IDEAS FOR CHOOSING YOUR COLOR SCHEME

If you have a room in your house or office that you would like to renovate, here is an exercise in planning the color design. Stand in the middle of the room and think to yourself: What purpose(s) will this room have? What theme do I desire? What colors do I personally like and dislike? Which colors appear in my dream getaway vacation? From your responses to these questions, the colors best suited to that room might come to you.

Colors affect us physiologically. Some colors stimulate our appetites, others encourage discussion, still others make us feel optimistic or calm. Can you identify which colors apply to which effects? Here are some examples:

Red stimulates the appetite.
Yellow encourages discussion and induces optimism.
Green makes us feel calmer.

All colors do not need to match in one room. Non-matching colors can lend depth and interest when applied correctly.

Follow nature's lead: Choose darker values of color for the floor, medium values for the walls, and light values for the ceiling. This mimics the ground or forest floor, the trees, valleys and hills above the ground, and the sky.

Add an accent of black for a dramatic effect. This could take the form of black chairs or stools, a black shower curtain, or black pillows. Black in a white room creates grounding and dramatic contrast.

The Latest Color Trends

The "Tuscan" look is popular and utilizes earth tones such as browns, yellows, desert red shades and forest greens.

The "Southwest" look is also appealing to many, and calls for earth tones plus turquoise and teal.

"Island Colonial" requires nature tones plus dark brown accents. An example is yellow-green, yellow, yellow-orange and dark brown.

KIND WORDS FOR ON THE BEAM

Some of our favorite On The Beam clients celebrate with us.


We are coming up on our 25th Anniversary as a company called "On The Beam Remodeling". It actually starts in 2010, but we decided to celebrate a little early before the holiday season gets underway and everybody is fresh and bright-eyed, not groggy from over-partying. The company has undergone several transitions since 1985, to wit: a single ownership, a partnership, back to a single owner, and finally incorporation. Through it all we have demanded of ourselves the best that we can possibly deliver in quality at all levels, both to our clients and within the internal workings of On The Beam.

With Apologies, We Blow Our Own Horn

Here is a response from one client:

Congratulations on your 25th Anniversary....The remodel that you did for me...looks as good as the day you completed it and I have still not found a "We should have done that different" spot!

With all best wishes,
Ralph Samuel

We designed and remodeled Ralph's kitchen in Oakland in 2003, listening carefully to his design requests as he had very specific ones.

More Horn Blowing

Here is another client's response:

You certainly have much to celebrate - 25 years of outstanding work is quite an achievement. We couldn't be more pleased with what you've done for us. Your dedication to quality and your patience and responsiveness to your clients are extraordinary. Please feel free to use us as a reference...We can't say enough great things about OTB.

Fondly,
Karen and Bill

The McClave-Stevensons had us build an addition to their home last year. We've done several other smaller projects for them over the years as well.

You can see their projects and others on our website gallery: www.onthebeamremodeling.com, click on "gallery". The McClave-Stevenson's project is one of our three slide shows.

WE'RE IN THE S.F. CHRONICLE!

I certainly hope you read the Home & Garden Section of the Sunday October 4th S.F. Chronicle. The feature front page story was about a huge, multi-level deck and entry we built in 2008 in the Oakland hills. In case you missed it, here's the link:
Click Here

We knew the article was supposed to come out that day, but we were all mum's the word by agreement....and here's why: You never know with the media. Over the years, we have counted on media coverage that didn't happen, or expected the company to be mentioned and then it wasn't. Once the reporter got our name wrong. We've learned to be blase about upcoming possible media events involving On The Beam Remodeling.

BUT NOW WE'RE EXCITED

Yes, that's the buzz word around here. Our excellent photographer, J. Michael Tucker, has some of his fine photos of the job spread all over the Home & Garden Section. Phil Tiffin of 522 Industries did the steel railings and the iron crutch that holds up a limb of the winding old oak tree in the middle of the deck. Jeff Cohen Electrical designed and installed the lighting for the entry and fence. We worked in concert for almost a year to produce this elegant outdoor lounging and relaxing center that brings in light and maintains the homeowners' privacy.

BEST HOMEOWNERS EVER

Steve Nelson and Brian Yoshida were great to work with, and we really enjoyed getting to know them as the project unfurled from paper to three dimensions. They added intelligent and sophisticated design choices to the mix and had a solid vision of beauty and elegance to share with us.

ABOVE PHOTOS SHOW THE REAR VIEW

The view you will see in the San Francisco Chron article are all the front entry. This gigantic deck wraps around the side to the rear of the house, and we're showing you the back view of it. There is also a lower deck underneath the back deck, a flight of stairs that we built to get from the front to the lower garden, retaining walls and a beautiful gravel pathway, which happens to be a featured photo in every On The Beam e-newsletter. Alan Bellamy of Paradigm Concrete & Masonry did the concrete work, retaining walls and installed the slate tiles in the front entry.

What made this deck particularly challenging is that the house is perched on a steep hillside close to the neighbor. We had to work carefully and delicately to maintain safety for the crew and respect for the neighbor.

Be Your Own Estimator

I am now announcing a new feature on my website, and I invite you to take a look. My website is: www.onthebeamremodeling.com. Once you arrive at the home page, you will see a new feature: What Will It Cost? If you click on that button, a magic chart will appear! This is the tool that you can use to actually calculate your own remodeling project.

My Budget: "It's a Secret"

The reason that I installed this on my website should be obvious: What are people dying to know? That's right, how much will it cost? I almost always ask inquirers if they have a budget that they would like to share with me, and the response is mostly, "No, I have no idea what it will cost. I just want to hear a price." However, everybody has at least one or two numbers in the back of their mind, that 'secret' amount of money that they don't want to exceed. And so often the reality of what building costs are collides with many homeowners' 'secret' cost.

Step-By-Step Process

The What Will It Cost chart will guide you step-by-step through your remodel, including most details that are required. I test ran it on a few guinea pigs to make sure that people not in the building industry could do it: Thank you, Chris, Bonnie, Peggy and Melissa! However, if you run into any difficulties, please just pick up the phone and give me a call. I will answer your questions and if I can't, I'll refer you over to Steve Schliff, who is the estimator of the company.

Keep in mind that these are going to be fairly rough estimates of your project. However, they will give you a realistic starting point.

My great appreciation goes out to the people that were involved in this project:
John McLean, a San Francisco Architect who devised the chart; Allen Romano, who cleverly recreated it from a magazine article to a virtual chart on the computer; and Tod Abbott, my website editor who got it up and running on the website.

Empathy for the Level

Steve and I are once again living through a remodel of our home. Oh yes, we've done it before, many times. We wouldn't ask others to go through something we never had gone through. On The Beam Remodeling, Inc. is at our house: breaking through a wall, sheetrocking, compounding, sanding, wiring, replacing windows, tiling a section of floor. There is drilling, hammering, machinery whining, and wind whistling under the temporary plywood where the old windows used to be. A gigantic plastic bubble tarp with handy floor to ceiling zipper puffs out against the breakfast table. A lovely thing to see over scrambled eggs.

HONEYMOON YEARS

We wax nostaglic over our honeymoon years, when we ripped the roof off of our first home in the Bernal Heights district of San Francisco one month after escrow closed. The next six years we lived amidst construction projects. The house transmogrified from one year to the next. I called it "organic living".

EMPATHY BUILDER

This is a good thing. This experience reminds us and once again imbues us with empathy - not just sympathy - for our clients. We don't just 'understand' what they are living through when we invade, demolish and build. We know it at the experiential level. All builders should be required to live through remodeling in their own homes (most probably do).

FUN AND EXCITING

And at the same time it's exciting. The vision of what will take form becomes clearer every day as progress is made. We mull over color swatches and consider styles and sizes of wall sconces. The imagined dinner party in our future new formal dining room takes on a certain luster.

FUNNY TOO

There is also humor to be had if we seize the opportunity. We have no cat door, so the cat must be let in and out. In she goes through the garden door and then where? Where there once was open space, there is now a plastic barrier. She's baffled until I lead her around the corner and through a new opening. The next day, that new opening has been closed and she must follow me along yet a new route. The third day, yes, it's another route, and the fourth day she merely walks in and sits down in total confusion. It's not often you see a cat do that.

Building It Green: What Price Eco-Friendly?

How Do You Build 'Green'?

There are many ways to incorporate eco-friendly materials and techniques into a remodeling project. Some are commonly and easily done, such as low-e double pane windows, or adding jacket insulation to your old or new water heater, which reduces heat loss by about 10% or more and is an inexpensive and easy retrofit.

Other elements of green building are more costly, such as solar roof panels that can provide enough electricity to your home to get you off the utilities company grid. Still other elements are downright esoteric, such as a sod roof, literally a green, grassy roof that sports a garden of growing plants while cooling the house underneath it naturally.

Interview with Neighbors Who Built Green

We have neighbors who really went to green town on their remodel/addition. That included recycled glass tiles, beautiful and environmentally correct, but much more expensive than regular ceramic or porcelain tile. They also put in radiant heat: pipes filled with water that get heated and radiate warmth into the space above through the flooring.

They used 'sustainable' wood, which is certified as not old-growth and replaced quickly by new planting. It's more expensive, but as Michael F. sagely pointed out to me, non-sustainable wood should be more expensive because of the damage that is done to the environment. "Damage to the environment is the real cost", he said, "so let's invest now for the future."

Budget Balancing Act

Michael also said that homeowners can balance out the expense of some sustainable, more costly items with recycled and re-usable less expensive items. For example, he and Irene choose a bathtub and variety of bathroom accessories, doors and medicine cabinets from Urban Ore in Berkeley. Michael vouched for the quality and the savings. They also re-applied existing redwood siding to the wainscotting and paneling in their new dining room, beautiful old-growth redwood that would have been prohibitively expensive to purchase new and a shame to toss in the debris box.

Green building and remodeling encompass many aspects impossible to cover in one short blog. I will be blogging about it again in the future. Look forward to:

How Did On The Beam Become Green Certified?
The latest savings on solar panels
How Green Is My House? LEED Certification
On The Beam's conserving/recycling/reusing practices

A Tip of the Hard Hat to the Contractor

I was reading an article in one of those slick, thick home and design magazines this morning. It starts out: "The request that (the designer) got from his client was clear: a bathtub situated so he could see the ocean." There's a brief description of how the bathtub was situated and the building was extended to protect privacy while affording a sweeping view of the Pacific Ocean. There are stunning photos of the tub and its interior setting. There is no mention of the general contractor who built the design.

Why is that, you may wonder? I wonder the same thing, yet this is pervasive and goes back a long way. I read an article back in 1937 that touted the architect and made no mention of the builder.

If you read the Home & Garden section of your daily newspaper, you will notice the same phenomenon. The exceptions are when a builder wins an award that is recognized in a news article, or if the builder is also the architect or designer.

There is a reality that many people not in the building industry aren't aware of. The builder doesn't simply build the exact drawing that the architect or designer supplies, following each instruction at precisely the measurement drawn. The builder comes through many times over in the course of construction where the design is not sufficient, which begs the question: Why isn't the design sufficient?

There are various and complex responses to the above question, but we'll start with the simplest one. Many architects (though not all) haven't done much construction work. Translation from pencil on paper, or computer lines on screen, to three-dimensional real space and materials, presents many challenges. Even the best of architects can easily miss a few factors, particularly when the project is a remodel and the new work must be integrated into existing old structures.

Other problems with the design involve inaccurate measurements and oversights. For example, we had to make allowance for a design that completely ignored the fact that a chimney flue was running through the middle of the room. We've also had to re-design a hallway entrance that would have had everybody bumping their heads smack into the wall.

The next time you read an article in the S.F. Chron or Today's Homes Magazine, notice if the builder's name comes up. You can be sure that they contributed to design and design-solutions in the process of the actual construction work. Let's tip our hats to them and inform the editors that we would like to know who built such beautiful rooms.