Close quarters — Making the most of your one-car garage

DMN: You do have a shed in back. What is in it? WL: That's a Tuff Shed. We tried to get someone to haul it off, but Jennie said, "No, not until you figure out what to do with the bikes." DMN: Which, apparently, you never did.

DMN: If you had a bigger garage, what would you put in it? WL: Another car. But you can see this garage also doubles as my workshop. So I'd probably start stockpiling more junk, if I had more room.

DMN: Your wife says she never even thinks about the fact that the garage is so small. WL: Yeah.

DMN: You've gotten used to having to let all the passengers out before you pull the car into the garage? WL: Yes. This is really critical. (He points to an open area to the side of the driveway.) It is critical that you have a pull-out space, so you aren't always moving cars around. On (architectural) projects we've looked at configurations where you only have this (one-car) width and want to go two deep for a garage, and that is certainly a compromise and works in some cases. But I have had a lot of clients who have said, "I would not do that."

DMN: They'd rather put their second car in a pull-out, even if it is outside? WL: Yeah.

DMN: Under the city's new compatible design covenants, you could have expanded your garage to 700 square feet. WL: Yes. The garage could be larger. Also it could be built to the property line. But it certainly fits the scale of the house now.

DMN: This is a cute garage to have next to the patio where you eat. WL: Yeah, it has the little window on the side. It really feels more like a garden wall, a trellis-type, rather than a big building.

DMN: Scale. WL: And I was really concerned: The room we added (onto the house) has windows on the south side for solar gain. We calculated all of that. So what if we did block the daylight with the garage, then what?

I do think I feel better with the idea of keeping the original garage and having it work for our family.

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E-mail: susan@desnews.com