No more basic ranch No more basic ranch (July 23, 2004)

New entry adds curb appeal -- with plenty of room for the whole family

By Carol Blitzer

Creating curb appeal and a new front entrance drove this Los Altos remodel, but the beneficiaries were far more than the family of three: Three cats now enjoy their own "cat zoo," a screened porch off the kitchen that allows their cats to be truly indoor/outdoor.

The cats can come and go as they please through a small cat door, and have easy access to their litter boxes on the porch. They can lounge on layered "kitty condos," use the scratch post, view the birds -- and daydream to their hearts' content -- all while still safely indoors.

The cat zoo was partly possible because the owners decided to create a new back door, leading from the dining room/kitchen to the garden and swimming pool.

When Kacey Fitzpatrick, a designer/builder who works out of Mountain View, bought her Los Altos home, it was a basic ranch house "which was very ugly and had zero curb appeal." An odd solarium jutted out the front, and the entry was on the side of the house.

The first thing she and her partner, Deborah Kilpatrick, did was re-locate the front door to the actual front of the house -- complete with river-rock wainscoting, one of the many Craftsman details in the re-design. Douglas fir columns were sandblasted to bring out the grain. "Now we have a real sense of entry and welcome," Fitzpatrick said.

Today one walks down vertical-grain bamboo floors into a new entry hall, with a wall niche at the end as a focal point. Off to the right is an alder-shelved library, where the family can display its collection of rare books. They even weather-stripped the lower cabinets to keep the dust out. To create the entry and library, they had to sacrifice a small bedroom.

The living room picks up the river-rock theme around the fireplace. The ceiling was raised, and coffered, to nine feet. The entry to the dining room was widened, making the kitchen/dining room more open and connected. "We love to entertain and have big parties," she said.

The kitchen was redone with birch cabinets and Paradiso granite countertops. By cutting back one wall in the kitchen and adding a header for support, the usable space became much bigger.

The bathroom boasts knotty alder with a distressed finish. "We had room for a double sink, but wanted to maximize storage," Fitzpatrick said. The arch over the sink mimics the arch over the tub/shower, which is lined with 17-inch-square ceramic tiles.

In the basement, a large room is allocated for a gym and another for a wine cellar, complete with an acid-stained, epoxy-finish concrete floor. There's a media/family room, as well as plenty of storage.

In the end, the house is about 60 square feet smaller than when they started, but "now it feels much bigger and flows better," she added.

Behind the house is a cottage, connected by a wooden bridge/deck. This now serves as an office/guest quarters. An important design element in the cottage was use of terramed over the drywall, which added texture and an "earthy" feeling. "I like things that are earthbound and natural, but also modern," Fitzpatrick said.

The bathroom features a cast-concrete counter in a wavy shape with a vessel sink atop a rhomboid-shaped vanity. "It's meant to feel like it's floating," she said, noting that you can't see the structural support.

With a water theme, they chose glass tiles resembling a pool of sea water that "flow" from the bottom of the shower in an asymmetrical pattern across the floor. Slate tops the curb. A mirror extends to the floor, behind the "floating" concrete counter to create a sense of expansiveness.

The remodel was more like seven projects, done in several phases over a couple of years, but in the end, Fitzpatrick said, "It's a really cool house. I love it."

Goal of project:
Create curb appeal, improve flow of rooms

Unexpected problems:
Wet basement had to be waterproofed by excavating the whole perimeter and using a ParaSeal system.

Year house built:
1950s

Time to complete:
Done in stages over couple of years

Resources:
Builder/designer: Kacey Fitzpatrick, Avalon Enterprises, Mountain View; 969-0712
Cabinetry: Otto Bernegger Environmental Designs Inc., 732 Hurlingame Ave., Redwood City, 364-2370

E-mail a friend a link to this story.