In addition, the firm principals are capable draftsmen and the designers of EVstudio's CAD standards. This aids the firm in flexibility, but it also means that the principals are much more capable of gauging how long tasks will take and knowing what the software is capable of.

Originally posted 2008-05-31 16:03:55.

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For single family homes and duplexes we go to the 2006 International Residential Code. It states that each dwelling unit shall have at least one room with a minimum of 120 square feet. Other habitable rooms need to have at least 70 sf excepting kitchens. (Bathrooms, closets, halls and utility spaces are not considered habitable rooms so they're also exempt). In order to count the square footage towards the minimum it must have a flat ceiling over 7'-0" or you can count the area under a sloped ceiling from the point it hits 5'-0" and over.

There are also minimum ceiling height requirements under the 2006 IRC. Generally you need 7'-0" clear minimum. Beams spaced 4'-0" or more can be at 6'-6" above the floor. Where you have basements with no habitable spaces (bedrooms, kitchen, living, etc) the ceiling can be at 6'-8" and beams and ductwork can be at 6'-4". Where you have the sloped ceilings at least half the room needs to have a ceiling height over 7'-0". In bathrooms you need 6'-8" over the fixtures and a minimum of 30"x30" at that height where you have a showerhead.

The 2006 International Building Code kicks in for commercial buildings and buildings with more than 2 dwelling units. The room sizes are very similar to the IRC with a minimum of one habitable room over 120 sf and other habitable rooms needing to be 70 sf. Habitable rooms excepting the kitchen also have to be a minimum of 7'-0" wide and there needs to be 36" of clear space in front of counters and appliances.

On the minimum ceiling heights the IRC requires habitable spaces and corridors to be a minimum of 7'-6" and bathrooms, kitchens, storage areas and laundry areas can have ceilings at 7'-0" minimum. Where the ceiling slopes at least half the room needs to be over the minimum and you can't count any area under 5'-0" toward minimum room size. You can also furr down a ceiling to 7'-0" for up to 2/3 of the room.

I haven't utilized the rules for efficiency dwelling units but they exist in the 2006 IBC. For efficiency units you need a living room of not less than 220 sf and an additional 100 sf for occupants beyond 2. The unit has to have a closet. It also must have a kitchen sink, cooking appliance, refrigeration and a minimum of 30" in front of each appliance. It also must have its own bathroom with a water closet, lavatory and a bathtub or a shower.

Originally posted 2008-10-20 23:18:57.

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1. Designing Your House – Part 5
2. Designing Your House – Part 4
3. Designing Your House – Part 3

One spot where this could be easily overlooked is restrooms shared between spaces where the restrooms do not have lockable doors. If a door is in a fire wall, you need to be able to latch it closed.

Originally posted 2009-04-30 23:09:12.

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1. Fire Door Protection Ratings May Be Less Than the Rating For the Wall Assembly
2. Opening Protection and Fire Rating in Garages – Requirements for the Door and Gypsum Board
3. Temperature Control in Buildings – What is the Minimum Heat Level Required in the Building Code?

Typically residential units are 20' wide or wider but on occasion we design units that are much narrower. The example above is only 13' wide (4 meters) with a total living area of 1,200 square feet or about 120 square meters. This is a townhome unit and would be bordered by other units on both sides. With a comfortable size room being at least 10 feet (3 meters) wide this configuration leads to four rooms that can have windows. Typically that means the living room, kitchen/dining and two bedrooms. This unit is set up with a shared upstairs bathroom that would work better if the second bedroom was primarily used as an office.

This unit is about the same size but slightly wider and less deep. It has two bathrooms upstairs and is slightly more efficent.

The difficulty with these small units is that the stair is not terribly efficient, it takes up a lot of space per unit. This client wanted townhome type condo units but if we had been able to use two common area stairs and 1,200 square foot flat units we would have had more options in the unit plans. A townhome unit also tends to necessitate an additional powder room per unit to avoid having guests using the upstairs bathrooms.

The narrowest that you can make a room in the International Building Code is 7' which provides a minimum unit width but a unit that narrow would be very hard to make inviting.

Originally posted 2009-12-26 00:50:16.

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1. Minimum Room Sizes and Minimum Ceiling Heights
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• Monuments placed (or a reference monument or witness to the corner) at all major corners of the boundary of the property, unless already marked or referenced by an existing monument or witness to the corner.
• Vicinity map showing the property surveyed in reference to nearby highway(s) or major street intersection(s).
• Flood zone designation (with proper annotation based on federal Flood Insurance Rate Maps or the state or local equivalent, by scaled map location and graphic plotting only.)
• Gross land area (and other areas if specified by the client).
• Contours and the datum of the elevations.
• List setback, height, and floor space area restrictions disclosed by applicable zoning or building codes. The source of such information must be disclosed.
• Exterior dimensions of all buildings at ground level
• Square footage of exterior footprint of all buildings at ground level, gross floor area of all buildings; or other areas to be defined by the client
• Measured height of all buildings above grade at a defined location. If no defined location is provided, the point of measurement shall be shown.
• Substantial, visible improvements (in addition to buildings) such as billboards, signs, parking structures, swimming pools, etc.
• Parking areas and, if striped, the striping and the type (e.g. handicapped, motorcycle, regular, etc.) and number of parking spaces.
• Indication of access to a public way on land such as curb cuts and driveways, and to and from waters adjoining the surveyed tract, such as boat slips, launches, piers and docks.
• Location of utilities (representative examples of which are shown below) existing on or serving the surveyed property as determined by either observed evidence or observed evidence together with evidence from plans obtained from utility companies or provided by client, and markings by utility companies and other appropriate sources (with reference as to the source of information). This includes railroad tracks and sidings; manholes, catch basins, valve vaults or other surface indications of subterranean uses; wires and cables (including their function, if readily identifiable) crossing the surveyed premises, all poles on or within ten feet of the surveyed premises, and the dimensions of all
  crossmembers or overhangs affecting the surveyed premises; and utility company installations on the surveyed premises.
• Governmental Agency survey-related requirements as specified by the client.
• Names of adjoining owners of platted lands.
• The distance to the nearest intersecting street as designated by the client.
• Rectified orthophotography, photogrammetric mapping, laser scanning and other similar products, tools or technologies may be utilized as the basis for the location of certain features (excluding boundaries) where ground measurements are not otherwise necessary to locate those features to an appropriate and acceptable accuracy relative to a nearby boundary.  The surveyor shall (a) discuss the ramifications of such methodologies (e.g. the potential accuracy and completeness of the data gathered thereby) with the title company, lender and client prior to the performance of the survey and, (b) place a note on the face of the survey explaining the source, date, relative accuracy and other relevant qualifications of any such data.
• Observable evidence of earth moving work, building construction or building additions within recent months.
• Any changes in street right of way lines either completed or proposed, and available from the controlling jurisdiction. Observable evidence of recent street or sidewalk construction or repairs.
• Observable evidence of site use as a solid waste dump, sump or sanitary landfill.

Originally posted 2010-01-25 00:38:09.

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Figuring it out is pretty simple, in order to qualify as a rated door it has to be labeled. So look at the door (typically the hinge side) and there should be a metal plaque with the rating on it. If the plaque has been painted over, clean it off. If you don't find a label, then chances are its not rated.

Originally posted 2011-08-18 00:01:24.

Related posts:

1. Fire Door Protection Ratings May Be Less Than the Rating For the Wall Assembly
2. The Easiest Place to Find Fire Rated Assemblies is the Gypsum Association Manual
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The Sundance Channel has a show called Architecture School. It follows the work of a studio at Tulane focused on designing and building a house in some of the more difficult neighborhoods in New Orleans.

Chris and Elicia and I have been watching it and I think it is well done. The project involves real clients and real construction so it is a more interesting show that it might be if it focused more on the traditional studio project. Of course my perspective favors the architecture school experience.

Originally posted 2008-09-12 20:35:47.

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The first test is occupant load. For occupancy types A, B, E, F, M, and U you can have up to 49 occupants with one exit. For day care centers in type E you're limited to 10 with one exit. For H-1, H-2 and H-3 you can have 3 occupants with one exit and for H-4, H-5, I-1, I-4, I-4 and R you can have 10 occupants. S occupancy allows 29 occupants with one exit. I-2 has a long list of requirements, let me know if you need to go through them.

The next test is common path of egress travel, basically how far you have to go to get to the exit door. For H-1, H-2 and H-3 you are limited to 25 feet with one exit. For other occupancies you're limited to 75 feet with one exit. There are several exceptions. If you have a group B, F or S and a sprinkled building you can go 100 feet on one exit.  If you have a group B, S or F and no more than 30 occupants you can also have 100 feet to get to the one exit. Group I-3 is allowed 100 feet. In a sprinkled R-2 building you can go up to 125 feet. Assembly spaces have a number of additional requirements, again just let me know if you need them.

Finally there are a number of cases that always require two or more exits. Boiler, incenerator and furnace rooms over 500 sf or over 400,000 Btu in fuel fired equipment require two exits. Refrigerator machinery rooms over 1,000 sf require two doors. Refrigerated rooms over 1,000 sf and maintaining a temperature below 68 degrees  require two exits.

Please note that there is a different set of requirements for buildings with only one exit than this list for spaces with only one exit. I'll cover that in a future post.

Originally posted 2009-03-30 00:01:33.

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1. Where the Building Code Requires More Than Two Exits
2. Means of Egress Hazard Categories in the Existing Building Code
3. Residential Occupancy Group as Defined in the International Building Code

Is the building structurally sound? Some structural fixes are easy but some aren't worth the effort. If the building is going to require a lot of work to make it safe to remodel then that tends to push the needle towards tearing it down.

Does the structure have historic value, is it on a historic register, in a historic district? If you answered yes, then you most likely have to look at a remodel or a serious amount of paperwork and meetings. There have been a few purchases that have fallen through for this reason.

Do you like the style of the existing house? Again, if you like the aesthetic of the house then remodeling may make sense. It might also make sense if the house has an expensive exterior that might be hard to rebuild within your budget. We did a remodel in Bonnie Brae where the exterior was all stone, brick and expensive tile roof so the exterior stayed.

Does the existing house preclude you from doing what you want to do? This is a multipart question, does the house sit on the site in a way that makes expansion difficult, does the room layout really not work, do the levels in the house not work or are the ceilings too low. Those aren't always remodel fixes and may mean starting fresh.

Do you have enough room to go out, or do you need to go up (or down) also? Adding levels to an existing house definitely adds complexity and may point towards starting fresh.

On the other hand, does the existing house allow you to get away with something that you couldn't do if you scrapped? We're currently doing a feasibility on a multi-unit building in Denver that is built to the property lines, if it were torn down it would have to be rebuilt 5-10 feet from the property lines and the site would yield less units. On a smaller scale, your existing staircase or window design may be built in a way that we couldn't build from scratch.

What are your plans for the house? Consider what your goal is, are you just doing a fix and flip or are you planning to stay for the long haul? This will have an effect on just how far you will need to go with your changes; how far do you chase that old pipe, how much do you insulate existing walls and do you really need to replace the furnace or the windows.

There is also an obvious need to look at the costs of your options and you can look at involving an experienced contractor or builder to aid in this analysis. You need to figure out just how many of the systems will need to be remodeled or replaced in order to bring the house up to current standards and codes. As architects we can give you a lot of advice but you should consider bringing on someone who works with material and labor costs daily.

There is another option to consider, if the house just doesn't meet your needs but you can't make the numbers work on tearing it down, you might look at selling and buying a lot that makes more sense.

Finally, if you are facing this dilemma or are looking at property to purchase and need some advice, please give us a call. EVstudio has experience and advice for your remodel.

Originally posted 2008-06-29 23:44:39.

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The primary concern with doing work in a new state is verifying that you are meeting the requirements of that state's architectural registration board and those requirements vary widely. In many states you don't have to have an architectural license to produce residential drawings, but you may need one to produce structural drawings. Some states set a restriction based on the size of the project and you'll also find municipalities that don't even have building permits. Some states require that you are licensed there prior to even starting a project, some require that you're licensed before the permit is issued.

One of our first steps with projects either in state or out of state is to investigate the requirements of the state and the municipality. With a little bit of research we can greatly reduce the headaches that could happen late in the project.

Thankfully, in recent years states have greatly simplified the process for reciprocal registration. I hold a Certificate from the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) that makes reciprocal registration much easier. In fact, some states don't even allow reciprocal registration without an NCARB certificate. This certificate gives EVstudio the flexibility to practice in new states after meeting a simplified set of requirements.

Originally posted 2008-06-01 15:49:24.

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1. NCARB Certificate and Architects, What Does it Mean
2. Education and Training Required to Become a Licensed Architect
3. When Do You Absolutely Have to Hire an Architect in Colorado?