Read companion article: A Gentleman's Loft

by Joyanna Laughlin
Photos by Ron Forth

What makes the loft a popular choice for many homeowners? “It’s a simpler lifestyle in a way,” says Harvey Hine, owner of Harvey M. Hine Architects in Boulder. “You can walk to the grocery store or coffee shop, and they’re great for entertaining. People like their airiness, too—lots of windows and a connection to the outdoors in a downtown environment.”

Hine’s firm recently completed a unique, ultra-contemporary, 3,000-square-foot-plus loft for a Boulder couple. Located downtown, the loft sports “an industrial look, with more sophisticated detailing than you usually find in an industrial loft,” Hine says. While the building is new, rather than the traditional converted warehouse space, stained concrete floors, exposed ceilings and an open floor plan give the space an industrial feel.

The clients hired Hine to design a previous loft for them a number of years ago, and developed a strong relationship with him. “Having already lived in a loft, they came into this with particular ideas of what they wanted, and were more hands-on than a lot of my clients,” Hine says. “My job was to fulfill their expectations and vision.”

That vision resulted in an elegant home that is also a fantastic entertainment space. Oversize windows let the outdoors in, rooms are defined by curves, and furniture groupings direct traffic flow and serve as space dividers. “What Harvey created for us was a very curvy space,” says the woman homeowner, who chose to remain anonymous. “And incorporating curves gave us a little privacy and a lot of interest.”

Curves are a key design element in nearly every room, but everything orbits around the amazing circular kitchen at the loft’s heart. To create the kitchen, Hine’s firm collaborated with Margie McCulloch of Red Pepper Kitchen + Bath in Boulder.

“The kitchen is the center around which everything revolves,” McCulloch says. “Our goal was to keep it in line with the rest of the home, and to make it warm and earthy.” The state-of-the-art kitchen incorporates whisper-quiet, soft-close mechanisms on all the cabi­netry, and ultra-handy interior organizers. A futuristic stainless-steel hood defines the space from above, while a semicircular black granite countertop and walnut bar top ground it in natural materials.

“The kitchen is really fun,” the woman homeowner says. “You can have a lot of guests sitting at the bar while you’re working, and there’s a flow into the dining and living rooms.”

Disadvantage to Advantage

Creating this curvilinear loft was not without challenges. One was finding a way to hide the number of pipes and vents from the units below that move through the loft to the roof above. Yet Hine’s inspired room layouts successfully solved the problem, the homeowners say.

Another challenge was to create the storage that the homeowners required. Since a loft is open by nature, “It’s a shock see how much stuff you have and then try to figure out where to put it,” the woman homeowner says. Her advice to potential loftees: “Build the biggest closet you can.”

Despite lack of storage, loft living attracts many. Easy maintenance and a sense of community are two big pluses, the woman homeowner declares. “We lived in a traditional house before this, and it was time to stop mowing. Now, it’s fun to see neighbors in the hallway.”

Joyanna Laughlin is a Boulder-based freelance writer and poet. While she thinks lofts can be fantastic, her golden retriever staunchly defends the joys of a large backyard.

© 2006 Brock Publishing Company
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