Interiors: Modernizing a Row House in the Slope
[nggallery id=”26489″ template=galleryview] The folks from Coburn Architecture, based in Dumbo, have taken on the task of updating, and adding to, a row house in Park Slope. If you have interior projects large or small, amateur or professional you’d like to share, please contact us. This mid 19th century row house on a quiet street…
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The folks from Coburn Architecture, based in Dumbo, have taken on the task of updating, and adding to, a row house in Park Slope. If you have interior projects large or small, amateur or professional you’d like to share, please contact us.
This mid 19th century row house on a quiet street in Park Slope was in relatively poor condition when purchased by the client. The house next door had burned down many years before, leaving the lot vacant and overgrown, and the new owners wanted to build a structure in its place that would connect to the existing house.
The client’s ambitious program for the new structure required a new master suite with a spacious bath and dressing room, a dining room, a garage with a driveway (a luxury for city dwellers), and some outdoor living space. To avoid having to move to temporary quarters, the client elected to complete the project in two architectural phases, followed by an interior design phase.
UPDATE: Brendan Coburn just dropped us a note to clear up a couple of things: 1) The house is only a combined 3,400 square feet, as the addition is just two stories high; 2) The construction and renovation took place in four phases over eight years.
“The house is a good example of the art of interior design done well. The warmth will come with the family bringing their own things and natural clutter.”
The art of interior design is to capture the clients’ sense of self and style. No two interiors should ever look the same because no two clients will ever be the same. To say that an interior designer furnishes a house and then the clients bring
“their own stuff” is absurd. You can get that “look” by simply buying everything in a showroom.
So what CMU?? It’s a free country. Get over yourself and complain about something that really matters. Not whine about why someone else chose to expand their house on an adjacent lot.
Why the negativity? For the same reason we (certainly I) decry McMansions. This is a double-sized house which must be at least 7000 sq ft, done up to the gills, with comments like “this family of four needed substantial storage space” (huh?). So I find it ostentatious, but that’s my standard. The owners may be perfectly decent, saintly, Democrats ;), but they have spent more money than God on this house and created a sterile haven. And yes, I will comment negatively on that.
[Where the heck is this random ‘shoe’ everyone is getting so crazy about?]
ssloper: ok, I thought the whole thing was redone at the same time. I understand that a dining room can/usually is more formal than a kitchen. I wasn’t raised in a hut in the boonies, thank you. I just felt that given how coordinated every room is, that it is odd that not even the colors or some texture or some something are carried over from the dining room to kitchen or vice versa.
I’m sure they’re fine people.
Re: why are the kitchen and the dining room so at odds with one another?! From what I understand, the kitchen reno was done several years ago (first phase of the reno)–the dining room was done later when the attached building/garage/master BR were built. The DR is more formal than the eat-in K, so I don’t see a prob. I agree with Leffertslodger–why all the negativity? I am quite sure I know these people. They are very decent people, I’m sure I would not decorate my house in EXACTLY the same way because yes, we all have our own style, quirks, money to spend, etc. but overall I think they did an amazing job. Believe me, these people have family photos, kids, a dog, etc., but the photos were probably taken by the architecture firm who weeded out all but the carelessly tossed shoe…
What’s up with all of the negative mean-spirited commentary??? The owners’ designed and decorated their house to their liking not anyone else’s. This is why I stopped writing on this blog – too many haters. Instead of helping each other and creating a helpful on-line community, too many people find pleasure in bringing people down and tearing each other to shreds. I don’t get it???
And no – I am not the owner, the architect nor the interior designer. Just diassapointed!
No, no, correcting syntax on my previous post.
Just happens to have the same (odd) word…
cmu? I can’t understand what you said? Are you saying that it’s odd for me to expect the kitchen and the dining room to have some cohesive elements? I’m so confused.
ahhh! …odd expecting that…can ever make…