By Catarina Ferreira, AIA

Architextual’s work is clearly not traditional in style. Having grown up in Europe, I’ve always understood that old homes can be given a new life through careful, thoughtful interventions. Lack of stylistic compatibility between old and new is not something I’ve ever believed to be real. European architecture is full of examples that prove otherwise. When cities and buildings have been around for centuries, change is seen as inevitable and embraced.

Practicing architecture in the US, especially in a city like Washington DC, I have come across many projects that attempt a more literal ‘stylistic compatibility.’ Tastes can differ. Style aside, for me what has always mattered is the quality of the space/project I generate, and how much it improves its occupants’ quality of life.

A lot of projects are interventions in existing buildings, often homes, many of which are around 100 years old or older. In these projects, we focus first and foremost on solving functional problems. Let’s face it, the way people lived 100 years ago is not the way we live today. As the container of our lives, architecture, especially homes, needs to reflect how we live today to be enjoyable.

On a project completed a couple of years ago, we had the opportunity to reinvent a classic center hall colonial home, likely the most common house type in the DC metro area. Located on a very desirable site, facing Rock Creek Park, the cookie cutter home did little to engage with its site conditions. Like many spec homes built nowadays, spec homes built 100 years ago were no better… they were repeated throughout entire neighborhoods with little recognition of site conditions, no matter how beautiful. As architects, we know that addressing/responding to site conditions is one of the ways a mere home can become architecture instead of mere construction.

Step 1 in this project was identifying the problems/missed opportunities. Here are the main ones we and our clients came up with:

Compartmentalized spaces limited access to natural light and views.
Kitchen was small and disconnected from other living spaces.
There was no mudroom, entry from driveway led directly into kitchen.
Sunroom space was oddly shaped and unusable, disconnected from other spaces, and blocked views of park from living room.
There was only one bedroom on entire second floor.
There was no laundry room on bedroom level.

Having just purchased the home, our clients’ budget was limited. Our interventions needed to be both precise and effective.

The pivotal decision in this case was moving the kitchen to the prior dining room area, something that was not immediately obvious as the right move to our clients. In order to do so, the dining room moved to the sunroom. To create a sense of spacious and add livability, the portion of the old load-bearing exterior wall was removed, requiring a large steel beam to carry the weight of the masonry above it as well as partial 2nd floor and roof loads. Another load-bearing wall between the old dining and living rooms was removed.

The rest of the layout fell into place easily. We created a mudroom where the kitchen had been previously located, added a second door to the powder room to make it accessible from both the mudroom and entry hall sides, enlarged/added windows in the new kitchen and living room areas, added a new pocket door connecting the living room and library spaces. Now we had a layout we could ‘roller skate around in,’ as is often my goal. There was improved functionality, flow, access to light and view. From the front door, we now had an obstructed path to the windows facing the park on the opposite side of the house.

On the second floor, what had been an enormous, labyrinth-like primary suite became a primary suite with private bath and dressing room, two additional bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a laundry closet.

On both levels, some of the original elements were maintained and refurbished, altered slightly without erasing their character completely: the main stair and balustrade, the fireplace, some of the original decorative trims.

The renovated home has abundant natural light, views of nature, a slightly Scandinavian/Japandi flair, with a composed yet informal, inviting quality throughout.