Design Tips

Growing your family? Just bought that almost-perfect home? Want to install a pipe organ? Whatever your reason, you want to add space to your house. But what if you don’t have much property? Local building codes mean you can’t go up or out. Have you considered going down? Many homeowners in the Washington metro area…

The arrival of 17-year cicadas in the Washington DC area always reminds me how important it is to consider the natural world when building or renovating a house. I have noted greater cicada density in some parts of metro Washington than in others. What accounts for the difference? Often, you can find more cicadas in…

I often get inquiries from clients about renovating or remodeling a historic home in the Washington metro area. I really love these kinds of projects. They require a special kind of creativity to balance modernization and lifestyle improvements while retaining the home’s historic character. However, there’s no denying that renovating a historic home can be…