The Inside-Out Room

Ahhh, summer. A cool drink, a soft breeze, a comfy seat on the porch. Close your eyes and listen to the soothing rhythm of the neighborhood: laughter, talk and footfalls; woofs, whirs and chirps. Life humming.

Porch-sitting, a Midwestern art form, is taking root in California.

Nancy and Tom Klosterman discovered it three years ago when they moved into an old house in Fullerton’s Golden Hills area, where friendly neighbors push strollers and walk dogs along tree-lined streets.

There’s a satisfying sense of neighborhood amid the old-fashioned street lights and 1920s houses.

What more could anyone want?

In the Klostermans’ case, a bigger porch.

The original porch of their 75-year-old Craftsman house had been enclosed; only a 20-square-foot outdoor area remained.

It was big enough to use but not to fully enjoy.

Their solution? A wraparound, covered veranda with Craftsman columns. More than 20 times bigger than the previous porch, the expansive new one, completed in mid-July, has become the defining element of the house.

After 25 years in a typical Southern California house, where everything was oriented toward the backyard, the Klostermans love being out front.

They are not alone. Developers, planners and builders say home buyers today want more neighborhood. That’s going to translate into a return of porches, alleys and grassy parkways in new developments, they say.

A recent Times Orange County housing poll found that a majority of people prefer the eclectic over the similar. Respondents said that front porches and different architectural styles of older sections of the county foster a sense of community.

The front porch disappeared in the 1950s and ‘60s when planners turned away from the Main Street concept that oriented the living areas of the home to the street, said architect Allan Cornia of Architects Orange.

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Porches are especially making a comeback in new construction, said architect Bobbie Sue Hood of Hood Miller Associates in San Francisco. She’s doing a lot of porches in urban San Francisco and in Playa Vista, a new development south of Marina del Rey where porches are used to connect the homes to open space in the planned community.

In San Francisco, Hood said, porches are outdoor living space.

“I think a porch is a wonderful form of comfort. It’s like an outdoor living room, and we see people furnishing it much more like a living room, with upholstered furniture, not just with wrought iron,” Hood said.

The Klostermans’ new porch reflects that trend, although the couple has stayed away from upholstered pieces and uses a mix ranging from wrought iron to wicker.

“I like to come out and read the paper. We sit here and have our coffee on the weekends, and it’s fun. Especially on summer evenings when it cools down and everybody’s taking a walk. It’s like being in the Midwest,” Nancy Klosterman said.

The perfect porch wasn’t inexpensive--about $22,000 including design, demolition, construction, painting and unexpected costs such as sprinkler relocation--but the couple say they have already gotten their money’s worth in terms of added resale value and additional living space.

Their grandchildren, who could play in the pool, a spacious recreation room or just about anyplace in the 3,000-square-foot house, prefer the porch. Klosterman is thinking about moving some long tables out there and having Thanksgiving dinner alfresco.

The porch is a hit with the neighbors too. They have honked and waved and given the Klostermans the thumbs-up sign to show their approval. “Almost every woman who has walked by has said to me, ‘I’ve always wanted a porch like this,’ ” Nancy Klosterman said. For her, the porch recaptures the feeling she got visiting relatives in Minnesota and Iowa.

Despite its newness, neighbors tell her the porch looks like it’s been there forever.

A mature carrotwood tree, growing just where the porch wraps around the house, is part of the reason, said residential designer Jim McCann. The original porch, enclosed to make an entryway, was probably built between the two front gables. Remodeling projects over the years, including adding stucco over the wood siding, had masked the home’s Craftsman details, he said.

“The Klostermans haven’t gone back to the wood siding, but the deck is a Craftsman style and it’s so prominent you don’t really notice the stucco. And that was really the intent, to turn it back into more of a Craftsman style,” he said.

An added bonus: the 550-square-foot wraparound porch stretches the narrow front of the house and makes the home look as big as it actually is, McCann said.

McCann agrees that the feature is desirable. Whether everyone can afford to add one is another issue. Adding a covered porch is about as expensive as adding a room, he said.

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On the plus side, real estate agents have told the Klostermans that the new porch adds $60,000--about triple the cost of the project--to the value of their home. And it’s a huge boost to curb appeal.

“That’s important to some people. When their friends drive up, they want the house to be impressive,” Nancy said.

For her part, she’s looking forward to honing her porch-sitting skills in all kinds of weather.

“I love to sit and watch it rain. I had them make the eaves go out farther than the plans called for” to keep the porch dry, she said.

The Klostermans even had electrical outlets added to accommodate a small heater in anticipation of curling up in the wicker settee on cold, rainy days to enjoy Southern California’s other season--winter.

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Steps to a Welcoming Veranda

Here’s how Nancy Klosterman got her dream porch in six weeks:

* She hired a residential designer she was familiar with (he was working on her daughter’s house), and she was willing to spend $300 on concept drawings. Her husband loved the drawings so much, he said they just had to do it.

* From a list the designer supplied, she hired an enthusiastic contractor, Scott Foley of Foley Construction in Fullerton, who fell in love with the project and went the extra mile to make it work. When Klosterman worried that the seven plywood columns the plans called for might be too big, Foley made life-size pairs of templates, complete with trim, in three sizes so she could see for herself. He didn’t charge her extra either. “I know most contractors would have just followed the plans,” she said.

* She didn’t go with the lowest bidder; she picked a contractor she felt comfortable with. The project was hers to handle, and not all contractors like working with women, she said.

* She ignored well-meaning advice that would have taken away from the look she wanted. Many people tried to talk her out of a wood deck, saying a concrete porch was easier to maintain. So far, she’s simply taken a mop to the off-white stained wood.

* She was gracious with workmen, providing a separate bathroom and stocking a refrigerator with cold drinks. But she also established boundaries: When one workman used the phone without asking, she called him on it.

* Her final bit of advice for those who would add a porch? Don’t forget the sprinklers. Hers had to be relocated, an unexpected and large expense.