Eastside · Kirkland
Renovating in Kirkland.
Kirkland is where we do our most complete work, because a condo has to be finished all at once.
You cannot renovate half an apartment and live in the other half. So the whole thing is drawn together, ordered together and built in one run, which is exactly the kind of job a design-build studio is for and exactly the kind that goes wrong when three trades are quoting separately.
The Kirkland condo, taken from one end to the other.
Matte deep green cabinetry with a fluted island under a thick marble waterfall, slim black arched pendants, an entry lined in paneled cabinetmaking with a full-height mirror, and a primary bathroom in dark veined stone with a freestanding tub against it. All of it milled in our shop to the drawings that were signed off.
What a Kirkland condo project really involves
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01
The HOA, first and not last
Alteration agreement, certificate of insurance, sometimes board approval. We start it before the drawings are finished, because it is usually the longest lead time in the job and the easiest one to forget.
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02
Kirkland pulls its own permits
The Eastside cities are not Seattle. Kirkland has its own building department, its own review times and its own inspectors, and we work to theirs rather than to a Seattle calendar.
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03
Waterproofing, because of the floor below
In a stacked building this is the single cheapest piece of insurance in the whole contract. Full membrane, a real pan, and it is never where anyone tries to save.
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04
One run, not three
Cabinetry milled while the first fix is going in, stone templated the week the boxes land. That sequence is the difference between eleven weeks and five months, and it only works if one team owns all of it.
The sales tax follows the address, not our office.
A Kirkland project is taxed at the Kirkland rate and a Seattle one at Seattle's. It is a real number on a real invoice, so ask any contractor whether their quote includes it. The gap between two honest quotes is almost always in what one of them left out.
The studio is across the bridge, and it is worth the drive once.
920 Dexter Ave N, Monday to Friday. Full-size samples, the drawings and the actual cabinet doors. After that visit nobody has to imagine anything.