Tag Archives: Small Style

Packing style into 500 square feet

Posted on October 23, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

We are coming down to the final weeks of our project, and we are just picking up a few things we’ll need for the laneway house decor. Like a sofa, a bed, a rug, a closet.

We are keeping things pretty simple upstairs, with mid-century modern and just one or two accent colours against the neutral background. The big pieces of furniture will be the same grey/brown as the floor. We like to keep it simple to keep it serene.

But not everyone feels like that. This family from LA likes to stir it up with a lot of colour and texture — and still manages to fit it into 500 square feet.

Here the Barcelona chair — usually covered in plain fabric or leather, gets a bright floral makeover. The stack of books reflects the books on the shelf over the window. The traditional rug pattern adds more movement to the design.

Here’s more colour and texture tucked into the main bedroom (can you believe a family of four fits into this small space?).

The bookshelf holds lots of different shapes for more interest.

And see how the stripes in the bedroom have different scales?

Altogether a lovely home. Get the whole look at Houzz.

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Laneway House Tour Recap

Posted on October 20, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

We had a great time yesterday during the Vancouver Heritage Foundation’s Laneway House Tour. We had about 275 people come through, and got to speak with quite a few of them.

Thanks if you came by!

Novell had really put a lot of effort into getting the place ready. Friday the place was crowded with hard-working trades:

Click to embiggen

The day of the show, the outside was painted so you could see what our home will look like when it’s finished. They had tidied up the front with river rock and gravel, so it looked nice. Very nice!

Don’t be fooled by comparing the garage door opening to the height of the gentleman standing inside. He is very tall.

Inside, it was hard to believe the chaos of the day before had created such calm and terrific-ness. (Remember, the electricity had been hooked up the day before). All the pot lights were in, and looked great.

In the kitchen most of the cabinets were up (Good work, John from Pacific Rim Cabinets!) and they look fantastic. They are finished in walnut and the grain matches exactly across the span of doors. They look just like fine furniture — just the look we are going for in our combined kitchen/dining/sitting space.

The Blomberg fridge and stove from Colony looked super, and we were able to check out the new appliances for how much they can hold (DD will want some help with Christmas dinner, but we’ll have to see if the new oven can hold a big turkey).

Even our kitchen sink was in place, though the counters won’t be installed for another couple of weeks. We wanted, needed, insisted on a double sink, and though it does take up valuable counter space, we are glad to have it.

The floor was finished upstairs, but the installers were not able to put it in the lower floor as the levelling concrete they had poured was not solid enough. Novell put down some carpets to keep our shoeless visitors comfortable.

The beautiful tiling was in place in our teensy wash room. The sink and toilet were there just to indicate where they’ll be installed when the room is finished.

Novell had a plan of the home pinned up in our “closet” area, with numbers corresponding to special features. Design build efficiencies like the wall thickness, radiant heat, and the mechanical room placement. Tight space fixes like the shoe storage in the staircase and the garage storage placed up high. And healthy home solutions like the sundeck and the living roof.

LanewayFeatures20131019 (click to see the pdf)

Grant was there from Live Roof to explain all the advantages of having a living roof. Everyone wanted to see it, we were happy to oblige, and it looked terrific.

Many thanks to the Vancouver Heritage Foundation and to the volunteers who helped with the crowds. Cheers, Kim, Maureen, Deb and Sandra.

And thanks to the fantastic blog readers who came up to say hello. You made my day!

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Posted in Laneway House and tagged Lane Home, Lane house, Laneway House, Small Style, Vancouver Heritage Foundation Laneway House Tour. Bookmark the permalink.

Getting ready for the Big Show! Places, everyone!

Posted on October 16, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

We cannot keep away now — we drop by the house every day. And every day we see more developments.

Today we couldn’t enter the house because we could hear the whine of the paint sprayers inside. We admired the siding appearing on the exterior and the forms all ready for the concrete walkway and deck.

The rush is on, not just for us, but also for the Vancouver Heritage Foundation’s Laneway House Tour on Saturday. We’re chuffed to be part of the tour, and want to put our best face forward.

The Vancouver Heritage Foundation is happy to have us, and have even put our picture in the invitation:

That’s our crew. Cute, yes?

Local media are writing up the tour, as in this story in the Vancouver Courier. The house and laneway featured in this story are up in Marpole.

“It originally sat here on a larger piece of property and was one of the original south Granville farmhouses built in 1912. It would be one of the very few surviving houses in the neighbourhood,” said Roberts, who’s owned it for about five years.

Laneway homes are being celebrated for helping retain the charm and character in older neighbourhoods while still supporting densification.

Will we see you on Saturday? We’ll be there, and the house will be about 90% finished. We are keeping our fingers crossed that BC Hydro will have us hooked up by the time of the tour, but that is completely beyond our control. Except for the finger crossing of course.

Novell has promised to have something special for people who come to our house. And N.A.T.S. Nursery might be there, too to talk about living roofs.

Hope to see you! Be sure to say hello.

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Posted in Laneway House and tagged Lane Home, Lane house, Laneway House, Small Style, Vancouver Heritage Foundation Laneway House Tour. Bookmark the permalink.

Cute and little house in the woods.

Posted on October 12, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

Trying to fit as much living space — and style — into 500 square feet can be a real challenge. You can see how that challenge is being met on the Vancouver Heritage Foundation Laneway House Tour on Saturday, October 19. Get your tickets now for a great afternoon of discovering all the ways designers meet the constraints of building a home in a tightly restricted size limitation. Our place and one other are the smallest homes at 500 square feet. Some of the others go up to nearly 1000. But in every one you will find lots of great decorating and renovating ideas.

Be listening to the Home Discovery Show Sunday morning, October 13, for a chance to win tickets to the tour!

Far away from Vancouver’s urban densification, homeowners outside of Golden, Colarado found themselves with a similar dilemna. They wanted to build a studio/guest house close to their main dwelling, up in the Rocky Mountains. But they were restricted by building codes to build in the footprint of a recently-demolished shack — to just 500 square feet. And they wanted the new structure to fit in with the rustic style of their existing residence.

As this story in Houzz shows, the answer was a delightful little “Hobbit House” seemingly growing out of the granite of the hills.

Rustic Exterior by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

From the quaint rounded front door to the slate roof, every detail was carefully planned and executed. Guests can make themselves at home in a loft bed

Rustic Bedroom by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

Or a Murphy bed

Rustic Bedroom by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

And the “kitchen” is actually a studio for the owner, a jewellery designer

Rustic Living Room by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

There’s a modern bathroom that still fits the quaint esthetic (a custom concrete sink keeps the theme going).

Rustic Powder Room by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

And the fireplace and open beams are a perfect way to incorporate “Hobbit” charm. The mullioned windows along one side are actually doors that slide open to the deck.

Rustic Living Room by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

Once again we see that good design can overcome site difficulties. Who wouldn’t want to make their way to this guest house after a day of hiking or skiing?

Rustic Exterior by Golden Architects & Designers TKP Architects pc

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Posted in Decorating, Housing, Small House, Uncategorized and tagged Decor, Lane Home, Lane house, Laneway House, Small House, Small Style, The Home Discovery Show, Vancouver Heritage Foundation Laneway House Tour. Bookmark the permalink.

We will live a well-insulated life in our laneway

Posted on October 6, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

The laneway house is now on an accelerated completion schedule. Because we have to be ready for the Vancouver Heritage Foundation‘s Laneway House Tour, we will be working hard to present a nice looking, almost-finished house to the participants. And by “we” I mean our builders.

So it was good to meet with Laurel and Angelito from Novell this week to see what’s happened and talk about what will be happening.

The rain-screening is complete on the exterior and just needs the sign-off from the home warranty inspector before the Hardie Board goes on.

The interior has all been insulated — and well-insulated, too. We have a combination of batten and spray foam.

Here's a combination of batten and closed-cell spray foam

Here’s a combination of batten and closed- and open-cell spray foam

Here is batten above and open-cell spray foam below.

Here is batten above and closed-cell spray foam below.

Upstairs you can see the south-facing wall and the ceiling/roof:

Here’s the gable over the stairs with spray foam.

And here’s what’s going to keep us toasty in our shower:

You can see the packages of tiling here — ready to be installed once the special water-resistant drywall is in place.

The spray foam is a combination of open-cell and closed-cell.

Monday we will meet with the landscaper. There’s not a large area to be landscaped, but we want it to be extra nice, for ourselves of course, but also for the people in the Main House and for the neighbourhood.

Next week we’ll see huge changes:

drywall
hardscaping
by Friday – tilework to start / doors installed / green roof and deck tiles installed

After Thanksgiving (Canadian Thanksgiving is the second Monday in October) we’ll see even more changes:

flooring
cabinets and appliances
smart garage door
plumbing and electrical finish

It may be a little cool in the house for the tour, Fortis isn’t scheduled to come in until October 22 to hook up the natural gas for the heating system, and we probably won’t have the counters installed in the kitchen. But for the most part we will have a completed house.

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Posted in Decorating, Laneway House, Small House and tagged Lane Home, Lane house, Laneway House, living roof, Small House, Small Style, Vancouver Heritage Foundation Laneway House Tour. Bookmark the permalink.

Closest to the closet we want

Posted on September 24, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

One of the things you must talk about when hiring a builder is where the money is going to go. And you should be putting your money where it makes the most sense — to you.

Take a look at your budget and see where you want to spend more — and where you will be more frugal. Only you can decide how your budget will be allocated. Of course, certain line items are going to cost what they cost — the foundation, walls, and roof for instance. But you can have quite a say about what goes inside the foundation, walls, and roof.

We wanted a custom kitchen — and we got it. It will be gorgeous (actually it already is gorgeous, the cabinets are nearly ready to be installed). But in the bathroom and the clothes closet we are falling back on the standard — IKEA.

At the time we were first conferring with Laurel, our designer, about the design of the laneway house we weren’t sure what kind of clothes closet we wanted. We had been spoiled by having a custom closet system installed in our condo, and we thought we might want the same in the laneway. So Laurel gave us a space that would fit any closet system that fits into a 200 cm width. And we left the item off the builder’s budget.

But after living in the rental for a while and sharing a closet, we realized that we could design our own clothing storage system ourselves, and why spend more? Go with PAX by IKEA.

Surprisingly, pretty close to what we want except for the dress — not my style.

On an unscheduled trip out to IKEA last week (long, boring story) we saw that the PAX system was on sale for 15% off until the end of September. So now we had a deadline. And thanks to the Main House, we had a space to store the flat-pack boxes until the system could be installed. So I pulled out the graph paper and we started to put together a closet that works for us.

Driving out to the IKEA on Saturday I had that tightening around the temples that means “I am not looking forward to this”. I love IKEA and used to love strolling around and finding things that I didn’t know I wanted, and putting them into those handy big bags and then taking them home and putting them away never to be seen or used. But this time we had to buy exactly what we needed. We had to have it delivered. And I was not looking forward to stalking the warehouse to find the right products and then wrangling them onto those airport luggage carts and manoeuvring through the check-out (I have terrible check-out karma) and then standing in line for the delivery desk. It’s a big deal.

BUT when we got there and realized that part of our plan would have to be abandoned because we could see it wouldn’t work, I started to go into full anxiety-mode.

We wound our way to the bedroom section and DH found an angel of mercy in a yellow shirt, Nancy, who held my hand and walked us through the process. First she drew up what we wanted on a computer that showed everything in a nice realistic rendering. She printed off a list of everything we had asked for and entered the numbers into another computer that showed whether or not they had it in stock (spoiler alert! — they did) then spoke those magic words that made all the difference. IKEA will not only deliver for a fee, but for another (perfectly reasonable) fee they will pull the items off the shelves for you. I could feel the relief radiating off DH, who was sure he would drag the wrong box off the shelf and we would have it delivered and then we would have to take it back and then there would be a lot of hassle…..and no, that was not going to happen. Nor would a grandmother-aged little old lady (me) have to lug huge boxes full of Hasvik doors onto those tiny carts.

That is how a trip to IKEA that we thought would take all afternoon left us enough time to go to IDSWest.

We still had a bother getting through the check-out (not IKEA’s fault — it’s my karma to get in the wrong line up and then have the cashier have to change the tape just when I get to the front) but….the items were all delivered the following afternoon.

We are looking forward to seeing our new closet in place. And we are happy that we got it for the lowest price we could. We have other places to put that money.

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Posted in Housing, Laneway House, Uncategorized and tagged Decor, Lane Home, Lane house, Laneway House, Small House, Small Style. Bookmark the permalink.

It’s a wrap!

Posted on September 18, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

No, it’s not a stealth house, our laneway is now all covered in a layer of, well, paper.

(click to enlarge)

I don’t know why, but to me it looks larger like this. Looking at it all one colour you can see the massing of the building. Placing the bulk of the upper story beside the stepped-back profile of the gabled roof doesn’t overwhelm the lot. On the other side of the upper storey we have the deck and the living roof outside the kitchen window–so you have that open feeling there, too.

The big hole used by the city to hook us up to the water and sewer is gone. And we are nearly ready to hook up to the electricity.

The power is going to come down that shiny tube for the laneway and the main house and run under the laneway and under the back yard to the main house. That means that ugly line that runs across will be GONE!

And the garden side of the laneway looks all wrapped up, too.

And way down at the botton, beside the bedroom window? It’s siding.

Maybe it will just spread across the outside like a wonderful, lovely, er, mold.

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Day 123 — a meeting with the builders

Posted on September 7, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

We always get so much accomplished when we meet face to face with our designer and builder from Novell. Last evening Angelito took us through the place and showed us where work had been accomplished over the past two weeks.

On the deck the lights have been installed and the torchon applied. In fact, all the torchon has been applied to the flat roof areas, too.

Here’s the area that will hold the living roof right off the deck. That’s a kitchen window you see to the left.

We really noticed the difference inside between the roof with the torchon and without. Previously there was a small lake in our downstairs bedroom from the heavy rains we’ve been getting. Now everything inside is nice and dry.

The living roof is nearly ready for us — but we are not ready for it. A few weeks of work have to be finished.

Inside all the wiring is done. Plus the sprinkler system is installed.

We have electrical wiring for the lights, low voltage wiring for the AV (with speakers in the ceiling), and more low voltage wiring for the alarm system. It’s going to be so good to have all this hidden behind the drywall.

Downstairs we see where the pocket door is going to go to close off the closet and bathroom from the hallway. I’ll have my own private dressing area!

Then we sat down with Laurel to talk about finishes. It’s surprising how much there was to discuss when we have narrowed down the choices already. The cabinet finish (walnut, with the grain on the horizontal), the floor (a grey-brown engineered floor), and the trim (very plain, baseboards only, no crown trim). We chatted a bit about the paint colours. And we chose the tiles for the bathroom. Two by two grey-brown for the floor, two by six white subway tiles for the shower and white hexagonal tiles for the shower floor and niche. We did talk about putting in larger tiles on the floor, but we love the non-slip aspect of the smaller ones, especially since we will be aging in place and safety is a big consideration.

We also talked about the window covering. This is going to be tricky because the windows go right to the ceiling, plus they open to the inside, so we may be going in a totally different direction than we had thought.

What’s next? Well the sheathing inspector just wants to see a letter from the engineers about the torchon (we think he is being extra picky about the living roof, a reasonable consideration) and then he’ll sign off. The water has to be connected before the drywall is put on, but I talked to the city last week (didn’t contact the Mayor’s office as had been suggested, just the Engineering office) and they were pretty sure the water and sewer would be connected early next week.

Then there will be insulation (a combination of spray foam and batting). Then the drywall! What a difference that will make. Everything is on track for the millwork, and the lights are on order.

A great meeting and we continue to be thrilled and excited!

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Do I really need that?

Posted on September 4, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

While we are waiting for the great strides that the laneway house will be making in the next few weeks, we are busy doing some decorating for the new place? Compensating? Maybe, but the tasks have to be done and we will do them. Ordering lights. Arranging for a headboard to be built. Checking out the bed situation.

Plus this evening DH told me that he would like to go up to the storage space this weekend and see if we can winnow down the amount of, well, crap that we have there. Even if we just organize a couple of boxes to be carted off to the Salvation Army we’ll be further ahead.

As if to emphasize the point, tonight I managed to break the coffee grinder. Not the whole thing, just the lid. Necessary to grind coffee as it contains the switch to turn the grinder off and on. Do we have another grinder? Of course! Plus another lid. But not here. No, they are put away in the storage space. If we are lucky we will run across them when we are rooting around the storage space this weekend. If not, we will have to buy our coffee pre-ground, because we must have coffee.

At times like this, it’s good to review a few rules for thinning down our belongings. Here, we see “10 Decluttering Principles to Help Anyone Clear the Clutter”. Things to remember:

1. Stop the Flow of Stuff Coming In.

We’ve already started cutting back on the papers entering the home, switching to emailed bills that are stored online, and we refuse to buy anything new. New books go straight onto the Kindle. But that doesn’t include furnishings for the new place, we have boxes of lights piled about. So there’s still a little work to be done there.

2. Declutter at Least One Item a Day.

OK, noble aspiration. But it’s difficult to find one item per day. I have managed to get rid of some decorating magazines by passing them along. And I’ve been throwing out my shabbier socks.

Let’s skip ahead.

5. Decide to Not Keep Things out of Guilt or Obligation.

This is the tough one, isn’t it? Especially since I’ve got so much of my parents’ things to dispose of. What is an extra dish or glass, what is a relic? Something to work on.

But it’s all summed up with the final suggestion:

10. Do Not Waste Your Life on Clutter. Every item you own takes time out of your life: time to manage it, clean it, repair it, and maintain it; time to choose between objects of a similar category; time spent shopping for it… and that doesn’t even mention the time spent earning the money to pay for it in the first space. Decide to sacrifice less of your precious life on the pursuit and ownership of stuff.

That’s the goal. to live life with the minimum of belongings to weigh us down and complicate our lives. Because you can get trapped by your extra stuff.

It not just clutters your life, it can cost you money. We are paying for a storage space every month. But some people pay a lot.

In the basement of Tribeca’s newest luxury high rise, the storage wars are underway. 56 Leonard just sold a 200 square-foot storage unit for $300,000 — that’s $1,500 a square foot.

More than we are paying. But why pay anything? Better to just rid ourselves of the stuff we aren’t using.

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Posted in Laneway House, Minimalism, Uncategorized and tagged Lane house, Laneway House, Small Style. Bookmark the permalink.

Decorating a small space for the most impact

Posted on September 1, 2013 by ladywholivesdownthelane

While we wait for the laneway to be completed, we are working hard to make sure we have all the decorative components ready to install when the time is right.

We are challenged by the small space, of course, but we know we can have a smart looking home — a jewel box of a house — with lots of special decorating touches.

This article at Apartment Therapy sums up the challenges and offers some rules to follow:

1. Don’t be afraid of drama. We are counting on our lighting to add a real punch to our spaces. Already on hand are the sputnik light for the bedroom.

I’ve always liked the idea of a chandelier hanging over the end of the bed — but we needed one that would fit in with our mid-century modern decor.

The kitchen will have a saucer lamp, another icon of mid-century modern.

and of course, there’s the nut lamp to hang over the garden door.

2. Use every nook and cranny. And

3. A place for everything and everything in its place.

This is a no-brainer as far as I’m concerned. A lot of people like open shelves in their kitchens, and I can see their charm. But our kitchen is also our sitting room, so we are putting everything we can behind closed, walnut-clad doors. Including our appliances that would ordinarily sit out in the open, which we are putting in an appliance garage.

Another handy rule:

6. Install wall-mounted shelves.

Our designer has planned for built-in shelves along the wall beside the staircase. These will serve not only as the repository for books and family pictures, but also as a “landing strip” for our keys and the mail when we come in the door. We’ll put baskets or decorative boxes to hold them out of eyesight but close at hand.

7. Bring in as much natural light as possible.

Another no-brainer. We are challenged in this regard by the slope of the lot that the home is built into — we have limited access for putting in windows. It worked out for us as we want our “quiet, dark” bedroom downstairs. Upstairs we put in windows wherever we could, a glass door out to the deck, and even a window between the upper cabinets and the counter.

8. Use multi-functional furniture.

Our bed will have storage underneath, and we are putting in drawers in our bottom stairs in the hall, so we get this message loud and clear. We are also looking at how we can have storage put into an ottoman for our sitting room area.

Good ideas all, read the whole article for more great suggestions. And stay tuned for more news on our decor!

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Posted in Laneway House, Small House, Uncategorized and tagged Decor, Lane Home, Laneway House, Small House, Small Style. Bookmark the permalink.

The Lady Who Lives Down the Lane

Tag Archives: Small Style

Packing style into 500 square feet

Laneway House Tour Recap

Getting ready for the Big Show! Places, everyone!

Cute and little house in the woods.

We will live a well-insulated life in our laneway

Closest to the closet we want

It’s a wrap!

Day 123 — a meeting with the builders

Do I really need that?

Decorating a small space for the most impact

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