Once upon a time long ago, I had a blog that I tried to write in at least once a month. Since my last post, I've gotten more Building-Beneath and House-Move projects, each one with unique and challenging characteristics. One in particular, in the "flats of Berkeley", has been on my mind to add to this blog, but somehow I never get the time to write.
Here's a photo of the house before we started. 
The Entry and stair presented a major challenge because the bottom step was quite close to the sidewalk, the lot is small - under 4,000 sq.ft. - and the owner did not want to encroach on the size of the back yard. The typical entry design that would meet the challenge would be to raise the house in place and create a ground-level entry at the new first floor level, not a solution that was appealing to this particular homeowner.
The solution was to raise the house without raising the front porch! This would allow the proportions of elements in the front elevation to fit well together from the outside and would provide an entry that would be closer to the common areas on the inside (Living Room, Dining Room, Kitchen).
Here's a photo of the completed front view. 
Of course the front porch didn't really stay in place while the house was raised.
The end result is a 2,420 sq.ft. Four-Bedroom / Three-Bath house, with a good sized Family Room downstairs (from a 1,115 sq.ft. 3B/2b house).
There - I finally got this blog entry ready for publication. Hopefully the dam has broken and I'll write something here more often in the coming months.
