Up goes the new top floor…
February 8-16, 2020….We last left our house sleeping quietly under a tarp with a new gabled roof in the back.
We had already been impressed by the team from Excellent Carpentry. They worked quickly, methodically and thoroughly. You could tell they wanted to get things just right. They worked as an extremely efficient team and kept things as neat as possible at the site.
As this was pre-pandemic, Mike and I were not at the house as much as we were still out and about during the week. So one day we were shocked and surprised to find that within eight hours they had erected the top floor. It was as though our house had been patiently waiting to be crowned with a true 2nd story and suddenly…ta da…we had a real master suite.
When we left in the morning….
…by the end of the same day!
Framing the master suite front windows
Top floor awaits real windows
Our addition of a master suite on top of the front of the home supported our philosophy:
Functionality: with this new master suite, each floor now has a unique purpose - top floor: rest and replenishment; next floor down: working and collaboration; main floor and lower floor is all about gathering, recreating and communing.
Community: our master suite supports us as a community of two while also allowing us to connect with the neighborhood through wonderfully large windows.
Sustainability: we added 600+ square feet without expanding the footprint of the house and disturbing our soil. We can also take advantage of how it’s easier to heat and cool a house vertically than horizontally.
While we loved our master suite addition, we did wonder about the size of the house and the look of it from the front.
While the elevation study showed it was in line with the scale of our neighbors’ houses, we recognized that what is in a drawing can look different in real life.
We were eager to see how the look would evolve once the windows were in and the porch was on.
We give a shout out to Excellent Carpentry and the other great folks working on the job!