The Conversion Rate

Four uncommon spaces reinvent the meaning of home.

LEFT: “When I bought the firehouse, it was an unreinforced brick building,” says Lucas. The steel beams seen here serve as both a seismic upgrade and a design element. RIGHT: The kitchen’s sandblasted-glass cabinets and concrete countertops reflect light from the adjacent sunroom. (photography by Joe Budd)

LOFT IN TRANSLATION   Beyond the circa-1884 cast-iron, Italianate facade of the historic Engine Company 13 firehouse in the Mission—the oldest standing firehouse in the city—lies a modern, 3,700-square-foot, three-bedroom loft owned by Daniel Lucas and designed with the help of his longtime friend, architect John Maniscalco. Lucas, a general contractor, is the principal of DML Renovations (a contemporary-architecture company run out of the firehouse’s cavernous six-car garage). “I did a fairly major restoration and paint job on the front, but to be honest, there wasn’t too much about the interior to get excited about,” says the London native, an avid modern-art collector. “The previous owner lived here for over 30 years. I had to strip away three layers of old wall coverings to expose the original brick”­—now hung with a museum-wing’s worth of photography by Todd Hido and Lucas’ ex-girlfriend Elena Dorfman, a haunting multimedia canvas by Austrian painter Gottfried Helnwein called I Walk Alone and a humorous “wallpapered” self-portrait by local artist Tim Sullivan. “It was really dark and filthy,” recalls Lucas. “Now, it’s open and warm.”   Lucas admits that the nearly decade-long renovation process—whose earliest stages included a seismic upgrade (the two massive steel frames he installed were left exposed, intensifying the loft’s industrial feel) and the addition of a mezzanine-level master bedroom—will likely never end. Most recently, the 40-year-old added a 1,500-square-foot extension comprising a sunroom, an outdoor patio and a future space for Alina, his 10-month-old daughter with wife Svetlana. “She’ll have to share it with a new pool table,” he laughs.

Ted Logan, founder of SF’s Logan Design & Construction, was just the right man to convert an old candy factory.

THE SWEET HEREAFTER   Five years ago, when friends and former coworkers Rick Vargas and Toria Emery looked at a 1900 Edwardian, two-story TIC—previously a confectionery factory—for sale on 18th Street in the Castro, they were instantly smitten. To seal their final offer, they included a CD of music and a letter assuring the solidarity of their friendship and coolness factor. “We didn’t have the highest bid, but we wanted the Logans [the previous owners] to know that their house would be in good hands,” says Vargas. “They definitely stood out,” says Ted Logan, a local architectural designer and contractor who undertook a complete gut-and-remodel of the candy factory from 2000 to 2002 while living there with his wife and kids. Because each unit is small, hovering around 1,000 square feet, Logan built windows above doorways to keep light flowing, and created built-ins to free up floor space. Since the structure is set back from the street, Logan created a gated entrance and a garden around the existing fruit trees. Walking through the courtyard slowly reveals the original Moody’s Candies sign, which Logan restored by stripping away paint and asbestos. “When I saw it, I realized that this place was special,” says Vargas.

The barn contains art studios for sculptor Dan Lockwood and his wife, Caitlin, a jewelry designer. Caitlin’s mother will reside in the barn’s one-bedroom loft. The couple (right) live nearby with their three kids.”

SIMPLY RED   When a married pair of former dot-commers bought a second single-family home in Eureka Valley in 2004, they did so for the love of the severely dilapidated turn-of-the-century barn at the back of the property. Dan Lockwood, now a creator of kinetic steel sculptures, and his wife, Caitlin, a jewelry designer, set out to remodel the main house and the barn (reportedly once the carriage house and stables for the historic Caselli mansion across the street), with the intention of selling the former and renovating the latter to house their art studios and a loft for Caitlin’s mother. Little did they know that they would be entering an arduous two-and-a-half year struggle with the city, in which their architect, Joel Karr, principal of local design firm Group 41, revised the barn’s blueprints nearly 10 times to accommodate the complicated laws that govern everything from the barn’s historical value to the contour of its roofline. “The compromise was to completely rebuild the barn—as long as the new building closely matched the original,” says Karr. The result is a handsome, 2,020-square-foot, brick-red structure with charming double-gabled pitched roofs, knotty-pine siding, wide-plank floors and skylights galore to illuminate the vaulted spaces. “It’s just luscious,” says Caitlin. “I love the idea of a 100-year-old barn in the middle of the city.” Would she do it again? “Only if you hold a gun to my head,” she laughs.

LEFT: The living room contains one of Marko’s favorite elements: the exposed wooden rafters. RIGHT: The kitchen features a library ladder for reaching high storage cubbies.

BORN AGAIN   The irony of living in a Mormon-temple-turned-synagogue-turned-3,400-square-foot-home is not lost on Joe Marko and his partner, Rafael Acevedo, who purchased the building in Eureka Valley in July. “It’s not like I’ve never been accused of preaching,” laughs the 41-year-old real-estate agent. He and the 37-year-old Acevedo, also an agent, are sitting in the 1,075-square-foot living room (formerly the sanctuary) under a pair of contemporary Moooi Light Shade Shades—twinkling crystal chandeliers paradoxically encircled by a sheet of mirrored film—which hang 24 feet overhead from rustic wooden rafters. “This home is a lesson in contradictions,” says Marko of the 100-year-old Arts and Crafts structure, which was converted into a three-bedroom, three-bath home in 1998 by previous owners, with the help of the PBS show This Old House. “But we have a passion for unusual spaces.” There seems to be, for example, as much square footage in storage space (in the form of cubbyholes and built-in cabinets) as there is in the actual living areas. The marble used to make the countertops in the kitchen (previously the church cafeteria) were reclaimed from—gasp!—a public restroom. “We’re crossing our fingers it’s not from a urinal,” cringes Acevedo. The 200-year-old vitreous-china janitor’s sinks in the master suite (where administrative offices once were) come with hot-and-cold foot pedals instead of handles. Because of the home’s celebrity, the biggest contradiction is the “welcome” invasion of privacy from curious passersby, who occasionally can be caught peeping through the gothic windows for a glimpse of the unusual space. Says Marko, “They’re appreciating it, and that’s just fine.”

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