ResidentialAdaptive Reuse

Jesse Street House

An adaptive reuse and addition for an East Austin residence

Type: Residential / Renovation + Addition
Location: East Austin, Texas
Size: [Size — drop in]
Year: 2018
Status: Built

Jesse Street House is a renovation and addition that takes the unfinished concrete-block walls of an existing East Austin house and treats them as the project's primary architectural material. New black steel beams open the ground-floor plan, polished concrete and white-oak floors meet in clean intersections, and a cedar-clad second-story volume sits above the original block, set back from the street and held up by the original walls. The project is the studio's clearest argument for adaptive reuse at the residential scale: the existing building is the room, and the new work is the volume above it.

Daytime view of the Jesse Street House showing the contrast between the white stucco and concrete-block ground floor and the cedar-clad upper volume above, with a person walking past the front door at right — Daytime facade — two volumes, two material languages, one decision to leave the original block walls exposed. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Evening view of the front-side yard with the house glowing from interior light, the cedar upper volume cantilevering slightly over the stucco ground floor, oak branches framing the upper edge of the frame — Evening — the cedar volume reads as warm against the cooling sky, the ground floor glows from inside out. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Tall portrait detail of the cedar-clad upper volume window viewed through a foreground of dark glossy loquat leaves, showing the play of vertical timber boards and the reflection of trees in the glass — Window through the loquat — the building was sited to keep the existing trees and read through them. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Rear corner of the house showing the cedar upper volume nestled into surrounding tree canopy, with a single tall corner window pulling reflections of the trees into the building — Rear elevation — the cedar volume reads as a tree house, sized and placed to be in the canopy rather than above it. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Wide interior view of the ground-floor living area looking back toward the stair, with raw concrete-block walls, exposed black steel beams overhead, polished concrete and white-oak floors meeting in a clean line, and a single Eames chair at the center of the room — Living looking back toward movement — the original block walls hold the room; the new steel beams hold the second floor. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Tall portrait corner detail of the ground-floor space at a window junction, showing the unfinished concrete-block walls, exposed black steel beam, full-height glass to the rear yard, and white oak flooring meeting polished concrete — Material junction — every interface in the ground floor is the negotiation between what was kept and what was added. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Wide interior view of the open ground-floor living space with a figure looking out the rear sliding door at left, exposed black steel beams overhead, the floating timber-and-steel stair on the right wall, and white-oak flooring meeting polished concrete — The open ground floor — every wall is structural, every joint is visible. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Kitchen viewed from the living area, with concrete-block walls framing the kitchen volume, an Eames chair in the foreground, exposed steel beams overhead, white quartz countertops on light maple plywood cabinetry, and stainless appliances — Kitchen from the living — the kitchen is held in a single bay between two block walls. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Detail of the kitchen window with three operable panels framed in black steel set into a concrete-block wall, light maple plywood cabinetry below, white quartz counters, and floating wood shelves at right — Kitchen window — the only horizontal cut in the block wall, sized to the kitchen surface below it. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Floating stair viewed from the living area, with steel stringers cantilevered off the concrete-block wall and timber treads, a small punched window beyond the stair on the block wall — The stair — three pieces of black steel and a stack of fir treads. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

A person in a white shirt walking up the floating timber-and-steel stair, motion-blurred, with the textured concrete-block wall as the background — On the stair — the stair is the only true sculpture in the project. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Tall portrait view from the upstairs landing with a figure leaning on the steel railing looking out over the double-height living below, a glass globe pendant hanging from a long cord, and the upper edge of the concrete-block wall meeting the white plaster ceiling — Upstairs landing — the second-story volume looks down into the original ground floor. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Tight portrait detail of the kitchen cabinet meeting the concrete-block wall, showing the texture of the block at left and the figured maple plywood drawers and brushed steel pulls of the cabinet at right — Cabinet detail — figured maple plywood meets the original block at a clean shadow line. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Tight portrait detail of the floating stair from below, showing the steel underside of the treads, the welded steel handrail, and the wood block-out detail meeting the concrete-block wall — Stair detail — the cleanest joint in the building, by design. Photo: Leonid Furmansky

Process: Design 4 drawings

Design-phase artifacts — sketches, massing studies, schematic boards, and the drawings that informed the building's organization.

Architectural site plan of the Jesse Street House showing the building footprint, surrounding lot, mature tree canopy, neighboring buildings, and street edge — Site plan — the building was placed to keep the existing tree canopy intact.

Ground-floor (Level 01) plan showing the open living/kitchen layout, stair, bathrooms, and rear sliding doors to the yard — Ground floor — the existing block walls remained as the room dividers; the new work is everything else.

Upper-floor (Level 02) plan showing the new second-story addition with primary suite and second bedroom organized around the stair landing — Upper floor — the cedar volume holds the bedrooms, set back from the front to read as a quiet addition.

Architectural section showing the relationship between the original ground-floor block walls, the steel beams that span them, and the new cedar-clad second-story volume above — Section — the steel beams that hold the second floor are the project's only new structural decision.

Client and program

The clients had bought a small mid-century house in East Austin with a single-story footprint of unfinished concrete-block walls and asked the studio for a renovation that would add a second story without losing what was already there. The brief was an open ground-floor living/kitchen/dining plan, a primary suite and second bedroom upstairs, and a building that would read as one project rather than as two stitched together.

Site and constraint

The site is a tight East Austin residential lot with a mature tree canopy that the clients wanted preserved at all costs. The constraints were the existing block walls (load-bearing in places, decorative in others), the trees (most of which were within 10 feet of the building footprint), and the neighborhood scale — anything we added had to read as a neighbor, not as an upgrade.

Design move

The original block walls were left exposed inside and out, as the building’s primary architectural material. New black steel beams were threaded across the ground floor at the existing wall heights, opening what had been a series of small rooms into a single open-plan space. A new cedar-clad second-story volume was built above, set back from the front and the rear, sized to fit inside the existing tree canopy. The cedar reads as a counter-material to the gray block; the steel reads as the seam between the two.

Construction approach

Conventional residential renovation sequencing, with one critical move handled carefully: the existing block walls were braced before any second-story load was introduced, and the new steel beams were installed before any of the old roof was removed. The cedar siding was specified for its tonal warmth against the cool gray block, and detailed for replacement (boards can be swapped one at a time).

Outcome

Jesse Street House is the studio’s clearest residential argument for the broader adaptive-reuse method. The existing building is the room; the new work is the volume above it. The block walls — the project’s most distinctive feature — were not added by the studio but by whoever poured them in the first place; the project’s discipline was leaving them alone.

Credits

Client: [Client — drop in]
Photography: Leonid Furmansky
Structural Engineer: [Structural Engineer of Record — drop in]
Contractor: [General Contractor — drop in]
Consultants: [MEP — drop in]

Recognition

ArchDaily · 2018

Jesse Street House — Submission to ArchDaily

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