Check out 9 garages we felt bucked norms with imagination and set new standards for what we can do with our garages.
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With it’s functional cupola and weather vane, stone veneer, copper flashings, carriage door, cedar trim and cedar shingles, this single-car garage is known locally as the ‘Garage Mahal’. The materials are designed to match the early twentieth century Ottawa house. It also accommodates a storage loft with a motorized hoist and fold-down attic ladder.
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The upstairs of this garage near Lake Minnetonka, Minnesota, was renovated to create an in-law unit. The bank of large windows in the gable end illuminates the living room and the office nook. The shed roof at right houses the bed nook.
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The transformation of a two-story brick 1870s carriage house from an old garage (and one-time soda factory) to a modern, single-family residence evoking the building’s industrial past remains one of Brendan Coburn’s and Joseph Smith’s favorite projects.
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Living in a city, the family needed only one car but wanted more outdoor space, including a way to tie the land behind their detached garage into the rest of the yard. The solution was to convert one bay of the garage into an outdoor porch, complete with lighting and ceiling fans.
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With parking at a premium in this San Francisco neighborhood, the owners of this 1900s Queen Anne Victorian hoped to add a garage when remodeling. Because the house is in a “potentially historic district,” the city’s planning department strictly monitored renovations and would not allow changes that would drastically alter the facade.
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Through and interplay of light, land, material, and site, a regional approach to the design of this woodshop garage and studio workplace illustrates how a building grows from, responds to, engages in and benefits from the “life forces of a place.” This place-specific design approach creates a garage, shop, work and play space with unique luminous phenomena, sensitive detailing, guided by daily use.
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This simple garage face lift was part of a 2 year whole house remodel with new windows, doors, interior and exterior trim and paint, drywall and lighting, better attic access and storage, trophy/memory shelves, hang all the signs and misc. tweaks.
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One of the first tasks at FHB‘s Project House was to create a shop so that there would be an appropriate place to work. The garage provided the perfect location for a shop, but the old garage door needed to be replaced. Hence, a new garage door became an early Project House project. FHB editors decided to replace an overhead door with a stylish pair of insulated, energy-efficient carriage doors.
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The south-facing garage roof holds the power plant: solar water-heating panels and a photovoltaic array that allow the home to achieve net-zero energy.
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