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Victorian Green: Oakland, CA

Enthusiastic owner-builders, Stefanie Parrott and Dixon Beatty “take their sustainable building seriously while approaching the daily grind of their owner-built project with a real sense of humor,” says their architect, Geoffrey Holton. The owners’ green goals started with the purchase of a Victorian house in the Oakland Point Historic District. Their premise is that reinvesting in this transit-friendly urban neighborhood (two and a half blocks from BART) and restoring deteriorating old housing stock are good environmental strategies.
 

Top-to-Bottom Green: Berkeley, CA

As a design/build architect and remodeling specialist, Maurice Levitch of Levitch Associates had always helped clients select design elements and materials based on economic factors and aesthetics. Recently, the combination of a client’s request that he learn more about sustainable building and an employee’s suggestion that he get certified as a green builder prompted Levitch to take a closer look at green building philosophies and methods.
 

Giving an Old House New Life: Berkeley, CA

Built 1908, Michael Boal's 2,200-square-foot Berkeley home was “remuddled” a few times over the decades, but still retained much of its traditional style. Boals brought in David Grubb Construction to rebuild the back of the house while preserving its nearly 100-year-old spirit. “Green building principles were used from literally top to bottom for this project — from the photovoltaic panels on the roof down to the high flyash concrete foundation,” says Grubb. 
 

Victorian Revamp: Berkeley, CA

Berkeley residents Kristin Leimkuhler and Jeffrey Wilk hired McCutcheon Construction to modernize their 1894 Victorian while preserving the building’s traditional exterior. Raising the house by three feet allowed them to transform a six-foot-high unfinished basement into a contemporary wheelchair-accessible first floor, doubling the home’s size to 2,815 square feet.
 

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