This house is a classic San Francisco Victorian. Built in 1900, it sits on an urban tree-lined street filled with similar properties. “In other words, the neighborhood has a ton of character and true San Francisco charm,” says Megan Rae Hannon of Rae & Heath Architects. “As such, it was important to us to retain the existing front facade exactly as is, even when adjusting a window or two would have made things easier for our interior layout,” she explains. “At the same time, the home and the family are firmly rooted in the present day.”
Megan has actually known one of the clients for years, albeit in a much different context. “We both taught barre classes at a local fitness studio in town, overlapping there for nearly a decade until the pandemic completely changed that industry,” she recalls. “Barre instruction was an evening and weekend hobby for me, but she is a true master of fitness and now runs her own program out of this property!”
The clients approached R&H with the project in 2020—masks and all—to help them with the remodel of their recently purchased forever home. “Both of the clients are originally from England, meaning that extended family comes to visit for more than just a day or two, and they have two young children,” she shares. “They were quickly running out of rooms in the three-bedroom original house and then the pandemic hit. That meant they suddenly also needed dedicated home office space for him and a dedicated fitness studio space for her plus a second kids’ bedroom.”
In addition, multiple renovations carried out to the back of the house from the 1960s onward resulted in a series of disconnected rooms on the ground floor with very little visual access to the rear yard and a stepped-back deck that wasn’t a safe play space for young kids. “In many ways, the goals of these clients were similar to that of most of our San Francisco clients with 1900s properties,” she says. “Add space and improve the flow to suit the needs of modern-day indoor-outdoor living.”
As the architect, Megan worked with the clients from the very beginning until the day they moved in. “To help these clients achieve their goals, we fully reimagined the layout of the home from top to bottom while being careful to respect and maintain as much as possible the best parts of the original Victorian home that the clients loved so much,” she says. “In our work, the interior and exterior are considered as one, and this project was no different. In addition to the architectural addition and interior modifications, we identified storage solutions and all of the millwork locations, determined the layouts for all of the bathrooms and the kitchen, and included lighting design.”
To strike the appropriate balance, R&H worked with the clients to develop a white-on-white color scheme with black accents that signals the modernized approach at the rear of the home. They chose to retain the classic gold detailing, which echoes the highly detailed interior. “Design trends may come and go,” Megan reflects. “As architects, our job is to create contextual, light filled, rational spaces, which are inherently beautiful and therefore timeless.”
Though the project represents their skill and talent, it also is a testament to their community. “Midway through construction, the project suffered an incredible loss,” Megan recalls. “The site superintendent passed away suddenly of natural causes at just 32 years old. It was an incredibly difficult time for all of us, and the project was briefly put on hold while the construction team took time to mourn. The team at R&H would like to dedicate this article and the project in his memory. John Paul O’Mahony, you are missed.”
