Winsome awarded McMinnville's new downtown Wine Village build

Welcome to Oregon's favorite main street...Third Street, McMinnville, Oregon.  This tree lined, turn of the century downtown boasts quaint shops, award winning restaurants, a thriving local bookstore, old time ice cream parlor, coffee shops and cafes, wine bars, art galleries...you name it, you'll find it here.   With so much already to discover on a stroll down this bustling downtown street, what more could be added...welcome KAOS Wine Village. 

Tucked near one end of Third Street on a site that formerly housed an old glass shop Bob Emrick, former CEO of Western Oregon Waste, Mike Hanks, a local entrepreneur and developer, and Dustin Wyant, local restauranteur who owns and manages the Recipe restaurant in Newberg, partnered up with assistance from Liz Heller, local realtor, to bring McMinnville a new hotel, restaurant and wine village.  This 21,156-square-foot, three story structure will feature a restaurant with outdoor dining plaza, a "wine village" where patrons will be able to taste the wines of 12 different wineries, an 11-room hotel and rooftop patio seating with views to the south, east and west.

City Planning welcomed the project as a positive addition to the downtown core, according to an article announcing the project that was featured on the front page of the News Register in May.  "The planning department liked the concept of replacing a vacant glass shop at Third and Galloway with a boutique hotel and restaurant.  It said the project would be 'positive and far reaching,' its central location promising to 'bring many more visitors to the city's core.'  It continued, 'Use of a property that is currently not in use is greatly supported. Additionally, staff appreciates the high level of detail that has gone into the design of this building.'"1

Nathan Cooprider, the architect working with the KAOS partners on the design, stated in the application to the City, "'The building design was carefully considered to match the pedestrian scale and details of the buildings in the downtown core,'" In a recent meeting before the Historic Landmark Committee he explained, "...the building would feature rustic golden brick below with dark earth-toned wood above.  'The intent of the design is to have timeless and authentic local materials that provide interest through a highly textural quality,'”1

There is much to be enthusiastic about in this new addition to the downtown core of McMinnville.  Winsome is proud to be a part of the team that will be working to make the vision and plans a reality to serve the Willamette Valley community and its visitors for generations to come.

For More Information

 New hotel complex displays confidence in Mac downtown, News Register, May 26, 2012

1 Downtown hotel wins 'landmark' OK, News Register, May 30, 2012

Plans for new hotel, Oregon Wine Press, June 1, 2012

 KAOS Wine Village official website

A Groundbreaking Experience

This is the second in this series.  Use this link to read the previous post:  "No Noise and Plenty of View"

When I broke ground on the first house I built, in 1988, I spray-painted a shovel bright gold, chilled a case of champagne, gathered a bunch of friends, and made it a party.  Many years, and a few new houses have since come to pass, and I thought I might not need to commemorate the start of a new building.  Then the Amity Fire District agreed to use our "old house" as a "Burn to Learn" training exercise, and a reason to party was reignited, quite literally.  It was a fabulous bonfire, including a gathering of friends, neighbors, dozens of volunteer firemen (and women), lots of big shiny firetrucks, and a hot chili lunch on a cold rainy day.  I'm grateful to the firefighters, not only for giving their personal time to protect our community, but also for turning 20 dumpsters of trash into 1 dumpster of ash.  Of course, there is a cost to the environment of burning a house, but we weighed in favor of not adding a whole house to a landfill and also saved money on the dumpsters.

We played by the rules and tested the old house for asbestos.  The results required that we contract for professional removal and disposal of the kitchen and bathroom sheet flooring.  We would've incurred this expense ($500 for the testing and $1,000 for removal and disposal) regardless of whether we burned or trucked-out the old house, as a landfill, too, would require documentation.  

We are not planning to place the new house on exactly the same site as the old house, so we've contracted for removal and recycling of the concrete to a local quarry.  We also removed most of the useable and recycle-able materials from the house before the fire.  We scrapped all of the metal, including siding and appliances, and we found Craigslist and Habitat for Humanity to be very helpful ways to re-home what we could not re-use.

MAKE A HOLE

Our building project just moved from the years-long "planning phase" to the "doing phase."  The paperwork is done, our building permit application is being reviewed by Polk County, and it's time to make a hole.  You don't need a permit to dig a hole, and by moving forward with the clean-up of the old site and excavation of the new site, we will be ready to start a foundation and walls as soon as we have the permit in hand.

When we contracted with an excavation company to dig up the power line from the old house last month (and used an electrical contractor and PGE to move the power to a temporary pole) we piggy-backed some preliminary site-work into the day.  While we had the excavation equipment on site, test holes were prepared for the septic field, allowing for an immediate soil and site inspection for approval of our septic permit.  We also removed a few trees and laid-out the driveway and work site.  A house may only sit on a 30 x 60 footprint, but 3 - 4 times that much space is needed to comfortably get around it and build it.

Site work is expected to take 5 days, followed by a day to construct forms for footings, a county inspection of the concrete forms, and then the first of a long line of concrete trucks will parade up our steep driveway.

The next installment of my story will be "The Wizardry of Walls" - stay tuned!

Nathan Good Vineyard Home: Structure From the Ground Up

This is the second in this series.  Use the link below to read the previous post.
"Design And Preparation"

Daylight Basement 

     At the base of this magnificent home is the foundation.  A daylight basement exits the back of the home just above the vineyard.  The footings and stem walls were poured with concrete that included 25% fly ash, a by-product of coal fired power plants.   By having fly ash in the mix, we save a substantial  amount from being disposed in a landfill.  Fiberglass fibers are also added to the concrete to act as an added reinforcement to the rebar it incases.  

Woodgrain texture in wine cellar.

     An old world look was achieved in the concrete walls of the wine cellar by placing rough cedar boards on the inside of the concrete forms, imprinting the character and grain of the wood into the walls.  The lower level features a slab floor which provides a base for radiant heat below the oak flooring.

Rainwater Cistern

      One of the most prominent features of the house is the large protruding porch on the back side of the home overlooking the vineyard. The foundation pour included the formation of a cistern under this porch  A 10,000 gallon tank will  serve as a rainwater collection system.  A typical system would have tanks in the basement or outside the home, either taking up storage space or detracting from the esthetics of the home.

     The upper floor has been value engineered by the architect to save lumber, using advanced framing techniques.  The walls are 6” thick which allow for a better insulation package (covered in the next blog). The stud layout also works to minimize thermal bridging, which prevents the movement of heat through the walls. The floors are constructed with open web floor trusses.  These trusses allow all the electrical, plumbing, heating and cooling to run completely concealed in the floor. There is rarely a need to build a chase or take up room or closet space for ductwork.  In addition to the wood framing steel was used to achieve higher ceilings and larger spans.  When the home is finished the steel will not be visible.

Hand cut roofline 

     Roofs are commonly constructed with pre-engineered trusses.  While they are less expensive, there are times they just can’t be used, due to the design.  The layered roofline of this home and the insulation package simply did not allow for trusses to be made off site.   So this roof was built the tried and true method of hand cutting.  It takes a bit longer but the results are truly stunning.

Watch for the next blog in this series which will cover insulation, windows, and doors.

Complete structure, ready for windows and insulation.