Summary

What features do you expect to have in your luxury home? We strived to include the best designs and accoutrements ranging from floor plan flow to home automation to convenience details. Let us introduce you to some of them.

Livability

• Circulation

  On the main and lower levels, the wide halls and circular layout pleasantly connect the public spaces. Between the lower and main levels, the inside stairway and wide deck stairs allow you and guests to easily flow between levels without retracing steps. The kitchen is directly in-line with garage to make unloading supplies a breeze. Just past the front doors is the guest room or office, strategically placed to impress visitors without intruding on the rest of the house.

• Windows, Doors

  Commercial windows and Nanawall doors, elegant but with a durable painted finish, have been used throughout. They will last longer than wood windows or clad windows, will not rust, have an exceptional water and wind seal, and are designed to withstand the wind loads and windblown rain coming off the bay.

  The divided light windows have double thermal breaks to keep heat loss to a minimum.

• Special Considerations

  Two laundry chutes, from the master bath and the northeast bath conveniently drop to a ventilated hamper closet just above the washer and dryer. The chutes are separate, isolating sound from each other.

  All closets have hall-effect automatic door switches for closet lights. Room lighting uses low reflection fixtures to avoid mirroring in the view windows.

  Several of the bathrooms have separate commode rooms so that that other people can use the washroom area at the same time.

  All water pipes are sound isolated and wrapped with insulation, keeping the plumbing very quiet. All drain pipes over or through living spaces are cast iron.

  For connection to possible future solar panels or other rooftop appliances, we have installed a conduit running from the attic to the mechanical room, just above the electrical panels.

• Kitchen

  A kitchen is so vital to any house. In this fine home, we have planned ahead to give you the most functional layout without compromising its stunning appearance. Your own lifestyle will ultimately govern the best way for you to organize your provisions and prepare dishes. Let us point out a few features that help your preferences dovetail with reality.

  The south sink, near the peninsula, can be the focal point of food preparation. Just to its left is the top of the line Wolf range. In between are drawers available for cooking equipment as well as just to the right in the peninsula. The peninsula can serve guests on the raised bar and provide more counter space for your endeavors. Just behind is the kitchen island; to save steps, we have added an under counter refrigerator to keep supplies handy for food preparation. In addition, there are plenty of drawers for bottles, cans, boxes, and whatever else you need to keep handy.

  The north sink, at the other end of the kitchen, keeps your dirty dishes and pans as far away as possible from your guests. Two no-scrape dishwashers allow for quick clean up and keeping your counter cleared off. A wide bank of cabinets just above minimize walking around to put items away.

  On the opposite side of the island we provided floor to ceiling cabinets to house every imaginable item. We placed a built-in desk in the middle to add flexibility to your lifestyle.

  We added a pull-out tray under the commercial microwave to facilitate handling heavy items.

Home Automation

• Capabilities

  The Omnipro II, by HAI Systems, provides a plethora of services including security monitoring, smoke detector monitoring, video surveillance, central control of thermostats and room settings, outdoor temperature, irrigation (garden watering) control, music control, and optionally, lighting control.

  We have provided one color touch screen control by the front door and another in the master suite. Additionally, a keypad control is in the mechanical room. Two video cameras, with infrared night lighting, one at the front door and one overlooking the south terrace can show images on the touch screen displays.

  The security aspect of the Omnipro II is currently setup to call a phone number if security is breached or a smoke alarm triggers. This call would alert your security monitoring company. In addition, the system has the capability to alert you by cell phone, email, or text message.

  Besides security monitoring, you can simply monitor your home, for example the current room temperatures and thermostat settings, through the Omnipro II via an Ethernet connect to your pc or via the Internet. It can also be setup to display reminder messages, such as "garbage day".

• Music

  In addition, we have installed the Hi-Fi music system, also by HAI Systems. This is integrated with the Omnipro "brain" and allows music sourced from various rooms to be played through selected ceiling speakers installed in several of the rooms. Wires to additional rooms are preinstalled and identified on drawings for future speaker installations. The system is capable of sourcing music from eight separate devices (CD player, stereo system, iPod...) and each room can concurrently play any one of those sources.

  The music source connections include an infrared port, where you can connect a remote control cable to your player and then use the remote control in the room where the music is playing. Each room with speakers includes a volume control and a music source channel selector.

• Future

  One final note: since technology and needs change over time, we have installed conduit to virtually every room so that phone, ethernet, fiber optics, etc. can be installed in the future. These conduits run to a central wiring panel in the mechanical room. In addition, all the music wiring runs to an additional panel under the stairs, back-to-back with the room with home theatre wiring. If one desires, the music system could be integrated with the home theatre system or with some other music server technology.

Heating and Ventilation

• In-Floor Radiant Heat

  Radiant in-floor heat gives wonderful warmth to your feet and keeps you feeling comfortable without making the air temperature too warm. Hot water tubing is installed under all floors in the main and upper levels and under the lower level bathroom floor. Since the rest of the lower level has insulating carpeting on the floor, we installed radiant heat in the walls.

  As some rooms absorb strong south sun and some face north, the heating needs can vary greatly from space to space. Thus, we designed 10 zones for the home, each with its own thermostat. This also allows, say, the master bath to be slightly warmer than the master bedroom area.

• Continuous Ventilation

  The heat recovery ventilator with air filters runs full time, ensuring fresh air continually freshens the bedrooms and other spaces. Concurrently, stale air is pulled from the spaces such as the bathrooms and laundry; nothing is recirculated. Because the system is push-pull, it will function properly even if windows are left open. The heat recovery unit reclaims almost all of the heat from the exiting air.

Exterior

• Weather Protection

  One of the most important exterior features is one that you will never see. Behind every exterior surface is an air space, sometimes known as rain-screen technology. While every effort has been made to prevent water from penetrating the exterior surfaces, strong winds and wear-and-tear may allow some water to get through. By providing an interior air space, any water that gets in will simply drain down and out weep holes around the base of the house.

  The commercial grade windows provide additional weather protection. These elegant but sturdy aluminum windows won't rust and may never need repainting. They are designed to withstand heavy wind loads and rain, and have better weather seals than other types of windows.

• Other

  Near the south deck, we have run a gas line and power to a convenient spot for an outdoor barbeque.

  The garden area by the front door has sprinklers, while the other garden areas are watered by drip irrigation. These are controlled by the home automation system.

  The custom designed chimney caps are built of copper and slightly "preaged". They should continue to weather to a beautiful mottled green.