Our clients approached us with the desire to completely recreate their first floor. After a walkthrough and lots of time spent discussing the detail of how this family lives, the dreams in the hearts of our sweet clients, and the functionality that would make their lives so much better, we got to work on the plan!
To begin laying out the ideas, Dan Ludwig of Hometown Design drew the design in CAD and the LLI Team weighed in on the layout and detail. There's lots of us asking "can we do this cool thing?!" Dan usually responding with "yes, but in order to do so we need to... or yes, like this..." The team-up is a dream because in this time spent, we blend the deep practical builder knowledge and the form, function, and style knowledge to get to a quicker, more realistic design. Sometimes when a design is created based solely on client's desires and without the fact-checking of a builders experience as to how these "want list items" impact cost and timeline, we wind up reworking a plan. This design + build duo of Hometown Design and Lindsay Laine Interiors is tried, true, and ready to roll.
design: Lindsay laine / Build: Hometown Design
First Floor Renovation
The rooms our clients wanted reworked included the kitchen, dining room, entry, hall, family room, back hall, main hall, powder room, and office. The biggest challenge in this renovation is swapping the kitchen and family room locations. Making these decisions is a collaborative process we have with the builder, the client, and our team.
The Before
After reviewing the structure of the home, we came up with a plan to recreate the new spaces which included the kitchen with an eat-in hearth room and back pantry. We will use the former kitchen and dining location to create a powder room with a swimming pool drop zone, as well as a family gathering room. Additionally we reworked other areas to carve out a mud hall and laundry, office, library/den which will also double as a guest suite via a Murphy bed and full en-suite bathroom.
The After
One of the greatest aspects of modeling is the fact that our clients can experience all the options they would like to explore and feel totally confident in the design direction and decisions made. Before we lift a hammer, we have full confidence we are all on the same page and the mission is clear. This is the most exhilarating way to build! As we go, everyone involved in the build has full access to the model, leaving nothing for explanation.
The 3D Model
The most gratifying experience for us is the "this or that" options we can show prior to demo and build. Some examples in this build were either keeping the existing brick as is in the former family room (soon to be hearth room) or paint the brick black. Painting the fireplace black to play into the new palette of this kitchen design was a bold design choice. Being able to show our clients the old brick versus the new black paint was eye-opening and allowed our clients to make the decision more easily.
Kitchen/Pantry
We lift lines off paper and create a photo-realistic digital home that we refine until it’s perfect and after the construction phase, we can actually step into. It’s the dream state come alive in the design build world.
Our most common feedback comes from our build clients in a state of wonder saying, “I cannot believe how exact the result of our home is to the model.”
Family Room
After a few revisions of the model, our clients are ready to go. The design is set. Our build documents have been updated and ready to be handed off to the builder. We now have clarity on the materials quantities we need to accurately inform the build costs. We see the actual materials we have selected from flooring to countertops to paint color, cabinet hardware, and appliance detail.
Laundry/Mudhall
The amount of information our models deliver is incredible. We reference it throughout the active construction phase and so do the trades as they move along in the project. It is a map to reference as we reach the end goal. We model because happy clients are our mission!
Office/Library
