Carriage-House Style

Room additions often become ho-hum assignments for the many chronically uninspired remodelers who manage to gain a client’s trust. The approach is cookie-cutter. Open up the back of a home on its first floor. Add a box. And “Voila!” they’ve got a room addition. Some might even argue that the standard room addition — in its ubiquitous incarnation — is the remodeling equivalent of production housing. 1. There are a lot of them. 2. They all look the same with their flat roofs and clapboard-style vinyl siding. 3. they stick out like a sore thumb. At least that is the tendency.

When inspired, however, room additions add much more than space. They bring a new richness to the overall massing of a home. And perhaps most importantly, good room additions help an existing floor plan function better. Silent Rivers Design/Build of Clive, Iowa managed to accomplish both in its recent remodel of an American classic — a modest-sized, red-brick colonial in the heart of the Hawkeye state.

Forty years ago, a four-bedroom, 2,835-sq.-ft. home like this one stood firmly at the higher end of the American Dream. At the time, the average American home came in well under 2,000 sq. ft. But, my, how times have changed. These days, 2,800 sq. ft. can feel pretty cramped for a family of four, particularly when that space is segmented into a traditional (living room, dining room, kitchen and porch) floor plan.

Silent Rivers’ principal Chaden Halfhill first encountered the owners of the colonial at a local home show in Des Moines. The remodeler was an exhibitor at the show and the family was actively in the market for more space. In fact, the clients had attended the show with the express purpose of screening remodeling companies for their project. (It’s funny how that works sometimes.)

Halfhill won the business and feels the homeowners picked Silent Rivers because he conveyed a willingness to attend to even the smallest of details, and because the design styles shown in a photo book of completed Silent Rivers’ projects fit best with their hopes for the space. And what is more, “they generally trusted us to work with them to get it right,” says Halfhill, who is also a sculptor.

Devil’s Work

Attention to detail was what the client wanted and attention to detail is what the client got. For example, the clients were keen on matching the red brick used on the original house for its added exterior. Halfhill not only found the right brick, but also took pains to match the mortar color and texture from the existing house to the new. Says Halfhill, “It took us a while to find the right aggregate to use when we mixed the mortar, but we finally hit upon the right combination of materials.”

Later, when the homeowner found a magazine photo showing a fireplace surround with a geometric positioning of the tiles, Halfhill worked with the tile installer to cut and place slates in orderly, yet distinctive, positions, giving the client the traditional/modern look she sought.

In addition to the slate-tile surround, the clients signed on for a contemporary looking maple and cherry mantel in the new room that serves as a pleasing visual terminus looking from the main house into the new room. They also agreed to add a rich coffered ceiling.

“The idea with the coffer was to scale the room down because there was some height there,” says Halfhill. “They wanted to give it a sense of warmth. They wanted to give it a sense of formality that would be characteristic of that room.”

And so, detail by detail, an inspired room addition with a full basement took shape, increasing the overall square footage of the house to 4,107 sq. ft. Ultimately, the completed project, which won a Silver Award for best room addition in Qualified Remodeler’s Master Design Awards, met the client’s overriding goal of creating a new family space fully within the scale and style of the original home.