The difficulties in finding an empty lot has made the architect Jeremy Levine bought the existing house to renovate, "Every architect dreams of designing their own house, but finding an empty lot in Los Angeles is almost impossible, so my wife and I decided to buy a 'fixer' that I could transform," Says Levine.
There were two main problems to be solved (apart from the “green” aspects) first is adding some space without cutting existing trees and making the 1,100-sq feet home feel spacious. The 400-sq feet addition for the house is built around the existing trees since the lot is surrounded by them. "Since we loved the trees, we decided to build the addition around them, enclosing them into open courtyard spaces," says Levine making every room in the house opens to an outdoor space dominated by a tree. While making the outdoor area green, the architect also complemented the trees with gray water recycling and storm-water collection system.
To make the home feel big, Levine even removed some closets, building storage underground using concealed trap door and carved the thick walls throughout the house to become shelves rather than buying shelves and making the space feels even smaller. “We also built custom furniture out of the recycled lumber, including an office with desks and shelves hung from threaded rods," explain Levine.
The green feature of the house are solar panels, a thermal rock wall, evaporative cooling fountain and mobile sun screens for passive climate control. There are also natural day lighting, grey-water recycling and rain-water collection systems, hot water on-demand, Xeriscaping, a leach field; recycled fly ash concrete, reclaimed lumber, thermal chimney, a green roof, and low-VOC paint.
About the house’s design, the architect explains; "The design plays on the idea of a ‘Regional Modernism’ by merging two of the local architectural styles of the region: the language of thick walls an and carved mass of the Spanish Colonial tradition and the modern abstraction and open space of the Case Study tradition." This house is Located in Eagle Rock, California - a suburb of L.A and if you want more information about the house, you could visit Jeremy Levine Design Via.
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