Q&A
Sally Kuchar, Dwell NextHouse: Silicon Valley Interior Designer
What is the overall design aesthetic of Mark & Ellen’s new home?Mark and Ellen are very family oriented. Be it grandparents or best friends, people frequent their home on a regular basis. They wanted their home to reflect their lifestyle: welcoming and warm. A loving place, but without sacrificing the sleek aesthetic of the architecture. We based the color palette on natural stones that Mark and Ellen had collected on a beach walk.
What has your experience been like working within the design of the NextHouse?
Refreshing. Working as an interior designer in the San Francisco Bay Area has its rewards (working on Victorian restoration, but with contemporary flair), but we don't get as much contemporary new construction as you'd imagine. Very rarely do we have a single family home being built from "scratch". I really enjoyed watching Joel Turkel's vision for Mark and Ellen develop and unfold over the months. It's exciting and fast. It seemed like one day the foundation was being laid and the next day the drywall was being put up.
How have you accommodated Mark & Ellen’s design ideas for their two small children, Zack and Sophia?
The most exciting design idea was the kitchen island. We had a set height for the adults, and the children have their own portion of the island that has an adjustable height. Right now neither of the children are over 3, so as you can imagine over the next 10 years they're not going to stay the same height!
Even though the house has been designed for each child to have their own bedroom, we assumed that Sophia and Zack will share a room for a few years. In that particular bedroom we've given the children a floor-to-ceiling magnetic whiteboard that spans the entire length of the room. Zack loves to draw and I can see him decorating the wall with his various drawings. It's going to be beautiful. We're also going to try to incorporate a living wall into either the kitchen or the deck outside. Aside from the aesthetics of a living wall, it also is a fun and orderly way to grow vegetables or other plants.
What has been your favorite part of working on this project?
We operate as a team. Sometimes in design processes people define their boundaries by the titles they keep. Not in this case. Whenever a problem or challenge arises, we discuss our options as a team, and everyone feels comfortable pitching in their ideas for a solution. I'm also thrilled that Mark and Ellen are so interested in the sustainable aspect of the design process. They are very interested in what all the different certifications mean, and how specific interior finishes will affect their health. They are very responsible about building a sustainable home.
Want to meet Sally in person?
Go here for information about the Open House events!
Mark & Ellen Siminoff, Dwell NextHouse homeowners
What was your main criterion for the new home with regards to neighborhood and design?At the time when we were shopping for the property, we were looking for a quiet neighborhood at the southern end of the peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area. We were in the market for a three-bedroom house (at the time, Ellen was pregnant, and were planning for more kids down the road) with 2 or more bathrooms, a home-office space for Ellen and a media room for Mark. We wanted the lot to be between 6500 and 8000 square feet so that we could have a nice yard for the kids to play in. We also knew that didn’t want to be in a cookie-cutter house in a planned community. The house we ultimately purchased was a small, yet charming 1908 “Craftsman” on a 7500 square foot lot. We had originally intended to remodel the house but the high cost of restoration plus our desire to have a bit more space for our growing family ultimately motivated us to look at a ground-up rebuild (By the way, if you saw the original photo of us in Dwell, that’s the old yellow house behind us).
Why did you choose Mountain View as a location for the home?
When we first started working with our realtor, she asked us to compose a new home & neighborhood wish list. We knew that we wanted to be in a neighborhood that was going to be a wholesome and safe place to raise our children. In addition, we were hoping to reduce the time we spent commuting to and from work in bumper-to-bumper traffic. A good school system, a neighborhood full of kids and an established parenting network were also high on the list of must-haves. Ellen specifically requested; “Tree lined streets with sidewalks, close to parks, restaurants and shopping” and Mountain View offered exactly that. The property we purchased is in fact located on a quiet tree-lined street that is close to a big park and just a few blocks from Mountain View’s charming downtown area.
Were you always interested in a Dwell NextHouse by Empyrean, or had you explored other options?
Actually, we looked into pre-fab homes from two other architecture firms in the SF Bay Area before choosing the Dwell NextHouse by Empyrean. We were fortunate to discover the NextHouse after Ellen’s business partner saw an article in Dwell. The article was about a line of affordable modern prefab homes that Dwell and Empyrean were working on together. Having grown up in a Contemporary-style house in New Jersey, the idea of owning a modern prefab really resonated with Mark. We made plans to meet Joel Turkel at a presentation by Dwell and Empyrean at Restoration Timber in San Francisco. Twelve days after that, we had our first meeting with Empyrean’s west coast project manager on the property in Mountain View where we wrote a deposit check, signed a contract, took a deep breath stepped into the development of our new NextHouse.
What have your biggest challenges been so far in building this house?
The challenges building our NextHouse have been the similar to many of the stories we had heard about (traditional stick-built) new home construction; The architectural phase was longer than we had originally anticipated. This was due to in part some customization to the floor plan that we wanted to incorporate. We worked very closely with Joel Turkel, designer of the NextHouse to modify our home so that, although it’s a prefab, it feels like it was designed just for us.
The City of Mountain View has very rigid new-construction guidelines regarding setbacks and total permissible square footage. We put a considerable amount of effort into communicating back and forth with the city to make sure that we met all of the design criteria. We were diligent when it came to crossing our T’s and dotting our I’s but it still took two rounds of submitting drawings before our demolition and construction permits were issued.
The other challenge that most new home builders confront is keeping the budget in check. The possibilities for upgrading the features of the house seemed limitless; siding, windows, floors, doors, countertops… and each one was more expensive than the next. Since we didn’t have an unlimited budget, it has been a series of difficult compromises between the stuff that we needed and the stuff we wanted.
Want to meet Mark & Ellen in person to talk to them about their home?
Go here for information about the Open House events!
Joel Turkel, NextHouse Designer
How does the design of the NextHouse take advantage of sustainable technologies or modern building practices? At Empyrean, we are adamant that all of our homes be sited so as to take the best advantage of natural influences on the site – this home carefully considers natural light, solar orientation, seasonal shading from vegetation, prevailing wind movement and many other influences and is designed to take advantage of them to contribute to passive heating and cooling. We build exclusively with wood, and use responsibly harvested products in every application we can.
What do you like best about modern design and prefab in particular?
To me, modern design as we think of it here at Empyrean is not about adhering to a style, but is rather just about good design, and to us, that is design that is responsible and responsive. Prefab is simply a proven and sound method of ensuring those beliefs are upheld. Since we make what we design, we can control how it is made, the type of labor used, and what materials and processes are used in its manufacture. Prefab is going through a bit of a resurgence right now, but for us its not a trend – its how we’ve maintained excellence for over 60 years.
What's your creative process like?
My process always begins with the client. To design for someone well is to understand their needs, which means putting away ego and trying to enter the client’s frame of reference. Every client has a different take, and while they may be attracted to what they perceive as my design signature, how that signature will best be used for them is an unknown at the opening of each design process. I like to meet a client and spend time just getting to know their attitudes toward their own lifestyle, what there aspirations are, and why they purchased the site they want to build on. I like to get them on the site, discussing its potential and hear about there dreams for it. A house is simply a method by which a better future is made possible – my goal is to understand the future the client aspires to, and then help them uncover how rich and full of possibility it can be.
Read more about Joel and the Empyrean NextHouse.
Want to meet Joel in person?
Go here for information about the Open House events!
