Contemporary Remodel: The Manis Residence

About two years ago now we were contacted about the opportunity to design a contemporary remodel to an existing storefront building in the Springfield area of Jacksonville by Lane and Steve Manis.  Lane is the  Executive Director for the Jacksonville chapter of the American Institute of Architects and Steve is a Civil Engineer.  Needless to say they had many connections to the Architect community in Jacksonville, they received several plan concepts, and ultimately chose our design.  Construction was completed about six months ago.  Here are some professional photographs from the Springfield Christmas Home Tour.

Here is a picture of what the building looked like before we started.

After we listened to the Manis' story, it became very clear what we needed to do to design the house.  They were passionate about preserving the historic structure, the masonry bearing walls and the wood post and beam in-fill.  They also wanted to create a front porch on a building positioned on the lot line.  

Our design carved out a space for a front porch by removing existing storefront windows and framing a new exterior wall along the first wood column line.  We designed the house to become more private as you move from the front to the back.  The porch as a very public space, followed by the living areas and punctuated by the three bedroom at the rear of the house.


Throughout the entire process we pictured our design as the walls of a museum to display the beauty of the historic structure.  We exposed the structure as much as possible in the program.  Only one habitable space does not have the wood structure exposed in some form, in that bedroom the Manis' repurposed transom window frames as art frames.  The only room in the house where you can not see the exposed brick walls is the utility room.  

 

Lane toured a house designed by William Morgan and saw the flush base detail with the negative reveal above, which she loved.  We brought that detail to her house and added a second negative reveal as a picture rail.  We also did not use casing on any of the doors to further add to the minimalist/contemporary flair of the design.

During construction the ceiling was braced and the structure was taken down, cleaned and sealed.  Before it was replaced foam insulation was sprayed into the ceiling to help make the building more efficient.  Wall board was applied to the structure to cover the foam before the bottom cord of the roof trusses were replaced.  We painted the board white to further emphasize the wood and to help its beauty show.  

This was an amazing project, Lane and Steve were a pleasure to work with.  We are very proud of the completed work and we are still grateful we were chosen to help create a contemporary piece of architecture.

All Photos courtesy of Lamar Smart at SMART Studio Photography