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Kitchen Eco-Renovation (part 1) It’s been so long since I’ve reported on the eco-renovation of the Eco-Home™ kitchen, I’m recapping some of the steps that were fully described in previous issues of Ecolution. I have cited them and also had them posted on our website www.ecohome.org
During the summer of 1994, with the help of many professionals who gave generously of their time and expertise, I drew up plans and elevations of the dream kitchen for Eco-Home™. (See figures 1-3 on page 21-22) For a list of our Team, see “Eco-Home™ Eco-Renovation Team” on our website, or pg. 5 of the Fall/Winter ‘94/95 Ecolution. First steps were taken in Fall 1994.when I invited Mary Cordaro and Kathryn Metz to perform a Baubiological and Feng Shui analysis of Eco-Home and make recommendations. This is described in the Fall/Winter ‘94/95 issue of Ecolution, pages 14-16. (See “Eco-Renovation Log, Fall ‘94/95” on our website.)
Due to the extensive research necessary to try to find the building materials that both met our environmental criteria and fit within our budget, there was a 2-1/2 yr. delay before more actual physical labor was started on the job. For a description of this stage of the kitchen renovation see pages 16-18 of the Fall 1997 issue and pages 20–22 of the Winter 1998 issue of Ecolution. On our website See “Eco-Renovation Fall 1997” and “Eco-Renovation Winter 1998.” The renovation had to be done incrementally as I only had enough funds to do it piece by piece. There was a hiatus of several years, while I refinanced the house to pay for the completion of the project and recuperated from the stress of the first stage of the kitchen remodel. Whatever people say about the ordeal of renovation, it can never be fully communicated in words.
The bathroom renovation went so pleasantly and well, I was lulled into a false sense of my own competence as a project manager. In retrospect I see that it had much more to do with the character and personality of the contractor, Javier Hernandez. A primary lesson I’ve learned in this process is that the character and personality of the people you work with, as much as their skills, make a project a pleasure and a success or a nightmare. If you have the time – and even if you don’t have the time, make it – work on a relatively small, but real project with your prospective contractor or workman, to see how your personalities mesh, how they react under stress, their reliability, their integrity, as well as their skill, of course. Unfortunately, Javier wasn’t available to work on the next stages of the kitchen renovation. So I was susceptible to the siren call of Denise Bonfilio. I didn’t know Denise well, but had seen her at “green” events for years and admired a business she started under the name of Eco-Junction that sold beautifully designed and crafted wood furniture made of recycled wood. At one point she had arranged, unbidden, to have $1,500 donated to the Eco-Home™ Network. I saw her as a true friend of Eco-Home™.
A major part of creating the new kitchen in the image of my drawings was still ahead. The old cabinets, sink and existing window had to be removed, a new bay window with dual-glazed panes built and installed, a new sink installed in a different place, the plumbing moved, a new fridge bought and installed, two windows removed, new cabinet boxes, drawers and doors built and installed and walls and cabinets painted.
I finally sent Denise a letter itemizing the work her workmen had done and a fair price for that work and asked for a reimbursement of the balance of the $8,000 I had paid her up front. I never heard another word from her. Nor was a dollar ever returned to me by her. I belatedly followed up on her credentials and found:
I took her to Small Claims Court. She didn’t show up for the hearing, I won a judgement for $5,000 against her. But it’s up to me to collect. Letters to her are unanswered. I don’t have the time to seek her out. I don’t have the funds to hire someone to track her down. I won but I lost. Whom can I blame for this debacle? No one but myself. May you take heed and avoid the pitfall of un-professionalism:
As mentioned above, do work on a smaller project with your prospective hiree before hiring them for a large job. Do NOT pay a large amount up front. Ten percent of budget is pretty standard. Do include a completion date in your contract. And do hire a professional project manager it you don’t have the time or the temperament to oversee the work being done, daily, even hourly at certain critical times. One would think that I would have learned all these lessons by this point. But given my subsequent actions, I am forced to face the fact that I am simply not qualified to oversee a construction or rehabilitation job. Rather than facing facts, however, I went into a frenzy of activity. I was possessed by the NEED to complete this kitchen renovation. Once again I refinanced the house to pay for the completion of the kitchen renovation, which I had to do because I had thrown away $8,000 of what I had obtained from the former refinancing. The refinancing paperwork dragged on. I was impatient. I was told the refinancing wouldn’t take more than two months and would probably take much less. So I withdrew $8,000 form my IRA, substantially depleting my account. No problem. I’d put it right back as soon as the refinancing came through. As the weeks and months progressed and the paper work for the refinancing just dragged on and dragged on, I became panicky. But it was too late to do anything about it. I had already spent most of what I’d withdrawn from my IRA. The 60 day deadline for me to return the $8,000 to my IRA to avoid tax penalty came and went. I won’t go into the gruesome ramifications of this missed deadline here. Suffice it to say I was in a less than optimal state of mind to continue forward with the project. But I went ahead anyway. I had to make decisions about the kitchen cabinets. I interviewed several carpenters. Their estimates were way beyond my budget. And they complained about the unusual angles in the cabinet design. They tried to get me to change them, always promising me lower costs if I would. I very much didn’t want to change the angles in the cabinet design. When I looked at sketches with the angles altered to something more conventional - square corners - it looked far less graceful, comfortable and functional. After all I had been through with this kitchen the thought that I would have to settle for something that would be a constant reminder of my dis-empowerment was unacceptable to me. I looked into IKEA cabinets. They advertised that their wood furniture was made of certified sustainably harvested wood. I worked with their kitchen designer to figure out what I would need for the kitchen and it came out to ------$6,000, much less than any estimate I had been able to get for custom cabinets. I was ready to go! But I asked the kitchen designer to confirm in writing that the cabinets I was ordering were fabricated from certified sustainably harvested wood. He referred me to the CEO of marketing. The CEO said he could not guarantee that the cabinets were made of sustainably harvested wood because they didn’t have complete control of the “chain of custody” of the product. Alas! Foiled again. I couldn’t install wood cabinets in Eco-Home that were not verifiably made of certified sustainably harvested wood or recycled wood or some environmentally benign material. I should point out that my experience with IKEA took place several years ago. Forest certification is growing rapidly, and it may well be that IKEA is now able to guarantee in writing that their wood products are entirely certified sustainably harvested. It certainly would be worth checking out if you’re in the market for wood furniture or cabinetry. Metal had been suggested, but I don’t like metal cabinets in the home. Somehow my association to metal cabinets is schools, hospitals and offices. It’s not what I want in my home. Meanwhile, I had found Meier Brief, a licensed contractor/carpenter whose estimate for the kitchen cabinets was within reach AND HE DIDN’T ARGUE WITH ME ABOUT THE ANGLES! And at this point of high suspense, I must pause and invite you to tune in to the next issue of Ecolution Bulletin for the exciting and welcome conclusion to this mis-adventure in eco-renovation. —Julia S. Russell Acknowledgements: Carol Lamkins. kitchen designer: 714-738-7171 |
