Construction Diary: It Took a Decade, But Their Experimental, DIY Home Was Worth the Wait
Using an abandoned Portland house as their personal design lab, the couple behind JHL Design craft a sustainable, cost-effective dwelling.
Using an abandoned Portland house as their personal design lab, the couple behind JHL Design craft a sustainable, cost-effective dwelling.
Twelve years ago, Holly Freres and David Horning were renting a house by architect Dale Farr in the leafy neighborhood of Dunthorpe, in southwest Portland, Oregon. As designers themselves—she is owner of the firm JHL Design, where she oversees interiors and he runs the architecture side—they longed to create a home of their own, which would be a better long-term fit for themselves, their four children, and two hunting dogs.
They started searching in the neighborhood, and they eventually discovered an abandoned 1956 property listed as a "serious fixer"—which ultimately turned into more of a rebuild.
Before: Holly Freres and David Horning, both of JHL Design, bought this abandoned 1956 "fixer upper" on a .69-acre Portland lot for $285,000 in 2012. "This is after the bank had come in and actually cleaned it up," says David.
Courtesy of JHL Design
Holly and David met while working on an early LEED-certified project, and they were eager to experiment with sustainable building strategies while balancing splurges (like soaring windows and hydronic radiant floor heat) with more cost-effective construction measures (like having David act as general contractor).
The couple completed the project in phases, with years-long breaks in between to build their budget back up. The first phase took a year and a half—seven months for demolition, planning, and permitting; and ten months for building, ending in a 2014 move-in. In the next phase, they landscaped the three-quarter-acre lot, and in 2020 they built a backyard "casita" flex space for guests, an office, a home gym, and a sauna. Holly and David recount their decade-long experience below.
Before: Holly and David stand in front of the home during the deconstruction process.
Courtesy of JHL Design
Finding the Property
Holly: There are very few empty lots in the neighborhood, and it’s pretty small. We were lucky enough to find a home that was in really bad disrepair.
David: The price point in this neighborhood was really high. One day I was looking at Zillow, and there was this property that popped up for $285,000, which was significantly less than anything else. We didn’t know where the road was; I couldn’t find it at first. The property was completely overgrown. There were trees blocking the driveway so that when you drove in, branches were hitting the top of the car. It was just a dump. And I looked at it, and I said: "Well, this is it. This is the place."
Before: The couple used the home’s original foundation and added a small addition of about 700 square feet, for a new total of 3,610 square feet.
Courtesy of JHL Design
See the full story on Dwell.com: Construction Diary: It Took a Decade, But Their Experimental, DIY Home Was Worth the Wait
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