Design snapshot: Grounding exterior stairs

At first, I was a bit surprised to discover this image from my Houzz page finding its way into Houzzers ideabooks with great frequency. Then I began to see that perhaps the very feature we had considered a design liability was actually a design asset.

We originally designed this studio over a garage to have a single entrance via the French door in the shed dormer at the top of the rear stairs that climb from the deck. In an effort to make the stairs more integral to the building, we specified that the stair stringer walls be clad in cedar shingles to match the building's exterior walls. 

Then, the local building inspector required a second egress stair. At the time, we felt this was redundant since both egress doors would be opening into the same studio space about fourteen feet from each other.

Nonetheless, we complied and designed the second stair that climbs from the deck and travels up across the end gable to a second French door. We took a similar design approach with the second stair and specified that its stair stringer walls be clad primarily with cedar shingles and, near the base, vertical cedar skirt boards like the sides of the deck. We designed both stair guard rails to have narrow wooden balusters to prevent the stairs from feeling too enclosing and appearing too overwhelming for such a small building.

Interestingly, the two exterior stairs which had struck me as somewhat cumbersome, seem to actually help ground the building. They bring the building down to an easily relatable scale and soften or mitigate what might otherwise have been a fairly harsh transition from a tall sidewall to a sloping grade. They also help visually tie this building to this specific place, as if the building and its stairs grew directly out of this incline. Sometimes a building regulation really can be a design asset.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast

Design snapshot: Winter Wyeth-like

I generally scout for Design snapshots in New England's more temperate months than in bone-chilling January or February. Every once in a while, though, I snap something despite the cold because it simply begs to be captured.

This stoic New England gambrel at the crest of a brown hill, with a thick stroke of bordering hedge and a bare tree at its corner, called to me. Its first-floor shades drawn and its porch framing a quiet block of blue held my gaze. Its cloak of weathered-grey shingled walls and roof dotted with 8/12 and 12/12 windows, edged with moss-green trim, and accented by a tall, brick chimney nose greeted me plainly. Yes, this house speaks my language.

I grew up with a print of Andrew Wyeth's Christina's World behind the family room couch, which -- along with 19th century farmhouse it occupied and my mother's taste for sturdy local antiques -- must have trained me early in the hardy, resilient language of vernacular New England dwellings and their surrounds. I feel in their company as if I have found a dear friend or relative, someone with whom I can be completely at home.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast

Design snapshot: Homey garage

This is a rare two-photo Design snapshot. Pretend for a moment that you hadn't yet seen the title of this post or the thumbnail photo below. Would you think, as I did initially, that the structure to the left in the image above is a home addition with an entry? Maybe an in-law suite or a home office? Imagine my surprise when I turned the corner and saw four garage doors. A garage? With such a nice sheltered entry and lattice-edged stoop? An entry more inviting than the workaday entry to the far right?

Then I began to wonder if perhaps the space behind the double windows, just to the right of the sheltered entry, functions as a mud room. And perhaps the garage isn't an addition, but an original cottage turned garage once the rest of the house was added to the right ? Or perhaps it was once a free-standing carriage house that was later absorbed by the larger house to which it is now attached? These kinds of narratives about how a dwelling was or may have been shaped over time can inspire the design of an addition (whether the addition is a garage or a larger house). What ever the true narrative for this property, this side-facing garage is particularly homey.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast

Design snapshot: Rockin' red shed

Many antique structures (and some inspired newer ones) are painted a single, deep, bold color. Instead of relying on multiple exterior colors to differentiate the various component elements, such structures rely on texture and depth to communicate order.

Here, wide tongue-and-groove boards establish a field of horizontal relief which clearly reads as siding, and is differentiated from thick trim boards, proud slatted shutters, and doors comprised of vertical tongue-and-groove panels framed within crisp stiles and rails. A clipped rake and a short eave are just deep enough to cast shadow lines. The result is a taut, nuanced, rockin' red shed.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast

Design snapshot: Self-assured symmetry

I just watched East of Eden this weekend, the c. 1955 Hollywood interpretation of a portion of Steinbeck's classic, which recalls Cain and Abel -- with James Dean as Cal (Cain) and someone else as Aaron (Abel). They're brothers vying for their father's affection. Well, Cal thinks their vying, when, truly, Aaron has already, long ago, handily won. Aaron has it all: confidence, good looks, a solid reputation, a balanced ease, support of the establishment. Poor Cal is the seeming opposite of Aaron, in all respects save the looks department. You might (if you're a House Enthusiast) even compare their attributes to those of symmetry and asymmetry.

What is it with symmetry, so sure of itself, so solid, so relentless, so balanced, so attractive, so established, so lauded, so trusted, so good, so Aaron? This Georgian could be the poster child for symmetry. It's a self-assured delight. How we enjoy the parade of double-hung windows and the march of stone treads, railing, and balustrade emanating out equally from the center of the door and pediment. What pleasure we take from the repeated shadows cast by the matching sconces, thick sills, and proud window heads. How comfortable we are with a countenance that's symmetrical like our own.

But fear not, asymmetry has its strengths, too. It's the underdog, less established, less trusted. But it, too, can posses its own unique kind of balance. It can be less relentless and more open as a result. It can win your trust. And it can be uniquely attractive; take a look at Cal (James Dean); he's redeemed in the end. He just needs someone to believe in him. I'll keep my eyes peeled for a worthy asymmetrical "Design snapshot" to share, if only for Cal's sake.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast