Photos courtesy of Cleary Company
When they remodeled the exterior of their home, one of the main things Westerville area residents Jeff and Darlene Kerr wanted was to bring their 1980s home into the 21st century.
“We wanted to refresh the exterior to make it more contemporary,” Darlene says. “As you can imagine, that goes beyond just slapping a new paint color on the outside of your house. You want to pull it together and really make it look updated.”
To do that, the Kerrs enlisted the help of the Cleary Company and its in-house designer and project developer, respectively, Cathryn Brassfield and Robert Raskin.
“I wanted to move to a look that gave a nod toward (a Craftsman style) without going overboard on that, because we’re obviously not a Craftsman-style house,” Darlene says. “We wanted to include some features that are Craftsman, and that’s why it was important for me to go with Cleary Company, because they have an in-house designer that you can work with.”
Having an in-house designer helped the Kerrs realize their visions in a way that was still attainable, Darlene says.
“I went into the project with ideas of my own, but just having that designer to play off of and also to be able to draw on their experience … was very helpful for me,” she says.Among the renovations about which Darlene was the most excited was the Craftsman-style post on the porch.“What we originally had was … just a plain lumber post,” she says. “We wanted a stone bottom and a kind of decorative post at the top that’s painted.”To achieve this, Cleary put in a Craftsman column with a stone base and a white-painted column on top.
The Kerrs also wanted to make sure their new exterior remodel would be easy to keep up. To that end, Cleary replaced their normal wood siding with a vinyl siding.
“We really wanted to … do something that would be more maintenance-free in terms of not having to repaint things and replace boards and things like that,” says Darlene. “We had tried it on our own before … trying to do painting and some basic updating, and that’s fine to a point. But if you really want a fresh look … I think it’s really worth it for people to consider contracting with a company.”
All in all, the Kerrs are very happy with their home remodeling process, so much so that they’re contracting with Cleary again in the future for an interior remodel.
“(Cleary) was great in making sure all the pieces were in place before the project started, so it didn’t drag out forever,” Darlene says. “It was a very painless process for us.”
Patio Column: The column on the Kerrs’ patio was revamped by replacing the plain wooden post with a new Craftsman column with True Stack Calgary stone veneer
Siding: To reduce the amount of upkeep on the siding of the house, the front exterior wooden siding was replaced with vinyl siding.
Front Door: To match the new color scheme and to increase the exterior’s curb appeal, the Kerrs’ front door was repainted to match the new blue siding on the front of the house.
Garage Door: A new, lighter garage door and hardware was installed to further modernize the Kerrs’ home.
New Color: To bring the exterior of the Kerrs’ home into the 21st century, Cleary repainted the trim white and used blue vinyl siding for the exterior.
Emily Real is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
