Ruhl Walker Architects

We are a few days away from move-in day at our Lincoln project, so we closed the studio for a few hours and everyone took a pre-Certificate-of-Occupancy look. Yes, there is a bit of a final punch list (as always), and Lincoln’s new Building Inspector brought up a few last minute concerns (also not unexpected), but on this gorgeous spring day, the sun shone gloriously, and we could all imagine the joy we hope our clients will feel once they are fully ensconced in their new home…

Will Ruhl

The custom prefab house we designed in Lincoln is nearing completion, and the owners are getting excited about moving out of their temporary apartment and into their new, sun-filled dream house! The cedar tongue and groove siding looks fantastic; it has a temporary protective coating and will be stained in the spring after studying some color options. There is a lot of frantic activity inside also, with the quarter sawn red oak flooring being finished this week, tile and trim almost complete, the stainless steel cable railings being installed, and the Pedini kitchen getting final adjustments.

Last week we posted images of recent progress on our transformation of a speculatively-built house in suburban Boston, and this week we have windows to show off, adding a dose of scale and reality. Perhaps not as dramatic as when an entire custom prefab house is set in two or three days, like our Lincoln house, but the rainy weather we’ve been having is less potentially destructive with site-built structures than it can be with custom prefab modular. It’s fun to see the new spaces coming together, especially the new living spaces that hover over the basement level excavation, and the new master suite.

There has been some real progress recently on our transformation of a speculatively-built “Garrison Colonial” house in suburban Boston. Since we first posted the design back in June, 2011, you will notice that there have been some substantial changes, namely to keep more of the existing house’s shell including its gabled roof. This was initially proposed as a cost-savings measure, and even though it didn’t ultimately result in substantial cost savings, the owner preferred keeping more of the original house for sentimental reasons. The excavated basement is also no longer going to include a lap pool; instead the space will be used as a home theater and guest suite. Last week we had steel and concrete, this week we can see the actual form of the “new” house!

Drawing, designing, and dreaming are all gratifying aspects of being an architect, but we also really love when the projects we’ve designed begin actual construction. That is after all the primary goal of what we do all day in the studio! We work with some fantastic general contractors, and working closely with them until the day our clients move in is an exciting, collaborative process. Check out the projects below, and we’ll keep posting updates in the coming weeks.

The renovation of this Boston rowhouse includes opening up the middle for a dramatic, three-story living space, with natural light eventually pouring down from a large skylight above.

A couple we met when we designed new faculty housing at St. Mark’s School in Southborough, MA, asked us to design a small addition to their two-room house in the Berkshires. The new space will provide additional living space as well as a bedroom and bathroom; the existing house with only an open sleeping loft, lacked the kind of privacy needed with older children. The flat roof of the addition is accessed from an exterior stair tower, and will eventually have a railing around it for small rooftop gatherings for star-gazing and enjoying views extending deep into Vermont.

A view of a steel stair above the front entrance of a new house in Lincoln. The stair treads and partial risers will be solid red oak, and the stair landing will have red oak flooring and red oak veneered plywood below.

Major earthwork is evident at this substantial renovation project in Chelmsford. Here you see the beginnings of an excavation that will become a landscaped garden and terrace cut into the ground in order to bring daylight into new lower level living spaces. Natural light is so critical! Only small parts of the existing house will remain untouched when the project is finished later this year.

Having worked on several cool projects in Hawai‘i over the last few years, our eyes have really been opened to architectural possibilities that rarely exist in New England. For example, we collaborated with Rhoady Lee Architecture and Design on the Big Island on a new house near the Four Seasons at Hualalai that had custom motorized rolling walls of glass and teak (detailed by our own Sandra Baron and Lilly Smith!) that disappear into lava rock walls, opening virtually every room in the house to trellised lanais, an edge-less pool, lushly landscaped courtyards, and sweet tropical breezes. So, how can we introduce these exotic possibilities to the custom houses we design in New England?

One answer is through bi-folding glass walls from companies like Nanawall, and we’ve designed several recent houses that utilize their exceptional technology. Our clients wanted to have large screened porches so they could live outdoors spring, summer and fall without the ubiquitous New England mosquitoes and flies, and wondered how they might join those porches to the rest of the house. Voila, we proposed Nanawall doors and something that has traditionally been a barrier in older New England houses becomes an opportunity. Added benefit: makes a great party house even better!

We are thrilled to be able to update you all on the progress being made at our modern custom prefab house in Lincoln, MA. All of the double height windows are installed at the two-storey-high living room and stair hall, eight 6×6 steel columns have been carefully inserted around the double height spaces, the Nanawall doors are installed between the dining room and screened porch, the roof and skylights are complete and water tight, and there has been a ton of plumbing, electrical, HVAC (geothermal), and listening room work performed inside. Exterior siding will start being installed this week, so everyone is hoping for continued un-seasonably-warm weather, and looking forward to the green zip-system sheathing to be covered in cedar! FOMA (Friends of Modern Architecture in Lincoln) should be pleased that the house is suitably modern, as they required during permitting; how wonderful (and unusual!) for a town to take a stand against cookie-cutter-McMansions! Check out the photos below, and let us know what you think!

Bigger is not always better. One of our favorite current projects under construction is also one of our smallest.  For this two-story unit in an urban row house, we were asked to find a way to better connect the upper level entry to the lower level main living spaces.  Budget and logistics precluded anything drastic, and happily, this is a case where a few architectural tweaks can go a long way.   We’ve kept the original stair structure, but resurfaced the stair treads with a new chunky profile, to be stained a rich gray/brown.  The outside wall of the stair is being re-surfaced with large-scaled, floating panels, to visually connect the two stories with one common element.  On the upper level, the entry hall will feel much larger after we replace a solid half wall with a glass and stainless steel railing. Downstairs, the wall supporting the stair is being re-clad with a custom patterned “clapboard” which aligns with the steps and conceals closet doors. LED lighting strategically placed between the clapboards will add some evening sparkle.

We’ll keep you posted as the project progresses! In the meantime, let us know what you think!

We’ve been working for what seems like a very long time on the renovation of a South End duplex.  The project started out as a general clean up of finishes along with a new kitchen and baths.  As the design phase progressed, however, and as the poor condition of the existing construction was revealed during some preliminary demolition, we ended up very nearly gutting the two story space. We were ably assisted along the way with one of our favorite contractors, John Benjamin of Benjamin Construction, as well as Zhanna Drogobetsky of Casa Design.

The construction is now nearly complete and we’ve taken delivery of some new furniture.  Still to come are a few more key pieces – dining chairs, a rug or two, and accessories.  We’re also eager to get started on a completely new rear garden, designed by Keith LeBlanc of Keith LeBlanc Landscape Architecture.

While final completion and photography are still a couple of months out, we wanted to share a few close-up details as a hint of what’s to come.

After months of planning, the eight modules for the modern prefab house Ruhl Walker custom designed for a site in Lincoln, MA, were delivered from Pennsylvania and “set” (the term custom modular prefabrication companies use for the assembly of the modules) last week. The original set plan anticipated by Haven Custom Homes was for a single long day, but thanks to some unexpectedly difficult site constrictions and then a day of steady rain and thunderstorms, the set ended up taking three full days. Managing the process was the team from Sea Dar Construction, as well as a set crew from Haven, with Ruhl Walker Architects on site to help solve any architectural challenges that might arise (and we must admit that watching a “set” can be a whole lot of FUN; in fact, the whole studio turned out to watch).

In hindsight, it was brilliant that our clients decided NOT to build through last winter and its record setting snowfalls, but now it’s almost October, and it would be an understatement to say that everyone was more than ready for some serious action! Fortunately, that is one thing that you can rely on from prefab / modular: one day all you have is a foundation and piles of dirt, and the next day you have an almost entirely finished house, complete with plastered walls, interior trim, windows and doors, lighting fixtures and wiring, plumbing systems, sprinkler system, and in this case even a highly customized Listening Room / Home Theater.  There is still a lot of work to do to finish both the inside and outside of the house, but all of a sudden there is A LOT to get excited about.

DAY ONE:

Haven Homes has spent the last month fabricating the modules, including ordering and obtaining all of the custom selected materials, packaging / weather-proofing the factory built modules and making everything safe for the eight hour drive through four states, as well as strategizing the set. Every state has slightly different regulations regarding transporting prefabricated modules, including maximum widths, heights, and lengths and whether it is necessary to schedule State Police escorts. The modules left the factory on a Monday and were delivered to a temporary staging site in Lincoln on Tuesday, ready for the set to start at seven the next morning.

A team from Haven had previewed the route and mapped out a strategy, and the first day began with a dry run with one of the smaller modules.  All seemed fine, so they want back to the staging area (it is necessary to reserve / rent a staging area prior to the set unless you happen to have a huge, open, easily accessible area next to your foundation!) and loaded up one of the largest modules.  The plan was to start at the back of the house, work their way forward, then finish with the three modules on the second floor. However, Murphy’s Law holds for every type of construction, including prefab, and the first module to be delivered took many hours longer than anticipated to get around the last two corners. Trees were closer to the road than anticipated, a power pole was tilting at just the wrong angle, power lines were just a hair too low, and the rig pulling the modules had a turning radius that just didn’t meld with the side street’s geometry. Fortunately, modules two and three were shorter and went in much faster, but the day ended prematurely with the State Police closing the set down, forcing Haven to park module four overnight on a very patient and forgiving neighbor’s front yard so as not to disturb rush hour traffic…

The first module arrives, and everyone ponders how to make the turn without removing the power pole or the neighbors’ landscaping.	A small crowd of neighbors created an impromptu parade, following the first module backwards up the street.
The foundation and perimeter sill framing were ready just in time (or “almost too late” as some people who shall remain nameless prefer to say), as was the 115-ton crane.	The first module floats up and over several much loved trees to its final resting place, on the way having to be rotated 180 degrees in mid air.
Temporary support columns were installed to hold the first module in place until the other modules were assembled, at which time the permanent structure would be installed to fit tight to the modules. All beams are integral to the modules, so no beams impede headroom in the spaces below.
VIDEO: Module number one being lifted in place.

DAY TWO:

After overnight thunderstorms and heavy downpours, there was some question as to whether day two would be a total washout, but the rain had become a light drizzle by 9:00 so the teams reassembled and prepared module number four for its short trip from the neighbor’s front yard to our clients’ foundation. More good news was the discovery that the previous night’s efforts to make the installed modules water tight was a success.

Module number four is the longest of the eight modules, and includes the front lower section of the living room at one end, an open roof deck in the middle, and a guest bedroom on the other end. This inherent asymmetry made the prep work for being craned into place much more delicate than for the other modules. Instead of the usual two cables being fed through the perimeter floor structure, this module required four, and this work had to be redone several times to insure that the module was balanced perfectly. With a new band of thunderstorms on the way, the set was closed down after module number four was set in place, and the house was buttoned up for another rainy night.

The first three modules were well protected from the overnight thunderstorms.	Module number four was too long to fit into the driveway without posing a hazard to overhead wires, so much thought and time was spent figuring out an alternative strategy.
Eventually a backhoe was delivered and its superior flexibility allowed the Haven crew to fit the module into the driveway and out of the way of the overhead lines.	The main window of the living room will be installed on site rather than in the factory because it straddles two modules.

DAY THREE:

We awoke to an absolutely beautiful, sunny day today, and therefore the third day of set began on a high note. The final three modules are all substantially smaller than the others, and were to be installed above the modules from the previous two days.  The first module of the day was the Listening Room, which ended up resting gently within the edge of the canopy of an existing maple tree, which should provide spectacular views this fall! The second and third (final) modules house the upstairs home office as well as the upper half of the living room and main stair.  All three modules were installed by lunch time, and then the process of making the entire structure weather and water tight commenced.

The next steps are to install the roof parapets and final rubber membrane roofing, remove any temporary framing (for instance the temporary shoring at the double height living room and stair hall, as well as at the twenty-one foot long by eight foot high Nanawall opening), install the skylights and double height windows in the living room and stair hall, install all the exterior siding and trim, and finish off the interiors (tile, cabinetry, wood flooring, custom steel stair, etc.).

See our post from April 8^th to see a digital preview of what the house will look like.  Lots to do before Thanksgiving…  Keep checking back to see updates!

It is absolutely critical that any insulation that comes loose during transportation be secured in place prior to the module being set. In this case the module was lifted up to the second floor and had to hover in place while one of the set crew climbed up and stapled the insulation back to the studs. Netting should probably have been installed prior to shipping.	The second to last module rises into place, with the final module resting on the ground below.
The final module is finally set in place. Some neighbors were surprised by how few windows were on the front of the house, but were relieved to hear that most of the green boards (“zip-wall”) will be removed for two enormous windows.	The final form of the house is beginning to take shape. The temporary structure at the middle roof deck will be removed; that framing was necessary for transportation.
The second floor finally comes into being. In the lower right is a temporary module, most of which will be removed once the final screened porch concrete slab is poured and the porch columns are built.
VIDEO: Module number seven being set.