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3M innovation creates an organic modern home
September 05, 2016By Janna Fischer/3M StorytellerCollecting Inspiration and Artifacts: A Homeowner’s Labor of Love
Collecting Inspiration and Artifacts: A Homeowner’s Labor of Love
Collecting Inspiration and Artifacts: A Homeowner’s Labor of Love
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Artist, Architectural Designer and Interior Designer Ashii Vrohidis and her husband share a love of nature. So when they discovered a tiny, run-down cabin on an overgrown lot on Lake Calhoun – a coveted city lake in the heart of Minneapolis, Minnesota – they knew it would be the perfect location to build their dream home.
He’s a water person and she’s a fire person, says Ashii. The lakeside location would offer him the ability to walk right out the front door when he wants to go windsurfing and would provide her convenient access to a range of restaurants. The site also delivers a beautiful setting for Ashii – who is also a chef – to entertain guests as she serves dinners at home.
They purchased the lot. But shortly after closing, the journey to build their home took a slight detour. Her husband – a 3Mer – was given the opportunity to work abroad, so instead of breaking ground, they packed their bags and moved to Hong Kong and then on to the Middle East. It would be four years before they’d be back in Minnesota to begin constructing their forever home.
Ashii embraced the delay, and while living abroad, she traveled extensively to collect both inspiration and artifacts for her Minnesota home. Her goal? To build a functional space with sustainability in mind that celebrates her individuality and the unique creativity of artisans from around the globe. Ashii also wanted to add an element of experimentation to the project, so another ambition of hers was to integrate as many 3M products as she could into the construction of her new home.
Wherever she went, she brought her feather pen and leather notebook, drawing up floor plans and furniture designs along the way.
“As I traveled through Thailand, I began sketching out what the home would look like,” says Ashii. “I saw all these old beautiful buildings, and on the inside they had been lovingly turned into bed and breakfasts. I wanted our home to feel like that – functional, yet connected to history and nature.”
Photo courtesy (above): Landmark Photography and John Kraemer & Sons, Inc.
Photo courtesy (above and below): Landmark Photography and John Kraemer & Sons, Inc.
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She collected artifacts as she went, including a piece of ancient wood from a Buddhist temple in Burma; sinks from an artisan who was crafting them out of clay on the side of a road in Thailand, and manufactured timbers from an island off the coast of Hong Kong. She imported faucets, light fixtures, marble – every detail she’d need to adorn her Minnesota home with unique, collected pieces from around the world.
Ashii also began crafting items for the home herself, using 3M adhesives and materials whenever possible. She designed the sofa, the chairs, the coffee table, the metal bathroom divider – to name a few – and worked with local artisans to manufacture them. She created custom artwork to adorn the walls, including a three-foot-long grouper named “Ralph” that she macerated and put back together, bone by bone; and a butterfly she made out of the molted feathers of her pet birds.
When they returned from their time away and began to break ground, Ashii held her breath as crates were opened, hoping that all the items she had collected and designed thousands of miles away would work together seamlessly in the way she had envisioned.
The tiny, 35-foot-wide lot Ashii and her husband had purchased only allowed for a 25-foot-wide home. It also was on a slope, so they needed to build massive retaining walls to hold up the structure. She likens the entire project to a “Rubik’s cube challenge.” She and the builder – John Kraemer & Sons, Inc. – worked closely together to ensure the 2,400 square-foot, three-level home would feel as spacious as possible, would incorporate sustainable elements and have a high level of functionality.
Together they came up with a few tricks to make the narrow space seem more expansive. They put in neutral cement floors and forewent floor boards, window frames, door frames and even outlet covers throughout the home, creating a more streamlined, simplified aesthetic. The idea, says Ashii, is to remove all non-essentials “so that everything else disappears, and all the eye sees is the beautiful craftsmanship of the artists and the thoughtful design elements throughout.”
And since this is their “forever home,” Ashii wanted to do her part to ensure they use less energy and create efficiencies wherever possible. They created a rain garden that collects water; in turn, keeping runoff from ending up in the storm drains that empty into the lake and disrupt the ecosystem. She also covered the slope on the side of her home with wildflowers “because I love to see the bees and butterflies, and I can’t imagine a world where they don’t exist.”
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Fun with 3M innovation
Using 3M products from the ground up ended up being one of the highlights of the project for Ashii. Her husband is a 3Mer, so Ashii was familiar with the consumer products 3M offered, like Command Strips, painter’s tape and masking film – and she used those extensively. But through the design and building process, she came to realize how many other ways 3M products can be utilized while building a home, and she decided to have some fun with it.
“I used 3M’s vent tapes, window films, adhesives, and water and air filtration products,” says Ashii. “For my solar panels, I worked with a distributor who uses 3M films and attachments. The more I researched, the more I learned about the array of 3M products that I could use to build a home – not only from an innovation and ingenuity standpoint, but from an aesthetic standpoint as well.”
One of her favorite 3M discoveries? 3M’s glass bubbles. Glass bubbles are microscopic glass spheres that are hollow inside. Their round and hollow composition makes them extremely lightweight and incredibly tough – so they are a secret ingredient behind making all sorts of things lighter, stronger and more buoyant.
Ashii added glass bubbles to elements throughout her home – she mixed them into her concrete floors, countertops and sinks. She also added them to the Venetian plaster in the guest shower. The glass bubbles helped make the concrete lighter in weight and therefore “more workable.” And, due to their insulation properties, she says the glass bubbles increased the R value – or thermal resistance – of her concrete floors, adding to her goal of overall energy savings.One of her favorite 3M discoveries? 3M’s glass bubbles. Glass bubbles are microscopic glass spheres that are hollow inside. Their round and hollow composition makes them extremely lightweight and incredibly tough – so they are a secret ingredient behind making all sorts of things lighter, stronger and more buoyant.
Ashii added glass bubbles to elements throughout her home – she mixed them into her concrete floors, countertops and sinks. She also added them to the Venetian plaster in the guest shower. The glass bubbles helped make the concrete lighter in weight and therefore “more workable.” And, due to their insulation properties, she says the glass bubbles increased the R value – or thermal resistance – of her concrete floors, adding to her goal of overall energy savings.One of her favorite 3M discoveries? 3M’s glass bubbles. Glass bubbles are microscopic glass spheres that are hollow inside. Their round and hollow composition makes them extremely lightweight and incredibly tough – so they are a secret ingredient behind making all sorts of things lighter, stronger and more buoyant.
Ashii added glass bubbles to elements throughout her home – she mixed them into her concrete floors, countertops and sinks. She also added them to the Venetian plaster in the guest shower. The glass bubbles helped make the concrete lighter in weight and therefore “more workable.” And, due to their insulation properties, she says the glass bubbles increased the R value – or thermal resistance – of her concrete floors, adding to her goal of overall energy savings.Photo courtesy (above and below): Landmark Photography and John Kraemer & Sons, Inc.-
“3M is woven into the fabric of our lives from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep – we just don’t know it,” says Ashii. “But when you look, you’ll find the options are endless. I became a regular at 3M – asking if I could try this or test that. I researched and experimented, putting glass bubbles in all the concrete that went into my home – as well as into some of my art projects. The results were incredible.”
The home was selected to be a part of the Artisan Home Tour, a showcase of Minneapolis and St. Paul homes that represent the vision and craftsmanship of some of the most respected and innovative homebuilders in the area. Now that the show is over, Ashii and her husband finally get to move in.
But even before she’s had the chance to kick her feet up and enjoy her completed project, she’s already begun ruminating on her next labor of love: to one day open up a French-fusion restaurant near her home. In the meantime, Ashii plans to soak in the views from her new front stoop.
GLASS BUBBLES“The Lake Calhoun area is so diverse – it’s such a melting pot,” she says. “We can just imagine growing old here – people-watching from our front patio. Just sitting and watching everyone go by.”
GLASS BUBBLES“The Lake Calhoun area is so diverse – it’s such a melting pot,” she says. “We can just imagine growing old here – people-watching from our front patio. Just sitting and watching everyone go by.”
GLASS BUBBLES“The Lake Calhoun area is so diverse – it’s such a melting pot,” she says. “We can just imagine growing old here – people-watching from our front patio. Just sitting and watching everyone go by.”
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