Eichler Lovers looking to create our own

Welcome Lioness. :)

Some of the best mid-century modern furniture around is available at Design Within Reach (http://www.dwr.com). If you don't already receive their catalog, be sure to contact them and request it. The website is very nice, but does not show everything. Also, the catalog is a study in design all by itself. They use staging in some lovely modern settings.

They have a showroom in San Francisco and in Palo Alto. They are a supporter of this site, which is how I found out about them. Too bad it was not until after we finished refurnishing our house!

The owner's vision was to bring high-quality product direct from the designers to the public. All products are presented with emphasis on each designer that created them. As such, you can get Eames' chairs, as well as pieces designed by van der Rohe, Corbusier, and many others.

Cheers,

Cathye

You're about to do something unheard of, and perhaps unique. Build a new Eichler. Only time I've ever heard of that before is in rebuilding ones that burned down.
If you are truly faithfull to the Eichler vibe... and you sound like you are... I'd like very much to write about you, when you're done, in my "Eichlerholic" column.
If interested, please email me at [email protected]
Thanks!

I am not sure if they want 'to create a new eichler, atrium style' or if they want to create a new style for their eichler atrium. Maybe lioness can clarify the statement :-)

Our home will be just that, Eichler inspired. We currently have a little home that was built in the 1940's and a ridiculously large back yard.

We are expanding our current home into the backyard. The new plan is very linear in its floor plan layout, although the inpiration part comes into play with placement of the rooms, firplaces, sunken landscaping throughout inside and out and last but not least a rectangular atrium of glass.

From what I can tell of some of the original Eichler floor plans, there were many aspects that I think the naked eye doesn't always catch, like the reflective mirror aspect of a perspective of the house. I also notice distintive placement of the sunken landscaping, fireplaces and rooms, relative to a certain flow in the house.

In short, it will not be a true Eichler, but the essence of one.
and.......................
You are all invited to our house warming, don't forget to bring your to bring your best martini recipe. (Ha,Ha)

Thank You for your interest and we welcome any ideas or comments.

I am not too proud to plug my studio, I wiok for Design within Reach in their Oakland Studio, and own an Eichler in Walnut Creek. Let me know if you have any questions about either... happy to help out.

Chris
[email protected]

If you work for DWR, perhaps you know why they discontinued the Marcel Breuer 'Cesca' chair recently :-(

Best Wishes in designing and building an Eichler-inspired residence. Some thoughts - the materials, technology, and lifestyles of the 21st century are different than those of the 1960's. Consider a roof using TJI's (wood I-beams) with up to R-38 fiberglass insulation and 1x4 T&G wood on the bottom, in lieu of the original wood deck. Thermal, low-E glass is now essential. My customers are prefering French doors or more robust Pella sliders in lieu of the aluminum sliders, for security and maintenance. We've also gone to garages instead of carports to protect your investment in automobiles. Several clients have foregone the fireplace in lieu of bigscreen TV's. Give some thought to the Eichler plans that incorporate large built-in storage for lawnmowers, bicycles, etc. to avoid buying a storage shed. Also consider a larger pantry since we all shop in bulk at the discount stores. Prewire for security, computers, etc. Good luck -
Jack Logan, Architect. Albuquerque, NM. :wink:

"Prefab" Fireplaces are now a stock item at Home Depot et all and you can design the facing, mantel etc. around it, to code of course. And if you get a big screen FLAT monitor plasma TV you can hang it over the fireplace as some new modern homes have done. Forget the "Media Niche". And what about using steel framing? (a la X-100 kinda).
On the Orange County Eichler Home Tour there was an Eichler was successfully rebuilt after it was burned to the ground using some of the stuff suggested in the other posts-there was a URL with pics of the progress etc. but I don't recall but try eichlersocal.com and see if there's a link there where you can be 'inspired' or get some ideas.
Good Luck.
Wish some tract home builders would get inspired to do the same.

Modfan:

Don't be so quick to dismiss the "media niche". Even though you can go with a thin, swanky plasma over the fireplace, you still need a place to put the TV cable box, the VCR, the DVD player, the CD player, the amplifier/tuner, the VCR tapes, the DVDs, the CDs, etc., etc.

In our 1965 Eichler, we are currently wrestling with a way to store all that stuff, along with the record player (yep, still have one) and records (they haven't put everything onto CD yet) in a way that looks clean and uncluttered. It would be wonderful if there were a built-in location that could serve as the media center, with doors that close to hide the clutter.

Don't know if this is a good idea but thought I'd pass it along.

An uncle solved the "media niche" problem in the house he had built by hiding the box outside. That is, the front of the niche is flush with the surrounding wall. The box is actually bumped out into the side yard (where it was properly insulated and sided).

I guess you could vary the proportion of the box (cavity) between the inside space and outside space. And you'd probably have to respect any required sideyard clearance.

I have a "garden window" in the multipurpose room of my home (leftover from a previous owner's renovations) that hangs out over a little used/seen sideyard. I have been thinking about whether a media niche (or storage niche of some kind) might make sense there.

I'd be interested in others' thoughts on this.

Cheers.
Jake

Sorry if I'm hijacking this thread. :oops:

My wife and I have been looking to build a "new" Eichler for a couple years now (I mentioned it here back then). Our problem has been finding an architect or house designer that is familiar with Eichlers, let alone any modernist design in our city (Victoria, BC).

We even have a lot picked out, located on the edge of a "mountain", with incredible views of the ocean, Olympic mountains and surrounding hills. We still don't even have any idea of what it would cost to build such a house in this market (can't go much beyond $130sf cdn). Unrealistic?

Re: jake's solution

My friend's modern house has exactly that. The walls are flush but a panel opens up to reveal a media niche behind it. It is fabulous. Of course, you would have to use a wall that connects to the outside, and my Eichler doesn't allow for that.

I do like the idea of being able to cover everything up. We installed our cable under the roof to drop down into our pantry, so that when Wifi technology gets better, we're ready to put all of our boxes in the pantry and hang the plasma (ya, if we could be so lucky) on the wall...for now it looks like a giant digusting mess, but at least it's in the family room, where everything else is disgusting, too.