by Catarina Ferreira, AIA

Let’s face it, renovations are tricky, even more so when the patient in question is a difficult one. As architects, we sometimes need to have the gift of foresight: the ability to see what is not yet there.

In this add/alt project in Bethesda MD, currently on the boards, the challenges are many: an oddly located front door, barely visible; a way too prominent a garage, a multitude of levels and rooflines with no apparent rhyme or reason, a strange disposition of spaces, with the kitchen on a different level than the entertaining spaces, main bedroom and kids’ bedrooms on separate floors, etc. Our scope involves addressing all of that while improving the house’s curb appeal and renovating dated interior spaces.

A second story addition provides the opportunity to create a new primary suite on the same level as the children’s bedrooms, while allowing us to change the house’s problematic massing. Rooflines are the theme here, so we are going with it and trying to make sense of it all.