NoVa Greenovation: July 2010

While we were on a fabulous vacation out west (pictures here), the house got some guts. The plumber, electrician, and HVAC (heating and cooling) subs were able to get in and rough-in all of the connections. Thanks to our friends Kevin and Alison for taking these great pictures and keeping us up to speed while we were away.

Solar tube in the kids' bath surrounded by insulated air ducts. The A/C vents will be in the ceiling because (a) there's more room for them there than under the second story floor, and (b) cool air sinks and hot air rises so cooling will be more efficient with the vents in the ceiling.

Plumbing rough-in for the master vanity (which will have two sinks). How cool to be able to use spray paint to write reminders on your office floor!

Plumbing rough-in for the kids' bath and the installed bath (right). The bath and wall surround are made of Vikrell, a new material from Kohler. We're giving it a shot because it got great reviews on strength and durability and it saved us a couple hundred bucks over a cast iron tub and much more over a tiled wall. And, of course, we will be installing low-flow shower heads (1.5 gallons per minute) and toilets (1.28 gallons per flush) to reduce water consumption. If I had my way, we would have composting toilets, but Arlington County hasn't deemed them acceptable...yet.

Rough-in for the master toilet and installed master shower. We used a Kohler Vikrell shower stall here too. The name of the line is Sterling.

Rough-in for recessed lights in the family room. We realized one row of lights was too close to the kitchen so they'll have to be moved further into the family room [crosses fingers for cheap change order].

Within the next week or so, the house should be ready for its drywall. The kitchen cabinets arrived yesterday and just about all the finishes are on site now. Once the drywall is up, the floors will go in and the cabinets and vanities will be installed. Rolling right along!

It's been an exciting few weeks. This phase of the work is going pretty quickly. They finished the framing and we took our maiden voyage up to our second floor while the exterior walls were still open. It gave us a new perspective of our whole neighborhood and we really like the view. We have three celestory windows in our bedroom, positioned over the bed and looking out over the backyard. From Jody's height, you can see the tips of rooftops. From my height, all you can see are treetops and sky. I LOVE it!

In the kitchen, we decided to reuse our old kitchen window since we liked the size and it was fairly new (7 or 8 years old) and in good condition. We're also reusing a half-round window that was in the old family room. It will go in my closet. Jody's closet and the upstairs "kids'" bath will have solar tubes. They are highly reflective tubes, 14in diameter, that pop out the top of the roof and channel sunlight into the room. Ours are by Velux. It's a great way to get natural light into a space when the sun is out so you reduce electricity use.

Another note about the framing: we couldn't afford to use FSC-certified wood for the whole project, but we were able to use it at least for the roof trusses. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certifies lumber that comes from a sustainably managed forest, so that the forest can continue to be productive for a very long time with minimal harm the ecosystem. The FSC website says "The FSC label provides a credible link between responsible production and consumption of forest products, enabling consumers and businesses to make purchasing decisions that benefit people and the environment as well as providing ongoing business value."

We labored long and hard to decide which roof shingles and siding to choose. The siding, which is unfortunately vinyl (we just didn't have an extra $5k for the hardiplank), will come later. The color is granite gray. The roof shingles are from the Certainteed Landmark line and they're called "driftwood." We fell in love with the many subtle colors and think it will look very nice with the earthy gray color we chose for the siding. Since the main view from the street will be the large sloped roof, we spent a lot of time deciding on the color.

Enough blather. Time for some pictures!!!!

FSC certification stamp

Looking down the stair case from the second floor.

An action shot of the huge fork lift used to get the plywood up to the second story.

Shot of the back with the side roofs to the right almost finished.

We were actually supposed to have what's known as an "eyebrow" that would have made the second story look like a pop-top addition instead of part of the new structure. It was supposed to wrap around the back so there would have been a little roof overhang across the back of the house between the first and second story. Well, since the architect overestimated the roof height, that lip was hitting right at the top of the back windows shown in this picture. It would have blocked what little North light will come into those windows. We had luckily stopped by the house on Saturday to check on progress and the framers happened to be there putting up the eyebrow. The supervisor framer explained the situation and we had them stop work on it immediately. We then, with the framer, designed an overhang for the patio doors (pictured below) to help add some interest to the back of the house since it was pretty bland looking without the eyebrow.