Design Strategies to Make Your Kitchen More Functional

by Charles Hendricks | Nov 15, 2023 | architecture, Interior Design

Is your kitchen ready for the big day? Thanksgiving is coming.

Turkey Day is upon us and that means some of us will be spending a lot of time in our kitchen. As one who cooks (or heats up in some cases) a traditional Thanksgiving dinner each year, I know how important it is to have an efficient and functional space for cooking. I also know that if your kitchen is cut off from the rest of the house, you can feel isolated while others are cheering for their favorite parade float. Our kitchens are a central hub for activities for our family, so we’re providing some kitchen design tips to make your kitchen the best possible and most functional space it can be for turkey cooking and everyday family time. (Click each image below for a closer look).

1.

Universal design standards say we should have pull out shelves, drawers, multiple height counters, pull down shelving, and places to sit and stand to allow everyone to use your kitchen effectively.

2.

Including composting, recycling, and trash center makes for easy clean up and it can be hidden in pull out cabinets to keep your kitchen looking tidy.

3.

A large walk-in pantry allows you to keep things organized and in one place and for everything to have a place. Don’t settle for a small cabinet solution. If your home can handle it, make a space that works for your way of cooking.

4.

Maximize your storage opportunities, filling in blind corners and “spacers” to put in viable and functional storage options.

5.

Pick the right countertop for your kitchen goals. Click here for the pros and cons of different kitchen countertop materials.

6.

Make sure you have lots of natural light in your working space. You don’t have to have wall cabinets on all the exterior walls, you can use a walk-in pantry for added storage and open up your wall space with large windows.

old town harrisonburg kitchen (7) - maximize storage

7.

Add undercabinet lights so you can see what is on the counter while you are working. Having the ceiling lights in the right place can also add light to your work spaces.

8.

Install a 24” deep cabinet above your refrigerator to gain a little more functional storage space in your kitchen.

9.

Connect your kitchen to the living space so the entire family can gather while one or two people are preparing the meals.

Sometimes Being an Architect is a Roller Coaster

by Charles Hendricks | Sep 13, 2023 | architecture, random thoughts

The job of an architect can be an emotional roller coaster. You get the opportunity to walk with your clients to hear their goals, dreams, and aspirations for their new home (or business), feeling the excitement. Then the fun begins as you translate all the challenges, stretches, and opportunities into a cohesive design. We get to use our analytical side to process the information and constraints and our creative side to create a beautiful and functional design solution. This is architectural design, walking with your client through their dreams, grabbing the parts of the dream that matter the most, and creating a holistic design solution that brings it all together. You invest emotionally in their design as you sculpt their dream home, and when you get it right, you feel joy.

We recently designed for clients that had a very specific vision for their dream house. Their vision was centered around how they wanted to feel in the space that is sacred to them. Yes, they had some very specific aesthetic goals as well, but merging those aesthetic goals with a sense of softness and modesty was key to the final design. Working through the process we found an architectural language to define spaces and captured the right feel. We walked with our clients on their land, listened to their hopes and dreams, gathered inspiration, discussed goals, and developed a design concept. We absorbed their emotional connection and goals, developed the design concept, gathered feedback, and modified – multiple times.

bonus room with couch and chair. Light during golden hour streams through the window.

Once we had the right feel of space, we started working through the building science implications. The design demanded delicate details to achieve the right finished product. While designing with empathy is an important tool we use on a regular basis, a focus and understanding of building science, structural design, and material knowledge allow us to create beautiful, durable, healthy, and energy-efficient buildings.

outdoor seating area, sun setting over mountain view

This idea of creating / designing dream homes (businesses) can be challenging because dreams tend to continue to unfold as opportunities can better be seen (first draft of the floorplan) and room sizes and shapes start to form. As an architect you are often the one left to remind everyone involved that there is a budget that goes along with the dream. You are the one that has to break their heart when the budget doesn’t match the dream. You act as the sounding board for ideas, bringing your own and evaluating others. Years of experience, training, education, and trial and error feed your sense of design.

While I have heard many times that someone has an “eye” for design, there is no replacing years of experience and knowledge. The process of design relies on a “feel” for the right solution. It requires an emotional investment to get it just right. Sometimes you are in a state of joy and sometimes you are struggling to hit a budget emotionally strained.

Should you install Solar PV on your Roof? Part 2

by Charles Hendricks | Aug 29, 2023 | architecture, Building Science

Here is part 2 to answer should you install Solar PV on your roof? Check out part 1 as well as one of our architects, Charles Hendricks and Eric with Green Hill Solar answer your questions.

Charles, how does this Solar PV thing work, will my house be “on the grid?”

You will still use the grid and should pay a usage charge to the power company to be connected – this pays for the grid quality and your access to power at night – even when you are producing what you need or more than what you need – you are using the grid. There are no battery solutions that I have seen yet that are affordable and reliable. When there are, you will not need the grid.

Eric, I understand I can get “free solar” from some companies – how does that work? What about adding Solar to my commercial building? Are there still tax benefits to adding solar PV?

Be aware of the “free solar” statement. There really is no free solar. The current financial benefits are tax oriented. Private individuals and businesses will qualify for a 30% federal tax credit that can be taken over 2 years. Businesses and Farms can, additionally, depreciate their solar equipment. “No money down and no upfront costs” usually refer to a “no money down, loan”. If your project will be financed with a solar loan, understand any “dealer fees” that are being passed on to you. They are used to help bring down the loan rate. When you pay out of pocket for your system, you should evaluate annual production, Return on Investment (ROI), years of payback, and always the environmental benefits. When you pay with a loan, the key metric is comparing monthly payments to your average monthly electric bill.

solar panels on the roof of dairy queen in Harmony Square, Harrisonburg Virginia

Harmony Square Dairy Queen (above),

Charles, should I have my existing roof replaced before adding solar PV?

If your roof is not newer, you probably want a roofer to evaluate the life in it before installing solar. You don’t want to have to remove solar to replace a roof before you have gotten the value out of the solar PV.

Charles, now that you have answered a lot of our questions, where do I start?

Start with this website to determine if your roof has good solar potential.

https://sunroof.withgoogle.com/

If the answer is yes, then collect your utility bills for the past year for the solar PV company you decide to reach out to for a quote.

Ask someone like Eric Beck with Green Hill Solar to give you an estimate for installation. The way I would look at it, cost vs value – is to finance the system through a bank with a 15 – 20-year loan (panels will last a long time, but usually have a 25 year warranty). If your payment to the bank is less than your current electric bills, then you should have solar PV. If you can also use the tax credits that is icing on the cake. Solar PV does add value to your home so if / when you sell you should be able to get most if not all your money back out of the system.

Eric, final question, how long does it take to get the system up and operational once you get started.

An average residential installation should take 2-3 days. The utility application and approvals on the front and back end can take up to 30 days, so be ready for patience. Solar PV has been well designed to be very low impact and easy to retrofit on most homes, so the impact on the lifestyle of the occupants is minimal. Ultimately, be comfortable with the installer and their abilities, as you would be with any contractor. And understand, despite the rewarding nature of solar work, the unique challenges of solar work include navigating long utility review processes, local building departments, and physically demanding technical work.

What questions do you have that we can give to Charles and Eric to consider?

sunsetting and birds flying over roof solar panels of Casa Cielo

Photo above of Casa Cielo solar panels by Susan L Beck with Green Hill Solar.

Should you install Solar PV on your Roof? Part 1

by Charles Hendricks | Aug 28, 2023 | architecture, Building Science

Over the last couple of weeks, several people have posted questions on social media about adding solar photovoltaic (PV) to their home. So, should you install Solar PV on your roof? We asked one of our architects, Charles Hendricks, and reached out to the owner of a Solar PV company, Eric Beck, with Green Hill Solar to help us understand.

So, Charles, should we all have solar PV on our rooftops?

Solar on south-facing unshaded roofs that are financed with an equity line will cost you less per month than you pay now for power (in most cases). The equity line is a loan so you must qualify for the loan and will have debt until the loan is paid off. This will eliminate some that don’t have enough equity or others that don’t want to carry debt. However, you could look at your monthly power bill as a “loan payment” the same as an equity loan payment. If solar PV is cheaper or even the same price as grid power, I think the answer is yes, we should all have solar on our rooftops.

Eric, what are your thoughts about solar PV on our rooftops?

Distributed solar is increasingly becoming viable for many more people as technology improves and costs decrease through improved collection and other market incentives. Distributed solar is generally photovoltaic (electric production) and located on rooftops or ground mounts. They are very simply small electrical plants that are connecting to the grid across the country. A south-facing roof is ideal! Even if a roof is not exactly south facing (azimuth), solar collection has improved so dramatically that even East or West facing roofs can make sense.

Charles, how do you decide what Solar PV company to use to install this clean energy source?

There are many companies that are good quality trusted options in the area – I know most of them. There are benefits to full-service companies that will finance the system for you but they have more risk, so they get more reward. There are companies that have a better customer interface – again – you pay for that warm fuzzy feeling. Then there are companies that are average on warm fuzzy feelings that don’t finance the systems that cost less up front to. Your roof will need to be analyzed to be able to hold the added weight – all the companies will offer this service. Some of the companies will also do an energy audit and offer weatherization to cut use before installing the solar. Interview and select the company that you trust to provide the best value.

Eric, what are some ways to evaluate a Solar PV company before you hire one?

Because I’m in the business, I can sometimes lose perspective of what it’s like to be a customer. Below are some excellent questions that I have been asked recently by our customers when we were assessing their homes and offering our design/proposals.

Why have the companies chosen their type of solar panel and inverter? Always look for Tier 1 panels, and the differing inverters offer their own pros and cons.
What is the equipment warranty period and how are the solar companies warranting their labor? You should be getting a warranty of at least 25 yrs. for all rooftop components and understand how the warranty on installation works.
Is my roof or our property good for solar? Most salespeople should be able to outline how your property compares to an ideal orientation, and how much your solar production will be impacted by shading from trees, roof features, or adjacent roofs. In the Shenandoah Valley, there can be shading impacts from close valleys and ridges as well. Fortunately, your roof doesn’t have to be oriented in the perfect way to benefit from solar. Solar collection has improved dramatically and makes it possible for many to realize the environmental and financial benefits of solar.

Part 2 coming soon, check back for more answers.

Massanutten Technical Center Summer Camp – Architecture

by Charles Hendricks | Jul 11, 2023 | Charles Hendricks, citizen architect, community

This summer I taught a class for Massanutten Technical Center Summer Camp in Architecture. This was my third time teaching the course and it was as rewarding as ever.

One of the greatest gifts I have ever been given in life was finding my passion. I love serving others and it feeds my soul. One of the ways I am able to do this is by sharing my knowledge about architecture with others. I do this in blogs, on social media, lectures, and recently through a week long summer camp at Massanutten Technical Center. I had a class of 11 middle school students that signed up (most of them) or were signed up for my course because architecture sounded interesting. This week was a chance to explore a future career option, flex some design muscles, stretch their comfort zone, and get exposed to the built environment in a new way.

The main project I used for this week long course was designing a floorplan. In just 20 hours it is hard to do more than conceptualize a familiar kind of space. We talk about styles of architecture, scale, famous works of architecture, famous architects, color, light, and more. It’s a fun week for me to share something I love – the process of creating design.

The students take on the challenges along the way with a tower building challenge using marshmallows and toothpicks and a bridge challenge using one sheet of paper. We watch a variety of videos on sketching to learn different techniques and talk about how to sculpt space. We investigate room sizes and learn about architectural scales as a way to convey information to others.

Each day has a new challenge and by the end, each student has a floorplan designed for a family they have imagined. Some of the students get to the point of building a 3D version of their floorplan so they can better see the spaces. This allows them to think about a roof and vertical form of their creation.

Taking on this summer camp while keeping up at work is a challenge each time I have done it. However, it is so worth it to see these students grow. Over just a week, I could see them becoming more confident in their abilities to design and think through spatial design problems. If you have the opportunity to share your passion with others, in a summer camp or just a conversation, I encourage you to take the chance to share.

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