I am considering adding a third bay to an existing two car garage. My concern is the visual impact of this addition. Since the garage is the first thing you see as you approach the house it is critical to reduce the visual effect of a three car garage. The existing garage roof is flat, as will be the addition. The most obvious solution I see is offsetting the third bay to break the plane on the bank of three garage doors. I will be adding on to a bay that is 36 feet deep so there is some room to set back the third bay. I would like to get as much space as possible while reducing the visual impact of a three car structure. If there is a “rule of thumb” formula or other visual tricks to reduce the visual impact I would greatly appreciate your input.
Thank you, Eric
Replies
Here's my 2 cents. Setting the third bay in is a good start. How far back? I think you have to consider the whole elevation and then decide. The sun's shadow may play a part too. Of course you do the new bay with the same exterior materials, and not to paint the doors a contrasting color. Have you consider calling in an archi or designer on an hourly basis?
Tom
Make the door look like a wall?
Make sure it's a brick wall if you were to run into it. :)
Tom
Tom,
Thanks for your thoughts. My gut feeling is to offset a minimum of four feet, a max of eight feet. The addition will be no greater than twelve feet wide. You approach the garage on a level plane, however your first sight is from an elevated position driving down the lane. The garage doors face east , the addition will go on the north side. I should add there is an entry door to the left of the two garage doors. Exterior materials consist of double 6" cedar lap siding, four panel steel 9x7 doors with sunburst details over each garage door. Everything is painted white. I have not considered consulting an architect . If you have any further questions or other observations please let me know.
Thank you,
Eric
Eric,
There are about ten thousand ways to reduce the visual impact of a form but it all depends on what your existing facade looks like. I'm not getting a real good visual image from your description. Can you post a pic?
A competent architect will probably be well worth the investment on this little add on, even if it is just a garage.
Kevin Halliburton
"I fear explanations explanatory of things explained" -Abraham Lincoln-
Kevin
Im sorry, but I cant post a picture. I have since posted a description on this site to Tom describing the structure in more detail. I really think I'll have a hard time finding someone to take on an advisory role on such a small project without costing more than I have budgeted for this project. I am hoping to obtain ideas and solutions that others in this forum have used to "fool the eye". If you could share some of those ideas I woud be very appreciative.
Thank you,
Eric
In addition to physically setting the structure back as you have described, painting it a darker shade will cause it to recede visually. A word of caution however, with everything else being white, painting the garage a different color could actually draw attention to it. For the best "cammo" effect, choose a receding (dark) color out of your backdrop and use it to blend the addition into the scenery. Trimming the remainder of the house in the same color will help to unify the scheme.
It sounds like you are on the right track with your idea of breaking up the planes. Consider changing the height of the new addition as well. Anything to set it apart and diminish it.
Now, how about a whole different train of thought... Is there a possibility of using the new addition as a balancing or terminating element? Maybe I can best explain what I mean in english terms. What if you create this new addition in the style of the house and use it like a period at the end of a sentence? Instead of leaving the existing garage hanging out there like a dangling participle, maybe it can become a conjunction linking two similar thoughts. In such case you may want to bring the new addition forward with the current garage as the receding, less important, link tying them together?
One rule of thumb you may find helpful: Every vertical line or shadow will cause a reduction in the perceived width/ length and an increase in the perceived height. Horizontal lines and shadows will have the opposite effect.
A critical point- unify. You don't have to dress the new exactly like the old but they at least need to look like a close couple going to the same party. You may be able to do something different on the new that you reflect on the old instead of rigidly making the new form adhere to what is already there.
As to consultants, if an architect or designer is not in your budget ask a competent and experienced artist for ideas. Architecture is in large part sculpting on a grand scale. I use my bronze sculpture and graphic arts experience as much as anything in roughing out the form of a new building. You might even be surprised at the ingenuity of your musician friends. Proportion, scale, rhythm, symmetry- Architects aren't the only ones trained in their use. They are simply the ones best trained to apply the rules to building design. Hope this helps.
Kevin Halliburton
"Adaptability is not imitation. It means power of resistance and assimilation." -Mahatma Gandhi-
A couple more thoughts while I'm tossing out ideas. From your description it sounds like this addition is going to be the very first impression people get of your house as they approach. Rather than being introduced to your architecture by a utilitarian garage door, something like a nice courtyard would make for a more pleasant architectural handshake if you will. Do you have room to set this new addition farther back, turning it perpendicular to the existing garage? The resulting space, cradled in the L-shape of the garages, could be developed as a landscaped courtyard that would be a visual treat for approaching traffic.
A trick I learned as a child might work here too. I used to hold my thumb out at arm's length and cover the entire moon with it so I could see the surrounding stars better. Another option may be to create a planting screen that works like my thumb did- sort of a "green thumb" that would hide the glare of the garage door and allow you to focus on what you really want to see. Done right, it could also be used to frame an area you want to draw interest to as you approach the house, such as the front entry.
On that train of thought, what about changing the direction of approach to the house entirely so you drive past the house to get to the garages? If you can do this, setting the addition back a few feet would essentially hide it behind the existing garage altogether.
Again, I'm offering suggestions based on the best image I can draw in my mind from your description. I'm mostly just trying to get you to back all the way up to the point when your house first comes into view. Start thinking about solutions from there and work your way toward the house developing the impression you want. Good luck!
Kevin Halliburton
Kevin.
I'm planning a project that involves similar issues: minimizing/integrating the form of a second story addition (while maximizing floor space). I will ultimately hire an architect or designer to fine-tune my ideas, but for now I'm playing with floorplan options and want to keep within reasonable bounds (and I'm not yet ready to start spending money).
Your comments to xray were very helpful for me in planning. Do you have any suggestions of books or other resources where I might learn more about applying these principles to residential design (and see examples)?
(If it helps, this is a traditional center hall garrison colonial .. plan is to build over side-attached 1-story wing that houses 2 car garage and small family room)
Thanks,
RIck
Edited 2/18/2003 11:18:03 AM ET by RICKGREG
Edited 2/18/2003 11:20:18 AM ET by RICKGREG
In my opinion, you will learn a lot from just about anything Taunton Press publishes including Fine Home Building magazine.
From other publishers- two of my favorites stand out:
Architecture: Form, Space, and Orderby Frank D.K. Ching (Author), Francis D. Ching
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0471286168
This book was recently re-published in 1996 as a paper back but if you can find the original it's worth what ever they are asking for it! The original is hand written and illustrated by Ching and it is a work of art. By hand written I mean every page is hand lettered, including the title page, foreword, Index...etc. It is a white, hard cover book, longer than it is tall (I never measured it but I think the proportions of the book are the "Golden Rectangle" described in the section on proportion) If you want a simple, must have primer on the fundamentals of good, solid architecture get this book. I think it is still used in just about every university architecture curriculum out there and for good reason.
"A Pattern Language" by Christopher Alexander
Publisher: Oxford University Press; ; (1977)
ISBN: 0195019199
Taunton just published a follow up book to this one that is more specifically geared toward residential design. I've not read it yet but, based on my experience with Taunton, I feel comfortable recommending it:
Patterns of Home: The Ten Essentials of Enduring Designby Max Jacobson, Murray Silverstein, Barbara Winslow
Publisher: Taunton Pr; ; (August 27, 2002)
ISBN: 1561585335
Sarah Susanka's "Not so Big..." series and her design articles in FHB are excellent, well illustrated, solid design resources as well.
There are others but I think this list will serve to get you started. Maybe some of the more experienced architects who frequent this forum will offer us both the benefit of their favorites. I'm always looking for good resources myself.
Good luck,
Kevin Halliburton
Thanks Kevin. I found a used hardback copy of Ching's book on Amazon. I'll start with that and see where it takes me.
(On your other point about Taunton... I have been filing clippings from FH for years. Lots of good ideas there.)
Thanks.
-Rick
Kevin,
Your input has been quite helpful. In fact your suggestion that I back all the way up and look at this project again makes perfect sense. I must admit that my wife has expressed dismay on my thoughts of adding utilitarian space to the existing garage. She has suggested a screened porch over the existing garage with a railed open deck over the addition. This would create the vertical elements you describe. However, this leads to a conundrum; I can build an outbuilding with more room than the addition at less cost than the garage addition with porch. The outbuilding would not have the detail elements of the house, the porch would require these details. Frankly, I have never liked the way the garage looks as you approach the house and it looks like my wife is right on the money with her idea.
This also continues a recurring theme in the projects I've done over the years; what starts out as a seemingly small straightforward project blossoms into a project costing much more than I had planned to spend. I have asked a friend to show me how to post pictures and they will be coming soon. It also looks like I'll be making a few calls to get an engineer out here to tell me if I can build ontop of the garage without modifications.
Again, thank you for your suggestions. They have been very helpful
Eric
>> ... what starts out as a seemingly small straightforward project blossoms into a project
>> costing much more than I had planned to spend.
This may indicate that you're limiting your imagination too much. :) If you started out with elaborate, gradiose, expensive ideas, you could whittle them down as the design goes forward and end up patting yourself on the back for a project that's much simpler and cheaper than you had thought at first.
Here are the garage pictures
Eric
Eric-
It seems that you have a one story house that may, in the course of your intended project, discover that it is actually a two story. Here's what I mean: every house can be said to have a "face." The model for this face is in some basic way, our face: chin, jaws,eyes, hat. All these involve in our evaluation of their 'beauty', a dialogue with balance.
Your house, it seems, has two faces, a pleasant, bucolic one that overlooks the lawn, and a second, Jay Leno-jawed, clinical one that opens to the world connected by tarmac.
The drive-out placement on the knoll is typical of some of the fine barns that allowed animal and wagon access to the main floor as well as the basement. The rear, full-height elevations of this type of barn could potentially be useful for inspiration.
My personal take, FWIW, is that the garage door plane must be carried aloft to meet either an eave or soar up into a proud gable end. A third bay could be used to re-configure the floorplan of the house as an L, presenting a long wall hipped into the main roof (the eave option.) Or the existing ridge could be carried over the current garage and the rear pitch over the garage section eased to allow for covering the additional bay (the gable end option.) Three equal door openings, or two narrower flanking a wider middle, all with flattened arches for lintels might yield a "carriage house" appearance that would enrich your home by harmonizing the qualities of its public and private faces.
Lance
Well, there you go- that is nothing like what I had pictured in my head. If I understand correctly, you are talking about adding the third bay to the right in all of those shots. It doesn't sound like your planning a whole facade redo and probably don't really need one. The sunburst detail over the garage doors does a nice job of unifying the gable on the house with the garage. Yea, your garage doors don't necessarily make the nicest first impression but it's no where near the visual calamity I pictured from your description.
With the angle of approach I see in your pictures, it looks like you had one of the best solutions already worked out before your initial post. Your idea of setting the addition back should do the trick. I think you can set it back far enough that you will only get a glimpse of the corner on the outside edge as you approach. It looks like you are going to loose a nicely developing tree there. That's too bad but it's hardly cutting down an old growth forest. Since you have an elevated initial view I would also suggest lowering the roof on the addition and you might want to add some of the landscaping suggestions from my previous post. Hope this helps and good luck.Kevin Halliburton
"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." -Elbert Hubbard-
One more suggestion- paint. I think an earthtone shade on the whole east end of your house, pulled from your rock veneer on the front of your house, would go a long way toward unifying the whole structure. It would really help kill some of that "in your face glare" coming off of the garage. Other than the sunburst patterns there are not a whole lot of interesting things going on there so think "minimize." Painting your sunburst details on the garage and the gable of the house a shade or two darker than the walls would subtly draw attention to the most interesting and unifying elements while reducing the perceived mass of the whole wall. On a slightly taller budget- a rock veneer on the garage would do wonders.
Kevin Halliburton
"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man." -Elbert Hubbard-
Edited 2/21/2003 2:19:56 PM ET by wrecked angle
Wrecked is all over this, but my first instinct was to set back 4ft for 12 ft of width. What would make that vary is the angle of approach. But as you said, you approach from an elevated angle, and you have a flat roof, so this isn't something I'm ever going to fall in love with.
Instinct also dictates a reduced roof height, and I would tend to lose the door header detail for the addition. But you know what? A picture is worth a thousand words.
I can't design from a black hole, spend enough to get a picture on here.
Im sorry, but I cant post a picture. I have since posted a description on this site to Tom describing the structure in more detail. I really think I'll have a hard time finding someone to take on an advisory role on such a small project without costing more than I have budgeted for this project.
Ask around. An hour or two with a good residential architect just doodling some ideas may well open your eyes to possibilites that seem simple but somehow never came occurred you._______________________
"I may have said the same thing before... But my explanation, I am sure, will always be different." Oscar Wilde
Don't know the layout of your site, but is it possible to change the entry side of your garage, driving into it on one of the sides that are perpindicular to the current entry side? Then you won't see the garage doors at all, with 36' of depth perhaps you would not need to add an extra bay? Then, you could add other architectural features to make it look more like part of the house, for instance, a roof and/or windows...just a thought...