Getting the lay of the land, Part 1
Time for an overview of the house. We will take a few posts to do this, since it's a lot of house--and a lot of horse decor to take in. But first, now that we've been here for 4 days, a few observations:
1. "Mountain time" is kind of like "island time"--sense of urgency appears to be somewhat lacking around here.
2. Running at altitude in the dry heat is easier and more pleasant than running in NYC swamp summer weather.
3. From a 9-year-old-boy perspective, shopping at (an empty) Trader Joe's is vastly preferable to getting a FreshDirect delivery, mainly because of the snacks.
4. However, car shopping is way less exciting than anticipated by said 9 year old boy.
Construction status: See #1 above. Still waiting on bids. But second set of permits submitted Friday!
Murphy scale: 🍶🍷One sake for Matt, one wine for Melinda, namely due to the car shopping
On to the house. First, the layout. Imagine a sort of V shape, with a flattened middle. The middle is the heart of the home--kitchen, family room, formal dining room, formal living room, and study. One arm of the V is bedrooms. The other is currently a warren of playrooms, a separate small apartment (used for the farm staff), and some pool cabanas. Plopped on top of the middle of the house is a second story master bedroom and second study, added about 20 years ago.
We'll start with the easy stuff--the middle of the V, which is the part of the house we like and makes us convinced that it will end up being fantastic. Note that all pictures were taken by our architects so they are somewhat focused on the structural features not the best photographic angles. Also, they were taken before the previous owners moved out, so you can see the true state of the house when we purchased it.
Here is the main entry way and a big formal hallway. We mainly need new paint and new floors. The entire house is that "cold, hard Mexican tile" (bonus points if you can ID the movie that's from) and it all needs to go. The floors are radiant heat which may limit our materials choices down the line, but we'll go with some sort of wood for sure.
The formal living room and dining room are quite lovely--they open onto the backyard and are really in good shape. The living room needs a new surround for the fireplace and the chair rails will probably get removed. The dining room needs a new floor (it's not in great shape) but that's pretty much it.
On to the study, the future headquarters of Phase Two Advisory and Melinda's world dominance. The built-ins are overkill so most will come out. We'll salvage the ones on one side (the center picture) and refinish them (green laminate is not our thing).
The kitchen. It's actually in really good shape if you ignore the farm tiles and the weird island that has 17 different heights. And of course the fact that the appliances are not Matt's preferred ones. The plan is to try to recreate the Brooklyn kitchen as best we can.
Matt is excited about the butcher block cutting board that we will integrate into the new island.
We have a breakfast nook with a beautiful view of a garden (which hopefully we will not kill). The table fit the space so nicely, we bought it.
We also get a butler's pantry! It's currently at a weird angle to the kitchen and dining room, so we'll be blowing out some walls to make it a smoother passageway and turning the back half into a wine room. You heard that right: a whole room for wine. Apparently it's a thing out here in Denver, and who are we to complain?
Here is the main living room. Great light, great space, more not-great tiles. We'll be keeping the big piece of shelving or whatever that is--it's awfully big but probably functional. The woodwork is quite nice.
Finally, we leave you with the mudroom. First, because the concept of a fancy mudroom to hide all our crap is super-exciting. But second, and more importantly, because the horses are spectacular. When we are done with this, it will also include laundry and part of it will be repurposed and turned into a pantry off the kitchen. But for now: cartoon horses in all their glory.
1. "Mountain time" is kind of like "island time"--sense of urgency appears to be somewhat lacking around here.
2. Running at altitude in the dry heat is easier and more pleasant than running in NYC swamp summer weather.
3. From a 9-year-old-boy perspective, shopping at (an empty) Trader Joe's is vastly preferable to getting a FreshDirect delivery, mainly because of the snacks.
4. However, car shopping is way less exciting than anticipated by said 9 year old boy.
Construction status: See #1 above. Still waiting on bids. But second set of permits submitted Friday!
Murphy scale: 🍶🍷One sake for Matt, one wine for Melinda, namely due to the car shopping
On to the house. First, the layout. Imagine a sort of V shape, with a flattened middle. The middle is the heart of the home--kitchen, family room, formal dining room, formal living room, and study. One arm of the V is bedrooms. The other is currently a warren of playrooms, a separate small apartment (used for the farm staff), and some pool cabanas. Plopped on top of the middle of the house is a second story master bedroom and second study, added about 20 years ago.
We'll start with the easy stuff--the middle of the V, which is the part of the house we like and makes us convinced that it will end up being fantastic. Note that all pictures were taken by our architects so they are somewhat focused on the structural features not the best photographic angles. Also, they were taken before the previous owners moved out, so you can see the true state of the house when we purchased it.
Here is the main entry way and a big formal hallway. We mainly need new paint and new floors. The entire house is that "cold, hard Mexican tile" (bonus points if you can ID the movie that's from) and it all needs to go. The floors are radiant heat which may limit our materials choices down the line, but we'll go with some sort of wood for sure.
On to the study, the future headquarters of Phase Two Advisory and Melinda's world dominance. The built-ins are overkill so most will come out. We'll salvage the ones on one side (the center picture) and refinish them (green laminate is not our thing).
The kitchen. It's actually in really good shape if you ignore the farm tiles and the weird island that has 17 different heights. And of course the fact that the appliances are not Matt's preferred ones. The plan is to try to recreate the Brooklyn kitchen as best we can.
Matt is excited about the butcher block cutting board that we will integrate into the new island.
We have a breakfast nook with a beautiful view of a garden (which hopefully we will not kill). The table fit the space so nicely, we bought it.
We also get a butler's pantry! It's currently at a weird angle to the kitchen and dining room, so we'll be blowing out some walls to make it a smoother passageway and turning the back half into a wine room. You heard that right: a whole room for wine. Apparently it's a thing out here in Denver, and who are we to complain?
Here is the main living room. Great light, great space, more not-great tiles. We'll be keeping the big piece of shelving or whatever that is--it's awfully big but probably functional. The woodwork is quite nice.
Finally, we leave you with the mudroom. First, because the concept of a fancy mudroom to hide all our crap is super-exciting. But second, and more importantly, because the horses are spectacular. When we are done with this, it will also include laundry and part of it will be repurposed and turned into a pantry off the kitchen. But for now: cartoon horses in all their glory.
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