Going Green Remodeling House Ideas 01

Remodeling House Ideas : Going Green Remodeling House Ideas 01

According to Bruce Drake, a professor at the University of Portland, Oregon, he has never been in a house he has liked more than this one. Bruce, who with his wife, Eileen, purchased this English Cottage-style dwelling in 2001, had spent weeks passing the “For Sale” sign in front of the house on his drive to work. “The house spoke to me,” he said. “This wonderful blend of architectural styles, with the stone wall flowing almost organically into the house. It’s very stately without being pretentious.”

Although the 1928 house was virtually intact on the outside, “inside, it suffered from a bad case of the seventies,” said Bruce, a revelation that was particularly disappointing since the house had been originally built by “The Oregonian” newspaper as a model home to show off local woods. The remodel during the 1970s looked dated and ugly—the previous owners had replaced an elegant set of French doors in the living room with a fixed pane of glass without muntins, installed dark-brown kitchen cabinets, and dropped the ceiling. They also used garish accents in an upstairs bath, and slathered so much paint on the wood staircase that the carved heads on the finials looked like abstract sculpture.

Not only did the Drakes want to restore the house, but they also “wanted to do so in a sustainable, environmentally friendly way,” Bruce explained. The couple hired the Neil Kelly Company, a Portland-based firm known for its emphasis on environmentally conscious design.