Outside Again

Now that the weather here has finally turned mild (highs in the 70s, breezy), I’ve felt less inclined to go to “the gym” and more eager to get out in the fresh air. A nasty cold kept me in for a week or so, but I’ve since had several opportunities to reacquaint myself with the neighborhood. As usual, changes are more noticeable when some time has elapsed. The “little pink house” had been reduced to an empty lot the day after I reported it as a pile of rubble, and when I next saw it, on October 25, workmen were digging trenches for the footings of the new construction. The following day, a cement mixer was on site pouring concrete. The next time I got out (November 1), several courses of concrete block had been laid on top of the foundation, and the wall has continued to rise over the past week.

A few blocks away, I was astonished to see another vacant lot. The previous property owner had died some years ago, and the house had been empty ever since. The yard had been allowed to grow up into such a wilderness that it brought to mind visions of the prince hacking through briers to get to the Sleeping Beauty. Some months ago, the yard had been cleared, leaving only a few shrubs, and it was rumored that the property had been sold and the new owner intended to “remodel” or “renovate” the house. I was dubious. The property is a large corner lot overlooking the bay, and the house was small and run-down. The new owner had undoubtedly paid a pretty penny for the location alone. So I was not surprised that the house had been demolished, just startled to realize that it had happened while I wasn’t paying attention. Now the property is surrounded by erosion control fencing, but a yellow building permit sign is the only other sign of activity so far.

As an aside, one advantage of walking on a treadmill for several months is that I’ve gotten in the habit of walking faster, so walking outside should be better exercise for me than before. I’ve yet to match my time on the treadmill, at least in part because of traffic. Yesterday I stood in a crosswalk looking impatient while half a dozen cars passed; I felt justified in shaving that 20 seconds off my time. Today, on the other hand, a car actually stopped for me in the same crosswalk. Since there was a car speeding toward us in the opposite direction, I just shrugged helplessly. But the considerate motorist seemed bent on being courteous, and the other motorist, seeing that one car was already stopped for me, also stopped. Amazing! I was too intrigued by this drama to even notice how many seconds that diversion had cost me.

Another One Bites the Dust

One drawback to walking outside only once a week is that I lose track of what’s going on in my neighborhood. Today I was alarmed to see an excavator in the front yard of the little pink stucco cottage around the corner from me on Summit Street. As I approached, I could see that the house appeared to have been gutted, and there was a building permit staked in the yard.

When we moved to this neighborhood in 1980, our house (by virtue of having already been built onto) was the largest one on the block, with the possible exception of the two corner houses that face on Bayview Street, which runs along the bluff overlooking the bay. Since then our next-door neighbors on both sides have essentially doubled the size of their houses with additions, as have other neighbors down the street in both directions. Of the thirteen houses on the street, five are new construction, made possible by demolition of existing houses. Needless to say, each new house is larger than the former one.

The case of the little pink house will be no different, I’m sure. It sits on one side of a double lot, so its replacement will doubtless spread out to fill the allowable area and will almost certainly be two stories high. The existing single-story house has just two small bedrooms and one bath, a modest living/dining room, and a combined kitchen and breakfast room, plus a small screened front porch. A pull-down stair once provided access to an attic that appears to be standing height at the center. The house also boasts a daylight basement (rare in this area), but today there was water standing in it from yesterday’s rain, and it smelled dank and unusable.

Probably no one will really mourn the loss of this house. Much of its flooring has been removed, exposing rotting subfloor. Paneling in the bedrooms has likewise been removed to reveal faded and mildewed wallpaper. The breakfast room, with windows on three sides, must have been very pleasant, and what was left of the kitchen looked promising. It may well have been a cozy abode. Still, the owners’ attempts to sell or even rent it had not met with much success of late, and it had stood empty for many months.

It will be interesting to see what takes its place.

One Mystery Solved

In an earlier post, I wrote about the mysterious two-story “watchtower” in front of a house under construction nearby. (Actually “in front of” may be misleading. The property is on a bluff overlooking Mobile Bay, so the bay side is probably regarded as the front, with an expanse of lawn between the house and the edge of the bluff, and the street side as the back, with the driveway, garage, and other outbuildings.)

Today I finally had a chance to investigate it again, suspecting that further development had occurred. Indeed it had, and it is now clear that the building is a very tall workshop. A workbench extends around two sides and pegboard around all sides of the single room, and shelves above the workbench range up the walls toward the high ceiling. An extension ladder is currently propped against them, but presumably some more permanent means of access will eventually be provided.

The mystery that now remains is: Why so tall? What is going to be constructed in this workshop that requires the two-story height? That I may never find out unless I make it a point to meet the new neighbors and ask.

De Gustibus Est Desperandum

Although I have limited experience in book design, I appreciate handsome books. I have a reasonably good eye but no creative imagination, so I especially admire creatively designed books. Conversely, I am dismayed by poorly laid out books (often self-published). As a copy editor, I similarly deplore evidence of lackadaisical editing: typos, misspellings, errors in fact, and so on. But I realize that I can’t take responsibility for all the books that are published.

I often think that architects must feel the same way, appreciating beautiful buildings and sighing over or cringing at ugly ones. Some buildings are just ugly from the outset; others become ugly through injudicious alteration, and it is the latter type that I see a lot of. Many of the houses in my neighborhood are examples of design by accretion, and our house is among them.

I will readily admit that our house is hideous. Originally built as a vacation cottage, it had front porches upstairs and down. When some previous owners enclosed these porches, they tacked on a new front porch—not much more than a stoop really, of brick steps covered by a roof supported by incongruous “iron lace” pillars. They or some other owners built a concrete patio onto the back, then later enclosed it for a screened porch. The people from whom we bought it had added on a master suite above that porch. The porch, which extends to the west side of the house, continues to the east as a single carport. In order to provide covered parking for two cars, some other owners had added an aluminum carport onto the front of that. The end result of all these additions is a monstrosity, but at least it isn’t our fault (except to the extent that we haven’t done anything to make it better).

The ugliness of our house was a fait accompli when we bought it. But when new improvements are made to a house, it seems reasonable to assume that the current owners view them as an actual improvement. Though some of our neighbors have in fact managed to add on tastefully and unobtrusively, many other changes make one wonder, “What were they thinking?”

For example, there is a house around the corner that, when we moved here, was basically a big two-story box except that it had a large uncovered front porch stretching the width of the house. This was basically just a large slab of concrete, with no railings or roof. The front door opened directly into the living room, which also stretched the width of the house, and at some point the owners decided they needed a covered entry, so they built a little box in the middle of this expanse, tarted up with fancy woodwork, including a broken pediment over the door, but still looking very much like a wart on the house. This alone was bad enough. Then an artist bought the house and decided to add on further, constructing a studio area over part of the porch (and existing foyer), adding columns and railings to the now-covered porch. The result was what one local wag dubbed “the sky box” (see photo below). Note the clumsy way in which the existing roof was extended to cover this addition (in case it’s not obvious from the photo, that’s copper roofing used to extend asbestos “slate” shingles). When I asked an architect friend (whose sign was in front of the house) to reassure me that he had had no input into the design process, he hastened to do so, adding, “And the worst thing is that they want to put the vinyl siding back on.” (The siding covers existing clapboards, I believe.)

There’s a house a little farther afield that we had viewed as having delusions of grandeur. It’s a modest brick ranch, long and low, too low for the windows that have been crowded into it, especially the would-be-elegant Palladian-style window (flanked by two sidelights) whose proportions are quite ruined by being truncated and overpowered by heavy woodwork . As if this weren’t bad enough, the owners have now built what can only be described as a wooden deck onto the front of the house. You probably can’t tell it from the photo, but the posts supporting the gable (which is also new) have decorative “gingerbread” brackets, further incongruous with the style of the porch.

There are times when form should follow function, but it’s hard to say what function this porch will serve. People don’t do much porch sitting around here (too many bugs). Perhaps the owners are preparing for the day when their back yard falls into the gully on which it perilously verges (we’ve been watching for some time as the owners added onto the back of the house, moving ever closer to the precipice).

There are, however, some home alterations that must make architects (and everyone else) smile. My friend the artist Dean Mosher has been working for the past 25 years to transform a plain crackerbox tract house into a fantastic fairyland castle. It’s still a work in progress because he has limited time and funds for the work (most of which he’s doing himself), but you can see from the photo below what a charming and unique home and studio have resulted (it has been featured on HGTV and in many print media).

Spoilsports

Regular readers of this blog know that I like to explore houses under construction. Unfortunately, just when they begin to get really interesting, it usually occurs to someone to start locking them up. Sometimes this happens surprisingly late in the game, though. I personally do no harm; I wipe my feet carefully before entering and tread lightly, touching nothing except an occasional doorknob of cupboard handle. But I have often wondered why tramps and teenagers don’t discover these conveniently open shelters.

A locked door is usually the end of the adventure, though often they’re secured just enough to keep them from being blown open by the wind or brushed open by animals, and the security is easily defeated. Still, sooner or later, I have to give up.

I’m philosophical about this, but I have to say I was a bit taken aback when the sign pictured here appeared on a utility pole in front of one of the houses I’ve been watching. I meant to take a photo before it was damaged (by vandals or a storm, it’s hard to say), but the sense of it wasn’t any clearer before it was broken. Why would contractors who are not working on the job be coming to the site in the first place?

I’ve pretty much lost interest in the house itself, anyway, but I’m still curious about the “watchtower” in the front yard. As can be seen from the photo, it’s a square two-story tower. The first floor is windowless, but there is a small window on each side of the second floor—or what would be the second floor if there were a floor. So far, it is completely open and empty inside, and I’ll be interested to see whether a spiral staircase is later installed or what. My best guess is that perhaps it’s intended as a fort/playhouse for visiting grandchildren, but I suppose only time will tell.

Scouting Houses

Like farmers, construction workers around here work “all the hours God sends,” so it is not unusual to see them working on a Saturday, especially if there has been inclement weather earlier in the week. On Sunday mornings, though, one can generally count on finding construction sites deserted, so I schedule my new home construction explorations for my Sunday-morning walks.

This morning I checked again on the “mystery room” I’ve been wondering about. I’ve been forced to conclude it must be intended as a sort of butler’s pantry. It opens off a small hallway that connects the kitchen with the dining room and living room/study, and it now has counters and shelves that suggest storage of crockery or even food. I’m still a little puzzled by two tall cabinets without shelves (one might be a broom closet, but two?). I will continue to keep tabs on this room as long as I can get into the house.

I spent considerably more time exploring the gigantic edifice going up around the corner. Although it doesn’t have actual bay frontage (it’s on a bluff above the City’s bayfront park), it does overlook the bay, so I guess it is technically a “bay house.” My first assumption, given its scale, was that it was intended as a sort of family compound, where extended family could be accommodated for summer vacations. It has a three-car garage, a “breakfast room” larger than most formal dining rooms (large enough for a table seating at least 12), and a huge open space (connected dining room and family room) extending across the width of the house and opening onto a porch facing the bay (one of several porches opening off various rooms). It also appeared to have numerous bedrooms upstairs and down. It seemed clearly designed for housing and/or entertaining a large crowd.

Today I was pleased to see a sheaf of house plans laid out on a table. But the first-floor plan was crossed out with a large red X and had “Do Not Use” written across it, and it quickly became evident that the second-floor plan also bore no relation to the actual framing. The original plan was for a spacious master suite on the first floor, along with a “study” with its own closet and adjoining full bath; the general lines of these remained, but the master bath suite had been drastically rearranged (with one shower room not connected with the rest of the bath at all but instead opening off the entrance to the master suite), and the study bath was also different. Similarly, the large room adjoining the kitchen, originally designated as an entry/laundry room with a pantry and powder room opening off it, had clearly been rethought. (The architect who designed the house is one who doesn’t come cheap, and I shudder to think how much all these changes must be costing.)

Upstairs, the area (on the plan) is divided into Bedroom A (with its adjoining bath, closet, and attic space) and Bedroom B (ditto), but the actual upstairs is now cut up into smaller and more puzzling portions. The most inexplicable is the bath suite of one of the bedrooms. Although the toilet is in a separate room (with window), the tub and lavatory open into the bedroom through a double-width cased opening. Even assuming that double doors will fill the opening, this seems odd. It would be overkill even for handicapped access, and since there is no evidence of any plan for an elevator to the second floor, this would be nonsense, anyway. I’ll definitely be keeping my eye on this puzzle to see how it develops!