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Design and Planning

Needless to say it helps to have an architect in the family. . . .

The whole thing came about when we decided to convert our nice little rental property in Montrose CA, into our family home. The neighborhood was super wonderful and the great school district beckoned and as we began planning for our third child (Reid Turner Matthews, born May 8th, 2006) we realized that we had seriously outgrown our cool historic Altadena house.

So, planning began. Because Demery had worked in Glendale before we knew that the City had a very challenging Design Review process involving presenting your design at a public, televised, meeting and that their building department was very exacting and challenging to get through. We also knew that construction prices were skyrocketing. And yet we went ahead with our plan. Foolish? Time will tell.

Demery's design called for us to basically leave the existing ground floor plan with a few minor changes, including the addition of a stairway in what used to be the hall, and the addition of a small family room behind the kitchen. The 2 existing bedrooms would become Demery's design studio and a playroom. The new upstairs would incorporate a master suite and a bedroom for each of our 3 boys.

The design process began sometime in March of 2005. After the majority of the design work was finished by Demery in the fall (after 100s of hours of work) I decided to learn an interesting 3D modeling and rendering program, called Sketchup, to make a perspective rendering of the house, one that was required for the design review process.

The finished rendering of the front (click for a larger version)	The finished rendering of the back (click for a larger version)
The existing house.

VARIENCE HEARING: November 9th, 2005
Our first public hearing was required for us to get a variance for the driveway which was not the required 9 feet wide. The alternative was to shave one foot off the south side of the house and widen the 8-foot driveway. Not really an alternative. The process of getting ready for these hearings was substantial. Demery spent months preparing the drawings and submittals for the board and I put in many long hours preparing many of the other requirements like vicinity maps, photographic surveys, neighbor notification mailings and so on and so on and so on. . .

The hearing went well. . . BUT, we had neighbors from behind who showed up to the meeting with their lawyer who asked the DRB to keep us from doing the project (the 2nd story would block some of their mountain views). The DRB told them that a variance hearing was not the proper venue for this kind of opposition and that they should return to the actual Design Review hearing to voice their concerns. While this seemed like a setback to us, it gave us the opportunity to meet these neighbors and we took out plans and renderings to their home a little later, met with them and a couple of other neighbors and, to some degree, allayed their fears about us overdeveloping the site or about us doing this project speculatively. We were happy that after we met they decided not to come to the full DRB hearing.

DESIGN REVIEW BOARD HEARING: February 16th, 2006
The Second public hearing was the one we were dreading. Having gone to a couple of such meetings to see how they worked we had seen architects sent back for complete redesigns and most sent back for some kind of major alteration to their projects. Powerful and sometimes ruthless we just didn't know what the DRB would say about our plans.

[Here's where I get to be a proud husband. . .]
NO DISCUSSION. None. They loved the design and approved it unanimously without discussion. They liked it so much one board member asked Demery to take his place on the board (as he was leaving it soon) and a city building department planner also suggested she join the board!!!!!! I should have known there was no need to worry about the hearing ;-)

With our plans approved Demery prepared the final construction docs for building and safety review. At the same time we went through the process of getting contractors bids on the project. Permits were pulled on June 29th & 30th 2006.

Next Phase: Bidding