This project spotlight shares a Design Review for a new single-family residence in North Carolina. Find out more about this project on our project page.
Many people have a vision in their head of what they want their new home to look like, but translating that vision to paper and later into built form proves difficult. You become unsure about the design and start to lose confidence that what you’ve built up in your head will ever be realized. You start to second guess yourself and worry that it’s not going to turn out right.
This is where a design review comes in handy. Our design review services are an easy, low-commitment way to get a little help, advice, and confidence to keep moving forward on your project.
For the Tioga House, our clients were struggling with getting the exterior to look right. They wanted something more modern than the design they had on paper. They were also unsure how to proceed since they were using a traditional builder and were already framing the exterior walls.
Follow along as we share a behind the scenes glimpse into one of our recent design reviews, the Tioga House.
Project Specifics
The focus of our design review for the Tioga House was the exterior design. We were tasked with creating a cohesive exterior for a new mountain home by creating a material palette and cladding strategy that would help modernize the design.
Our clients came to us wanting to gain confidence in their home design. They previously had a home design created by another designer that was somewhat transitional in style. They yearned for a more modern mountain look, but were unsure how to achieve it since they were already under construction. They came to us with their plans, some colored elevation drawings, and inspirational images of projects they liked that they had found online.
They were concerned about their previous design choices and wondered if they would achieve the ultimate look they were after.
Initial 3D View provided by the Client
Project constraints that would affect our design review:
There were three project constraints to contend with on this project.
First, the house was already under construction. 
When our clients engaged with us for design review services, the house was already framed and siding was scheduled to start in a few weeks. This meant that our design review would have to focus on aesthetic features only and could not involve any structural changes. This also meant that we would need to finalize the design review within two weeks so that our clients could give direction to the builder on how to proceed.
The second issue was that our clients were working with a builder who was used to building traditionally-styled houses. There was already a little tension and hesitation by the builder to build more modern so we had to be mindful that making any changes to the detailing and trim work may get pushback and resistance, lead to some confusion, or worse yet having to redo work during the execution. This meant small changes that could easily be communicated.
And the third issue was that the house was in an area that was governed by HOA restrictions that dictated colors and materials. Colors were required to be “naturally occurring in nature”. And the front of the house had to contain some stone. This seemed doable.
Our Design Review
The goal was to confirm the color and material scheme for the exterior and to define the exterior detailing so that the house would achieve a modern mountain style.
Creating a Cohesive Siding Strategy
Our design review started with creating an overarching design strategy for material usage.
For the color scheme, our clients were keen to embrace the natural environment; they were building in the mountains so respecting nature’s colors made sense. They were drawn to the gray colors found in the local granite outcroppings on their property and the reddish-browns of the cedars and oaks nearby.
We agreed that sticking to natural grays would help the house blend into its surroundings and worked to create a material palette that was close to what they were initially thinking.
We suggested a grayish-blue lap siding and a Kentucky ledge stone veneer for the front foundation wall (to appease HOA). The Kentucky ledge stone (or a stone similar to it) would go well with the natural granite outcroppings scattered throughout the property.
To determine where siding would go versus another material, we looked to the configuration of the house to inform the strategy.
In looking at the massing, we noticed that the massing of the house was a rectangle with a chunk taken out of it. We used this subtracted area to inform how the siding materials should be used. The main house volume would be the main lap siding (grayish-blue) and the subtracted recess would be clad in an “other” material – in this case, we suggested untreated tongue and groove vertical cedar planks that would weather to gray. It would give a nice textured look but still blend in. This was also a good place to change up the material to help define the entry of the house.
Our clients were drawn to the following precedent images. They liked the modern gray look with the wood accent bands.
They provided us colored elevations showing their idea for an accent band around the house.
Colored elevations provided by the Client
We understood their intention for breaking up the solid walls with another material but felt that the band seemed a little too forced as it wrapped around the house.
Our suggestion was to simplify the accent band by only having it on two sides and aligning it with the window sill and head heights on the front of the house to bring some intentionality to it.
We also suggested a stained cedar band that would stay a honey brown color would give it a little pop.
Final Design Review sketches
Lastly, we made a few suggestions to simplify the detailing and trim. We suggested smooth lap siding with 5 or 6″ exposure in lieu of 8″ textured siding. Smaller courses of smooth siding give the house a more modern look compared to taller textured courses.
We also suggested removing the window trim and just butting the siding up to the window frame among other small detailing changes.
Summary
We summarized our design review comments through drawings, sketches, and notes. This would not only help our clients understand our thoughts but also be useful for the builder should they need visuals to communicate with him.
Design Review comments
Tioga material palette
Our wonderful clients had this to say about the experience:
[/fusion_builder_column]We’re building a house in the mountains but have been really struggling with our very traditional contractor who wanted very much to build a fine home for us but who wanted to give it plenty of “mountain accents,” which would have made it look like every other home in our area.Trying to define our own style, a modern, minimalist design with a hint of the Blue Ridge in it, we continued to get pushback from our contractor and were, frankly, losing confidence that we were headed in the right direction.
Reading blog after blog and scouring websites to try and find someone who understood our desire to merge two (and a half) design styles, we discovered Yvonne. And she understood exactly what we were attempting.
After talking to her and exchanging several emails, our blueprints, photos of our site, pictures of the homes that inspired us and exchanging the “whys” about our dream home, Yvonne made multiple tweaks to our drawings – and a pretty substantial suggestion on materials – and delivered a design that immediately landed with both of us. A couple of emails and a quick phone conversation later and we had a plan that we could get behind 100%. The home is almost finished, it’s coming out exactly as we had hoped and we expect to move to the mountains before the end of summer.
Describing your dream home can be tough – sometimes because it’s there – on the edge of your vision – but not really defined enough to truly verbalize it. What Yvonne really did was gradually tease out what we hadn’t been able to do by ourselves. She added color and a much sharper focus to the vision we had and we are, frankly, stunned.
If we have any regrets, it’s that we didn’t start working with her at the very beginning of the process… I suspect we’d have had a lot fewer discussions with our contractor and a much smoother plan to follow.
Thanks, Yvonne, for helping us realize our dream!
