High ceilings, balconies, plenty of glazing eliminate cramped- home feeling
MICHAEL SASGES
Sun
DERRICK BELCHAM/ FOR WERTMAN DEVELOPMENT
Attractively priced and centrally located, a Luzon apartment will pamper its household with that sense of spaciousness that belongs to those of us who reside under high ceilings, behind plentiful glazing and with lounge-chair-compatible balconies.
The ceilings in the five homes on the third, or top, floor, are averaging 13 feet above the floor, not universally, but certainly in the living and dining spaces. They are close r to 11 feet on the floor below.
The effect is especially pronounced in the north-facing 685-square-foot onebedroom plus den on the top floor.
For those 685 square feet, the infamously cramped Yaletown glass-tower household might sacrifice its first-born male child. In those 685 square feet, the older single-family-detached household would quickly know it has sacrificed nothing by downsizing to the Luzon.
‘‘ The units are actually bigger than average,’’ Daniel Eisenberg of GBL Architects says of the firm’s work at Luzon. ‘‘ Most of them are corner units. So they have a lot more light, especially those where the ceiling heights are higher. Those are the efficiencies that the market nowadays wants.’’
Proximities, too, create residency efficiencies. Located at 12th and Arbutus, the Luzon households will have the opportunity to enjoy a home life independent of the car.
Groceries are located a few blocks away, to the north and south. Fine, and casual, dining is a stroll away. The shops of West Fourth and South Granville are to the north and east.
Kits Beach is down the hill, to the north. Connaught Park, one of the city’s premier athletic fields, and the Kitsilano Community Centre are down the hill and to the west. A bowling alley, too, is a couple of blocks away, to the south.
How many of us make our home in a neighbourhood with a bowling alley down the street? More importantly, how rare is the opportunity to make a home in a new-construction residence in an old neighbourhood?
And Kitsilano is an old neighbourhood, one of the Lower Mainland’s first suburbs.
A quantitative measure of the age of the neighbourhood are the dates of construction of the local elementary school, Lord Tennyson ( 1912), and high school, Kitsilano ( 1917).
A qualitative measure is the arboreal splendour of the residential streets enclosed by the arterials of West 12th and West 16th and Burrard and Macdonald, and the lawns and gardens of those who reside on those streets.
The Luzon broker, Kris Pope of Dexter Associates, says the per-square-foot asking price of a Luzon residence, $ 550 on average, was probably last available on westside new-construction two or three years ago.
It was higher when he started selling. ‘‘ The price cuts were to accommodate market conditions, but as well to instil confidence in potential purchasers, that they’re being treated fairly and with respect because they are the market,’’ he The most likely Luzon buyer will be either a first-home buyer or an investor/ landlord, Pope expects.
Airy feeling permeates even smallest units
There is a-place-for-everything quality to a Luzon apartment, bigger and smaller, with artful exploitation of interior space and big balconies its hallmark. For example, at the entrance of the smallest plan, the 685square-foot A plan, is a windowless room ( above). It could serve equally as den or storage room and, with every cubic inch put to work, as both den and storage. In the 1,100-square-foot D plan ( left), the guest bathroom is accessible from the principal living quarters, but not directly. Its door is hidden behind a fireplace wall that creates a hallway, or an approximation of one. All the balconies are bigger than those typically included in newconstruction apartments, reports Daniel Eisenberg of GBL Architects. And some of them amount to an extra room, both by size and location, behind windows. The balcony off the D plan shown here is one-half of an across-the-back-of-the building balcony the second-floor D plan household will share with the apartment next door. ( Life is a constant weighing of assets and liabilities. This balcony overlooks a city lane, all of which can be made to go away with the right containerplanting decisions.) The stone-and-steel specifications are second to done. Developer and interior designer have specified an appliance package from the LG manufacturing company. Composite quartz will top the counters in the kitchens and guest bathrooms. Marble will top the master vanities. Space was created, or preserved, to separate tubs and showers in the ensuites.
Shops to line ground floor of Luzon
Twelfth and Arbutus is a prominent westside Vancouver intersection. The Luzon developer and architect have responded with a building worthy of the corner — and the residential buildings along Arbutus Street between 10th and 12th avenues. Shops will be located on the main floor. The homes are located on the second and third floors. This arrangement is a continuation of the streetscape that until Luzon’s erection stopped at the northwest corner of 12th and Arbutus. Luzon is located on the southwest corner. ‘‘ Not only will people live in this building. The rest of us will have to live with this building, walk by it, drive by it,’’ says Daniel Eisenberg of GBL Architects, the building’s designer. ‘‘ So, I think, a lot of care was taken with the design, a lot of attention was given. … There was a lot of innovation: There’s an interesting pattern in how the windows create movement. There’s variety in each unit. By shifting the windows each unit is unique. ‘‘ A second-floor unit is totally different from a third-floor unit. The position of the windows is different. So basically you have a different feeling in each unit.’’ Additionally, a relatively new ( to these shores) cladding tops the thoroughfare exteriors. It’s called SwissPearl; it’s a cement-composite panel; and, HardiePlank should be so lucky, it was named one of the top 25 design materials in the world at a recent international gathering of architects. Corian, from DuPont de Nemours, also made the list, an indicator of the company the Luzon cladding is keeping.