The Rhodo Reno
A case study in “Right Size” Design
By Sean Sullivan, AMB, CGP, CAPS

My wife (Laura) and I decided to buy a 1960’s rancher in downtown Black Mountain to renovate for ourselves. We liked the feel of downtown and wanted to be close in to the lake, park, pool and center of town. We had our work cut out for us though since the home hadn’t been touched in nearly 40 years!
The 900sf shack sat on a crawl space situated nicely on a corner lot near the golf course. Believers in making all things beautiful, and the desire to give every home we touch “curb appeal”, we first nailed down the floor plan. We wanted to keep as much of the original structure as possible, leaving the two exterior door locations, existing room layouts (virtually the same), as well as leaving the original location of the hallway and common bath. Because we had to combine the two end bedrooms into a master suite, we needed to design a small addition on the back to replace the lost bedroom and give the home a proper kitchen.
We enlisted the help of an architect partner to help create the new style, passive solar design, and get the exterior elevations just right. After that was nailed down, we set out to make this the most efficient use of space we could create. Since most of our clients end up building homes larger than they had originally intended (due to having lower levels on sloping lots), we wanted to show what it meant to “right size” a home.

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