh God, now what?” And I do remember the feeling of never being able to get ahead of anything. Because there was always something newly urgent that needed doing NOW, on top of my official job of running a daily rec center and rec program for the village kids, my unofficial jobs of co-hosting visiting travelers, grant writing, and helping run the weekly church activities.



But the truth is, I felt more alive. I’d spent my previous life in school,  reading and writing and studying, and playing music and working in commercial kitchens. So it was alternately daunting and exhilarating to have so much of my life now be in my own hands—if I could come up with a solution to a challenge with our buildings or with my work with the kids, I could just do it. And if I couldn’t, I’d better keep trying because there was usually no backup.



I’ve included as much self-reliance and simpler living as I could in my later life, from working on the houses I’ve owned—carpentry, roofing, electrical, and plumbing—to putting in gardens and even (God-forbid) gardening.



Now,  I don’t particularly want to have to split logs again, or build a fire an hour before I want the room to be warm.



But I do very much want to live more simply and robustly, so that I can directly engage whatever I need and make it work. This gives me a deep, deep satisfaction that I have never forgotten.




June 13, 2013

The Gift of the Group


I'm realizing that there's another layer of motivation to doing this project than just reaching for the companionship and energy that collective living offers me. Even beyond the delight of space designing my house. There's a layer under that, that is starting to bubble up to the surface. Because at last it can.

If I think about it honestly, sharing my home means having to do less. Less of the obligatory and the responsible, and more that is quite personal. And that's a healthy thing! It gives me time to find what must come from deep inside me and act upon it. How often do we have the time these days to do that?

Years ago, my beloved hubby and I tried doing it all ourselves. We did the tree-hugging, "back-to-the-land" lifestyle on10 acres in Washington. We were by ourselves because no other family lived in the state, and because my husband didn't trust strangers to hold true as a family would. We also had two young children. Even in our early 30's it was an huge task to create that from scratch on raw acreage. And, it became an overwhelming amount of work to maintain; ask anyone trying their own version of radical homemaking or urban homesteading. It is one of the reasons I do not have my husband anymore. We were trying to be supermom and dad and super global citizens all at once. 

I will also tell you that living all those values as just a nuclear family was very lonely at times. Everyone was a car ride away. Think about it. If you are trying not to get into that car until you have multiple errands and places to go, and if you are trying not to waste resources and conserve, then you do not hop into a vehicle every time you just ached to rub shoulders with a friend who is miles away. Nurturing yourself kinda settles to the bottom of barrel.  

So now, have those old priorities lost importance? Just the reverse. Those values are all the more dear to me, but I'm seeking another path to them now. One not so burdensome, or lonely, so I can achieve it.

Dunno if I'm wiser now that I'm older, but at least I've learned. I've learned that relying on someone else's muscles is okay. I've learned that reaping the benefit of their fascinations, inclinations, and strengths, enriches me. And now I am also realizing that their presence gives me breathing space.

And precious time. 

Time to relax, and exhale or walk to see a friend...just because. And even more to the point, living this way gives me time to explore all sorts of interests, some they've stimulated as well as my own. The time lets me delve into all those passions I discover I want to improve. To deepen. 

So if I look honestly at my own motivations, there's a real desire to use the collective as a gift for my own pursuits. But see then here's the thing: Being who I am, and still reaching for those values now means I get to focus on what skills I want to bring into the way I live. To train in skills that are important, and intensify my expertise. And that allows me to become more resilient, a deeper resilience that grows from the explore and the pursuit. (At least in the ways that I can, being who I am right now.)

Altogether then, I'm seeing that collective living, the intentional community impulse is in total harmony with transitioning into local resilience, and the Transition Town movement. They are interwoven for me, one fabric. Intertwined, they allow me, and anyone seeking that part of themselves, to seek and exploit my own resilient strengths.  

So now, what do I choose to make of this gift?














June 2, 2013

Phase 2: Pretty Pictures

If you like plans and project pictures, read on:

I don't make assumptions. Contractors are very concrete, hands-on people. As a designer and a creative who also likes to project manage, I respond to that urge myself. It's fun to move it all around in my head, but making it happen is the truly satisfying part.

My husband was a precise, excellent General Contractor and we grew a good reputation in the cities around Seattle, Washington. We were willing to tackle the really decrepit, old houses. They knew that I loved the challenge of obsolete space flow. So when they needed to condemn a place they'd reclaimed, they called us. They trusted John and I to get the sorry house back on their tax rolls, enlivening their neighborhoods. They even referred to the house that John built for us as the "250 Year House." It was that well built. Still  John never worked from formal plans. We worked from my sketches, and drawings, and this was way, way before CAD and Sketchup .

So the way I work with my contractor now is to give him plans for sure. But I also offer 3-dimensional views to make sure he is seeing what I'm seeing, and can get the whole picture that I have in my mind.

So for Phase 2 , I've created these pretty pictures: ( Click on anyone to get a slide show)

Of course I began with the whole house picture you saw when this project started. Now I add this simplified plan showing the area of the project, the demolition, new  construction and the electrical work being done (In a project this small it can live in one drawing):

 Then I've made these perspective drawings showing how I want the new kitchen alcove for mini-fridge and counter:
And these about the expanded pantry:
 
 










 
On the other side of the kitchen and pantry wall is where our new bathroom will be. In these pictures, I've made a wall transparent here and there, so he can see the bathroom and fixture layout. (Electrical is the yellow.)

And then here are the tile designs for Tim, using that fabulous "city lights" tile mix I spoke about in an early post about pulling the design together. It lives in both the tub and around the vanity, wrapping the recessed wall and connecting the two elements. Also, notice that my tub has a vertical pattern, while my vanity backsplash uses the tile mix horizontally and plays with the two-level vanity.  

Giving him all these perspective, noted drawings forced me to make better choices, because I had to think it all through and show him. Now I can let him work efficiently, without needing to grab me too often to answer "finish materials" or design questions. 

 Lastly, here's the alcove he'll be making from a sad corner that's always looked like this- even before we stuffed it with overflow to keep things out of the way for Phase 2:

 Let's see how it turns out!

May 28, 2013

The Bathroom Palette on a Budget

I love it. When the palette and components all pull together. It delights both the designer and the project manager in me. There's a lovely, satisfied release seeing it all lock together and take on its own life!               

Normally I have the core idea, and get the base pieces. Then I let each piece inform the surrounding pieces once it's in place. 

That habit comes from years of doing the rehab work myself. Being on the site every day gives you the opportunity to see pieces "in situ." That tells you a lot about the direction the rest must go. For example, I added a sandblasted art glass window to a dressing room, after I placed the built-in dressing table. I could just see how sandblasting the only window offered the needed privacy while letting natural light shine into the space. (And I got to design a unique window as well.) I like the feel of layering and growing the design theme in response to what's there.

Loni cutting the window resist
But my contractor Tim asked that I get everything chosen, bought, and delivered before he began any work. You know, essentially making all the design decisions at once. It makes sense of course, but it can be daunting.

If you're buying online as well as at local stores, purchasing several items at once gets you free shipping - no small chunk of change when items like tubs are involved. But that means you have to visualize how the vanity light fixture in brushed nickel will look with the tub doors that you've only seen as online "pictures". What's the scale of the design element? How does the polished "this" really look with the brushed "that"? Trust your sensibilities. Play! It does pull together and it is enjoyable to do. There's a total "Yes!" when it arrives, you lay it all out, and see how the materials and textures interplay.

In our new bath, the Designer me was inspired by one piece: the sandblasted Cavata tub doors by Kohler you see below. It created the whole textural palette that runs through the elements of the bath. 

Kohler Cavata sandblasted door
Once I found these doors with the light cross-hatched pattern, everything I added in some way incorporated that texture. Sandblasting expanded into frosted tile, and also became brushed nickel metallics. Then, as I found the next pieces, their shape, material or texture added additional conventions to the look. Now it was squared and frosted, brushed metal,etc. 

The challenge of course is to make it all hang together without looking like those women's jewelry sets of the 50's. You know, the identically matching earrings, necklace and bracelet numbers? So while all the metal is very square in feel, I'm mixing the polished chrome you see in the elegant tub spout in the top picture and bright square vanity hardware, with brushed nickel pieces to make the feel modern, more eclectic, and more visually engaging.

And yesterday, I bought the paint for the master bath, hallway and new alcove. (On sale, of course!) You can see the two colors I'm using in the bath tucked under the paint can, just below the white edge tile. That was a lovely, focused day carefully looking at tones, and undertones, grouping pieces to see their impact on each other. My goal was finding a palette that was subtle yet rich enough to catch some of the lively brown tile, but not too vintage that it would gray out the floor's white. See how the sandalwood tones just pull at the yummy "city lights" tile palette? And that mix really glows against the creamy white field tile. In a room without natural light....that's exactly what I need.

The brushed nickel multi-rectangular element is my vanity light fixture.Terrific yes? It has sandblasted lights that pick up the cross-hatched sandblasted pattern of my tub doors and the frosted  "city lights" tiles. So that finishes out everything needed for my Phase 2 redesign.

Remember that this design work was done on a slim, slim budget. Understanding that good design works deeply around one idea, you can let a single piece inspire and be your focus. Then as you judiciously buy what surrounds it, you can let go of other ideas (as I've mentioned in earlier posts here and here ) Concentrating that focus can be powerful. Or use good, budget-wise pieces to broaden the design conversation, as I did. Just make sure it's only one conversation!