Home Improvement HOMEWORK
Can you turn your garage into a home office? Ask yourself these three key questions.
• DOES MY ZONING ALLOW IT? The first thing to do is find out if your zoning laws allow your garage to be converted into a home office. This can be done by checking your local city or county ordinances.
• IS THE STRUCTURE IN GOOD SHAPE? This is critical in determining if the garage can be remodeled or if you would have to build something completely new. Hire a contractor to do a preliminary inspection to see what the design constraints of your property are.
• WILL THE CURRENT ELECTRIC AND PLUMBING SITUATION WORK? You don’t want to be running back to the main house to charge your phone or use the bathroom multiple times a day. Plumbing and electrical are necessary for a truly workable home office. Again, a contractor would be able to give you an estimate on the cost and feasibility of making sure your home office has everything you need.
OFFICE AND SHOWROOM
It was a true Cinderella moment for this garage. Seth transformed an unused garage into a home office and patio, but they also dug out the basement, transforming the subterranean space into a showroom.“It sort of became an extension of the office,”he says. With exposed brick and antique octagonal windows lining the walls, it’s easy to see how his technical touch made the showroom come to life.
UPCYCLE PICKS
But the real pièce de résistance is the home office itself. “No drywall really belonged in the office,” Seth says. He views upcycling as an integral part of his design vision. “The pine paneling, the beams that are up in the ceiling, and even the wood that we used for the built-ins, it’s all from Vintage Lumber.”
The home office needed to feel “of the earth,” he says. Even though he’s a self-professed “wood guy,” Seth wanted the space to feel open and filled with light. To accomplish this, he added two additional patios, allowing the home office to organically spill out into the garden, perfectly blending Kathryn’s interior professional life with the exterior nature of her garden design company. Seth approaches each architectural project like a puzzle, fitting his client’s needs with the architectural constraints and possibilities of the project. The end result is something to behold: a blend of old and new, utilitarian in nature yet warmly sophisticated in design.