A small series of Tributaries

March 13, 2016 by Evan Hart in outdoor

It has been raining pretty hard from El Niño 2016 and that has made the water flow down the hillside and around and under our house pretty apparent. Water flow and hydrostatic pressure are what cause foundations to sink and crack and retaining walls to fail.

Our house has water flowing under the back 2/1 addition which is the topmost point of the hillside and it seems to be meandering around under the house.

Then there are little rivers that are winding around walkways going down the hillside.

I also figured out the patio next to the kitchen seems like it was supposed to guide water away from the laundry door. I think this patio was added in '33 because it has the same fish scale pattern as the garage which I think was '33.

Maybeck houses are designed to be built with the hillside. The ideology is to be nestled among trees and compatible with nature. But it is also practical in terms of building because you don't need to make large retaining walls anywhere since minimal hardscapimg needs to be done to make the hillside conform to your design.

However, this means the crawlspace is 2' and under in many places making plumbing and heating work is difficult and the floor framing is close to the dirt.

With the floor framing close to the dirt, you don't want the dirt to be wet because moisture causes rot and mold. Therefore it is bad to have streams running around and under a house that is nestled into the hillside.

The remedy is a French drain. A French drain is a typically 4" pipe with holes in it that is sitting in a trench around the top back edge and sides of the perimeter of the house that is intended to collect water and keep the foundation and under house areas mostly dry.

Our house needs a few hundred feet of French drain which is a big project but could really help to stop the foundation from sinking and cracking. This will have to wait for sunny weather. Until then I will just have to listen to the now disquieting sound of trickling water.

#1 Maybeck Feature - Venturi Chimey

February 23, 2016 by Evan Hart in maybeck, outdoor

"Look carefully and if you see that Venturi chimney - it's a Maybeck."

Jacomena Maybeck from "Maybeck - The Family View", 1980.

The quintessential Maybeck feature is the Venturi chimney. Maybeck is known for putting in an oversized board-formed concrete fireplace with Venturi chimney in all his residential projects after around 1905 or so. The Venturi fireplace was patented in the 18th century by an Italian physicist who believed it would improve draft and Maybeck was apparently a big subscriber to this idea. His houses are full of many odd little details but none is so distinctly his as is the Venturi chimney.

Above you can see our Venturi chimney. The cap is a scrap of concrete. It's unclear what the cap used to look like but nearly all of them from this period appear to be flat concrete like on the J. B. Tufts house of 1931.

As Jacomena said, this is a distinctly Maybeck feature. The counter theory to our house being designed by Maybeck is that Maybeck's friend and builder from the time, Volney Rowland, builder of record for our house, simply copied Maybeck's style. But he also visited the house in 1951 and said it was designed by Maybeck. Maybeck was still alive in '51 and they could've simply went to Berkeley to visit him and ask - this fact is hand-written in the margin of the letter. We think it must have been some bureaucratic or tax reason why Maybeck wasn't on the building permit. Like Jacomena said, "If you see that Venturi chimney - it's a Maybeck." We agree

February Flowers

February 12, 2016 by Christina Flores in outdoor

There are TONS of plants and trees on the property. We have plans on getting rid of some of the larger, potentially dead, trees in order to bring some more sunshine to the ground. Fortunately, we already have some trees and shrubs that are flowering without too much sun.