Bob & Babe

Bob Coscarelli our resident photographer created a tribute series to the house and it’s previous owners Dr. Robert and Amelia Frost. The Frost’s were better known at home and to family and close friends as ‘Bob’ and ‘Babe’. The series was shot one Autumn Day in September 2019, it involved a team of people: Brandon Frein Wardrobe Stylists + Debbie Jacks Hair & Make-Up Stylist + Sabrina Jurlina as Babe + JJ Banicki as Bob.

Chicago Magazine – retro repast

Thanks for the lovely feature Chicago Magazine in your November 2019 print edition. It is always so fun to see the house in print. Thanks once again Eye Eaters Society for the fabulous evening, and to Clair Voon for the story and Ryan Segedi for the photos, we enjoyed having you at the event. On News Stands NOW!

Be our Dinner Guest

We have been dying to share this event with everyone. We are beyond excited to be working with Eye Eaters Society to bring this unique dining experience to our house. Tickets are going to sell fast. so head over to purchase your tickets ASAP and come join us for dinner on August 10th 2019.

Here are some details:

And the story people behind Eye Eaters Society brought to you buy the ever so talented Paul Octavius

Home Tour – July 21st 2019

We are thrilled to announce an exciting collaboration with Lubeznik Center for the Arts [LCA]. We have agreed to host LCA’s Sustaining Members for a series of tours on Sunday, July 21st. There will be three one-hour sessions beginning at 10:00 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. Each Sustaining membership includes admission for two people to one of these tours. If spaces remain, we will make them available to other LCA membership levels.

Sustaining Members can RSVP by calling (219) 874-4900 or emailing mshirk@lubeznikcenter.org. If you are not currently a Sustaining Member but wish to attend, you can purchase a Sustaining Membership over the phone, in person or online at www.lubeznikcenter.org

Glass Fence

We have had several requests asking about details on our ‘Glass’ fence. Let us start by pointing out our fence is a ‘fake-glass’ fence – it is actually made from polycarbonate material. We are not ones for long posts so we will break this down fast.

WHY A FENCE

Simple – we added a pool to the side-lot that came with the home, and state law requires the pool to be fenced. We also wanted to allow our dog Banksy to be able to enjoy the outdoors without us worry if he was playing on the road. The fence were were worried about – as we didn’t want to impact the look of the house – distracting from the original design and look of the garden – we started to lose sleep over the fence design.

DESIGN INSPIRATION

Luckily we didn’t need to look too far. We were inspired by our neighbors fence. Their gorgeous fence is an original pool fence to the house and it made from aluminum and actual safety wire glass. The minute we noticed it – we were 1] jealous 2] knew we had to do something in-the-manner-of to be period appropriate. Our landscape designer Julie DeLeon of Groundwork Design also provide some visual inspiration with black metal and glass fences, and we looked to our previous home for ideas too [see here].

MATERIALS

Here is a list of the materials that were purchased / utilized during construction:

• Fake Glass: Mulit-wall polycarbonate sheeting we purchased through EPlastics, the material was made in Wisconsin, we had it custom cut and shipped direct
• Posts: Standard 2″ square steel posts painted black [similar material – see here]
• Post Caps: Plastic you can easily source these [local hardware or amazon]
• Concrete: Used to set the posts
• Frames: Steel hot rolled Angle bar [similar materials – see here]
• Screws: Frames were screwed to the posts so at anytime if needed they can be removed.
• Gate Hinge: Again nothing custom – readily purchased at hardware store.
• Gate Handle: Simple and cost effective – here is something similar to what we used
• Gate Plate: Custom made from plate steel, welded to steel angle bar painted black.

CONSTRUCTION

We had been working with, and still to this day, work with a local General Contractor, Juan Ramirez and his crew RASE Construction LLC – hold our house together and are not afraid of our crazy project requests. We are not handy people, and rely upon this crew to help us with our projects, they figured out how to construct the fence from all the pieces and put it together. The frames were welded off site and everything else was put together onsite. The poly carbonate panels are 3ft wide by 6ft tall, and are set into frames that are 2 panels across, attached to fence posts set every 6ft. We tried to do 9ft wide with 3 panels, but the wind made them too unstable. The rest of the details – to us it was magic. Sorry we are not of much use here as to the ‘how’, we truly are useless even with a hammer.

LESSONS

There was some trial and error with the fence, just like anything, nothing is really ever perfect and you just need to roll with it. Here are a few things we learned:

1. Polycarbonate delivery was huge, the crates were custom made and hard to crack open – we needed a crew to help us off load a delivery that would normally go to a construction site with forklifts to offload – we had to do it by hand. It can be done, but be prepared with a crew to help you.
2. Light. The fence creates the most amazing light shows all times of the day. It really obscures detail until you or the object is up close to the fence. You can see movement of people and cars going by, and night the headlights and tail-lights are like moving abstract art. And you can see the garden plantings and their movement too. So far no discoloration to the panels from the light has been observed.
3. Weather. It is holding up well so far, it went in August 2017 and at time of writing April 2018 it is looking great. It has endured: heavy snow; high winds; tree branches; hot sun; and torrential downpours. So far we are giving it a thumbs up.
4. Cleaning. It is low maintenance, with the hammered effect to the poly carbonate, to make it opaque it helps hide the dust and the rain splatter. A quick hose down get rid of any bark or soil.
5. Channels. The polycarbonate is twin-walled so has channels for water and small bugs to make themselves a home. So far – the bugs haven’t been an issue. The first panels that were installed we used silicone and it created condensation issues. There is a tape to seal them that comes with the manufactures recommendation – don’t skip buying it, it seems to work to keep bugs out and condensation a way to escape [see photo below] It was only utilized on the bottom edge of the panels, the rest of the edges are sealed with silicone.

Oops this turned out longer than we thought it would. Well – we hope this helps, and please share your projects if you are inspired to create your own ‘frosted-fake-glass-fence’. And if you have any question please ask away we will do our best to answer your questions based on our project and experience to date.

 

 

Alside HQ

Our friend Tim Hills of Tryscraft was doing some research and came across this gem of an article, on Alside Homes and Emil Tessin, teaching us that Emil has other buildings out there in the wild.

What is so fantastic, is to learn that Emil Tessin designed the incredible Alside HQ that is still standing in Ohio today. There have been some modifications to the building, but it is a very handsome piece of architecture.

It is unfortunate to read that Jerome Kaufman and Emil had some disagreements over the design, and was likely the start of the demise of their relationship. I wonder what really happened to prevent the design from being completed as Emil intended.

Here is a picture of the HQ shortly after completion ….

Here are some images from google earth of the building today.