From Blank Slate to Design Development

In the fall of 2019 I was madly digesting everything I could about architecture and trends. The goal? Trying to figure out what kind of home we would build on the lot. Should it be modern? It would certainly stand out in the very traditional neighborhood. Craftsman? Lots of those in Astoria. Cape Cod with lots of gorgeous heavy woodwork? That one got a resounding "No". We started thinking about what we wanted - simple, easy, timeless. Not overdone. I hit Houzz.com, looking through interior and exterior photos, showing select ones to Scott (who did not enjoy this process near as much as I did). We eventually settled on modern with a Scandinavian influence. 

Mangosteen House, designed by Chadbourne+Doss

I started following architectural firms on Houzz that were in the Pacific Northwest and skewed modern. There are a lot of good ones in Seattle and Portland. And I quickly found that almost all of them had a minimum contract well over our budget. One of the firms, Chadbourne+Doss, responded that they work on both big and small projects and were intrigued by our lot and the prospect of building modern in the small traditional neighborhood. And in addition to their main offices in Seattle, they had a location in Astoria. Their project photos on Houzz were very enticing.

We met Daren Doss at the lot on the day of the core drilling in March of 2020. It was cold and blustery, normal for Astoria, and we talked about our requirements and vision for the house. Daren thought it could be done and we decided to follow up in the next week with a full conversation and next steps. We drafted our basic requirements as follows:

1. House must not slide down the hill
2. See rule #1
3. Do not skimp on external (envelope) materials 
4. Do not over-build for the neighborhood
5. Age-in-place (elevator is an option)
6. Clean, well-edited design (think Scandinavian modern-ish)
7. Green building and energy where practical - leading, not bleeding, edge
8. Quality, not quantity - no underused space 
9. Focus on views on each level
10. Smaller private spaces, larger public spaces
11. Master with private balcony
12. Large main floor balcony 
13. Lower level recreation/bunk room

We were assigned homework. A list of questions like, "If your house were a car, what kind and why?" to which we answered: A Mini Cooper S because it's fun, yet practical; sporty and fuel efficient; bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. There were a lot of questions about movies and music, what our days look like, our routines. How we wanted to live in and out of the house. It was fun and made us think about what we really wanted.

    

The results of that work, along with the preliminary geotechnical report and the survey, were three design options presented in February 2021. The exterior elevations and interior floor plans varied widely. I liked the Option 1 exterior, but the floor plan wasn't going to work for aging in place. Option 2 had a first floor kitchen and living area we liked, but the second floor was chopped up and the exterior elevation didn't do it for us. We selected Option 3 because it was the only one that included an elevator, we liked the flat roof design, and the floor plan, while still needing work, was closer to what we had in mind.

The Design Development phase included two major iterations in May and July 2021. The biggest surprise was the flat roof - it disappeared. This was a disappointment because we really liked the look, but the roof was just too big to do it well. And we wouldn't be able to take advantage of solar energy in a big way, which is something we really want to do, so shed roof. Other changes between iterations were exterior materials and kitchen window height, the addition of a powder room and butler's pantry, firewood storage and a three foot bump out at the stair landing that changed the back elevation in a positive way.