Designs for Remodeling Your Home: Bumps, Bays, Additions & More

By Jerold Axelrod

Thinking About Remodeling?
Whether its big or small, a room addition, a new kitchen, an in-law suite, a new facade,
a porch, whole house makeover - or whatever - this unique book will help you arrive at
the correct design solution for your specifi c home. Written and illustrated by a licensed
architect, nationally recognized for his expertise in the fi eld, this book is specifi cally
written to help steer you clear of the many pitfalls encountered in remodeling.
Whether youre a do-it-yourselfer, or you intend to engage professional contractors, this
is a step by step guide organized to help you make the correct design choices for your
home. With over 1000 illustrations and 300 different plans there is likely a plan, or many
different plans, that should satisfy your budget as well as your needs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 5, 2009
• ISBN: 9781462822928

Jerold Axelrod

With over 35 years experience as a residential design architect, Jerold Axelrod has won numerous awards for his townhouses,apartments, and single-family residences as well as many other remodeling projects. His designs have been featured in every major home design publication and have been built throughout the United States,Canada and abroad. Axelrod is a licensed architect in eight states and holds a certifi cate from the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards and dual membership in the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and the American Institute of Building Design (AIBD). Jerry refers to his design philosophy as the three Fs: functional, flawless, furnishable floor plans that are exciting to live in and readily furnished, something overlooked all too often.

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Copyright © 2009 by Jerold Axelrod, Architect.

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Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction-What This Book Is- And Is Not

Part 1

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Part 2

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Part 3

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

PART 4

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Part 5 ADDENDUM

Glossary

Dedicated to Florence, Sharron, Neil, Kiera, Ahron, Gabrielle, Julia and Sophia

Acknowledgments

The inspiration for this book originally came from a well known editor of a home journal who felt there was a need for practical design guidance for the homeowner thinking of remodeling their home. The horror stories one hears, about homeowners unhappy with their remodeling experience, often gloss over the fact that a major cause is often the poor quality of the original design, or even the lack thereof. With that inspiration I embarked on a decade long search to identify the primary home types and local remodeling practices around the country.

The result was my earlier book on the subject, Architectural Plans for Adding On or Remodeling, the first ever attempt to graphically identify the most prevalent and common home improvements happening today and to guide the homeowner how to successfully achieve a good looking, well planned renovation. This was updated with the addition of several hundred new drawings, many of which were based on comments received from thousands of readers from the first volume. The new designs also include a number of apartments, home offices, and some dramatic whole house renovations provided by my partner Glen Cherveny.

Sincere appreciation is extended to my dedicated office staff, particularly Adam DeLumen whose CAD talents helped to produce the quality of drawings in the book.

Introduction-What This Book Is- And Is Not

This book is primarily a sketch book of architectural designs targeted to help the homeowner thinking of remodeling their home. Like its’ predecessors Architectural Plans for Adding On or Remodeling and Time Saver Concise, Plans for Adding On or Remodeling, this book is unique in that it provides the user a veritable potpourri of hundreds of practical plans for remodeling a home. With more than 1,000 illustrations, and over 300 different plans, it has something for every situation. There are beautiful room additions, exciting internal room remodelings, and even dramatic whole house renovations; they range from a charming three foot breakfast area bump-out, to a complete remake of a large two story Victorian. There are porches, sunrooms, and vestibules, as well as kitchens, baths, bedrooms and family rooms. There are also garages, built-in or detached, and a whole range of apartments for parents or children.

There are plans that expand up or expand out, and some that rearrange and even reduce rooms. There are contemporary additions—and traditional ones, but most important, these are plans that are explicitly designed to remodel someone’s home. The homes on which these plans are based are likely to include yours. The homes chosen are extremely varied; there are one-stories, split-levels, one and one half stories, old bungalows and cottages and recent two story traditional style homes too. The plans presented are a product of extensive research; it is likely that there are several plans for remodeling that both suit your specific needs and match your existing home.

This book is also an encyclopedia of ideas—both graphic and written. It is notable for its profusion of artwork, but the written words are not meant to be glossed over, either; much of my experience has been put down in the written material. Although this is a book about remodeling homes, it should not be confused with the majority of books that deal with the subject; most are how-to books, written to assist you, once you know what you want to build. This book is not that.

Many remodeling books attempt to teach the layman how to design his own project, and then how to draw the construction plans. For the majority of homeowners I believe this proves to be an extremely frustrating task to learn. Most books, unfortunately, gloss over the subject of design, presuming the reader will gain that elsewhere. But where? The major source of such ideas are the home journals which do feature extensive examples of successful remodelings. But most such examples have little practical value to the homeowner frantically trying to plan a remodeling project. The majority of photographic features are, by nature, esoteric, one-of-a-kind essays on a custom renovation. In conversation with many clients, they tell me that, they gain helpful ideas from the journals, but find it difficult to apply these to their own home.

Interestingly, the original inspiration for the predecessor book, Architectural Plans for Adding On or Remodeling was provided to me by the editor of one of these journals, many years ago. He recognized the difficulty in the consumers ability to find practical, readily useable, design ideas for their own home. I resisted the concept at first, primarily out of fear of the magnitude of the undertaking. However, over the past twenty years, I began to research and collect ideas for common themes. The almost infinite number of variations, however, that are possible for any one design, did speak against trying to standardize them.

The answer to that came (or so I hoped) when we purchased our first computer. After several years of frustration and several aborted efforts, we returned to using pencils, only finally to achieve success. All of the plans reproduced herein have been drawn on our CAD system; this makes it very easy to affect individual nuances and variances in any home. This capability has enabled me to develop standardized, readily recognizable, existing home plans to work with as a base, with full knowledge that this base will grow overtime, as will the remodeling projects themselves. That, in fact has already occurred with the addition of some 25% new plans since the initial volume. This technology also enables us to provide any of these CAD files for the user to use.

As to the organization of the book: resist the temptation to look at pictures first. There is a significant amount of helpful written material in Part 1 to help you get started in the right direction.

The first three chapters of the book are designed to help one analyze needs, evaluate a home for change and develop a program. I do that with every custom client we have; it is a process you should not gloss over, as the satisfaction our clients ultimately receive from a finished remodeling project is directly related to the quality of the program we prepare.

A discussion ensues, in the next chapter, on how to best use the prototype plans that make up the balance of the book. There is a discussion for the lay person on when you need an architect, and how to have these plans customized. I do believe that architectural help is important, but that is why I prepared this book; my relationship with you may lack the personal contact, but the ideas—and plans—are the most important help that I can provide.

Part 2 of this book deals with subject of creating appropriate additions, not in specific plans as of yet, but in shapes and concept only. My goal here is to help you create appropriate and attractive looking additions. In the first chapter of Part 2, chapter 5, I have identified some 40 different specific shapes that fit specific, recognizable home types. However, there are too many homes we come across that defy the norms. Therefore in the following chapter I deal with additions as simply forms. This chapter 6, presents 60 prototype shapes for successful additions; I call them blockforms as that is all they are: simple block shapes that you may be able to easily recognize and relate to your home; if properly followed, any of them should lead to an addition that meshes well with the subject home.

The seventh chapter deals with what not to do. I debated frequently as to whether or not I should devote any valuable space to this subject; the problem was that to do it thoroughly could take a pictorial volume in itself. A brief discussion plus several pages of drawings was the compromise. If the project you are contemplating involves an addition there may be some valuable information here to help you avoid making a mistake.

The actual prototype plans are divided into four chapters in Part 3. Chapter 8 essentially presents room additions, that go up or out in every direction, on an extensive variety of existing homes; the additions comprise the full gamut of needs ranging from apartments to family rooms and kitchens to bedrooms and baths. If your plans include an addition, it is likely you will find one here. Following is a voluminous collection of plans appropriately dubbed bumps, bays, extensions and interior remodeling. Whereas the focus of the publishing world is usually directed at room additions, it is the identification and presentation of these smaller spatial undertakings, that makes this book most unique. The majority of home remodeling projects usually include such smaller, bump-outs or interior space re-arrangements, yet they have never been analyzed and presented in a useable format for