Something Old, Something New

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Jay Graham

An architect creates a one-of-a-kind live-work space in downtown Davis.

Most people adding on to a house try to make the new blend in with the old. Not Davis architect Maria Ogrydziak.

Ogrydziak grafted a thoroughly modern annex onto her hundred-year-old bungalow in the heart of downtown Davis. It was a controversial move: Some neighbors were horrified, and Ogrydziak and her husband, David, had to go before the City Council three times to get the addition approved.

The new, gallerylike structure and its Craftsman counterpart are like conjoined twins. For Ogrydziak, who wanted to create a live-work space for herself, it’s the best of both worlds.

“There’s something great about having something very old exist side by side with something very new,” she says. “I only get to live one life, so I want to have a maximum range of experiences.”

The existing 2,200-square-foot bungalow was a warren of small, chopped-up, traditional rooms. Another designer might have removed interior walls to make the house more functional and modern. But Ogrydziak kept the building largely intact, leaving the original kitchen, bedrooms and baths alone.

Instead, she concentrated her energies on the loftlike addition: a long, narrow, unbroken expanse of space that serves multiple functions, including office, conference room, private retreat, art studio and family gathering spot.

It is very obvious, both inside and out, where the old meets the new. From the outside, the blue-stuccoed bungalow butts right up against the addition, which is covered in horizontal bands of black and gray composite shingles. Inside, part of the old house’s exterior now serves as an interior wall for the addition. Ogrydziak didn’t do anything to hide its original purpose; in fact, she left a bay window in place and removed the stucco to expose the old redwood sheathing underneath. “When we took off the stucco, I thought, ‘Wow, this is interesting,’” she recalls.

Ogrydziak calls the house Edge Loft, a nod to the interplay between the old and new structures.

“I love the fact that I can see where things were connected,” she explains. “It tells a story.”

Which is why she kept the structural steel beams and trusses exposed—and even left undisturbed the construction chalk marks on an exposed metal column.

The addition is 60 feet long and 16 feet wide at the front of the house, widening to 24 feet at the back. There are three sets of French doors and lots of wall space for hanging large pieces of art. (Ogrydziak also is a painter and a sculptor.) The ceiling soars to over 20 feet, and large windows set high in the wall create an expansive view.

“I love to see the sky and trees,” she explains. “That’s very difficult to do in a low-ceilinged room.”

She kept the furnishings simple: a long conference table at one end, a couple of leather couches and a chaise longue at the other. As an architect, Ogrydziak likes to experiment on herself (the ultimate design laboratory). So she had a cabinetmaker construct a dozen square and rectangular modules out of medium-density fiberboard and painted them white. “They’re so versatile,” she says of the pieces, which she uses for seating, side tables and pedestals for books, plants and sculptures. “I can move them around, stack them, group them or use them singly or together.”

Most furniture is too “specific,” she says. “A table’s a table. These can be anything you want them to be. It gives you the mental freedom to make connections of your own.”

Mental freedom is something Ogrydziak prizes—and that she gets, in spades, from her Edge Loft. “I love the contrast between the old and the new,” she says. “This is a place where I can think and reflect.”

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