The City of Long Beach is very invested in preserving the historic homes and historic neighborhoods within its boundaries—as they should be! There are many beautiful historic homes in Long Beach that remind us of times gone by. They speak to values and tastes of past eras and tell us something about the people who lived through them.
Mark Grisafe, a Long Beach architect and member of the City of Long Beach’s Cultural Heritage Commission, had this to say about historic home remodels, “Long Beach is very interested and invested in maintaining homes in historic areas and designated historic homes. The homeowners of historic homes or those in historic districts have a lot of flexibility to make changes to the interior of the home, but any changes to the exterior must be submitted to a designated historic team within the Long Beach Planning department prior to standard plan check submittal. Anything from exterior paint colors, to new roofing materials, to home additions must be cleared through the Historic Planning team before the project will be reviewed by other departments at the City. For smaller scopes of work, such as repainting the exterior, the Certificate of Appropriateness can be approved administratively. However, larger scopes, like an addition that is visible at the street, will also need to be reviewed and receive approval from the Cultural Heritage Commission.”
While this process goes a long way to protect the authenticity of historic homes within Long Beach, these extra steps can lengthen the approval process for Long Beach historic home renovations—affecting the overall project timeline. The process can also be an added challenge for Long Beach architects, who have to balance their clients’ wishes with what the Cultural Heritage Commission will approve.
On a recent project that involved a home on the City’s list of Historic Landmarks, Grisafe was tasked by his clients with making several changes to the home’s exterior. The City was happy to approve changes that brought the home more in line with its historic style, such as a custom built wood window to replace a glass block window, and ones that weren’t visible from the street, such as a new bathroom skylight. But ultimately, they did not approve the addition of a new elevator, despite Grisafe’s attempts to show how low the visual impact would be on the exterior of the home. Grisafe says, “We try to always set expectations with our historic home clients early on that not everything they want to change will be approved. Fortunately, our architecture firm has a good relationship with the City, so we can usually get feedback pretty early on in the process about what will likely get approved and what won’t.”
Despite the challenges related to getting approvals, working on historic homes can also be very rewarding for architects. In many cases, a historic home remodel can help bring a home back to its former glory by adding back in historic elements that may have been removed during previous remodels. This could mean replacing the existing cabinetry and flooring with period-correct versions or adding trim and built-ins that are consistent with the style of the home.
While most historic homeowners in Long Beach want their homes to be period-correct, they also want them to have modern amenities. Some historic home remodels involve replacing a home’s entire electrical, plumbing, and heating and cooling systems. They can also involve adding more storage (something that is severely lacking in most historic homes) and modern appliances. It can be a complicated balancing act for architects, which is why not every Long Beach architect will take on historic home remodeling projects. However, those that are willing to take on these types of projects often find the end results especially rewarding.
