It takes lemons to make lemonade, and a three-year-old spec house in Atlanta’s historic Old Fourth Ward had plenty of the former when homeowners Eric and Elizabeth Breier called Nest Planning & Construction for help. “There were massive water infiltration concerns, and the whole house was rotting from the outside in,” says Frank Wickstead, a licensed general contractor and a partner along with wife Lauren in the Atlanta design-build firm. He is also an adjunct professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Building Construction.
Although the challenges were many, the Breiers decided to overhaul the home rather than move from their “dream location” near Atlanta’s Beltline and Ponce City Market. The year-long project, overseen by Nest Project Manager Michelle Treacy, was divided into two phases: demolition and construction. “Demolition was exploratory, just to see how much we were going to have to take off in order to build back,” Frank says of the gut renovation.
Many of the home’s original issues stemmed from its flat roof design, a feature that requires special strategies to prevent water incursion. So, Frank started with what he calls the “unsexy” details that make a big difference in how a house holds up over time. “I’ve always had a sustainability slant, which means water mitigation, wall assembly, insulation, and HVAC,” he says. “That’s where we start, and then we work on [making it] beautiful.”…