Month: July 2021

A Reis built West Village townhouse has been featured in September’s Architectural Digest.

The owners have called this West Village townhouse home for decades, including through two comprehensive renovations. In 2017, SKOLNICK alongside Steven Volpe Design engaged Reis Contracting to reimagine what a classical townhouse could be.

Among the many dramatic structural renovations, the largest was removing the rear brick façade and replacing it with glass, introducing natural light and rear-yard views into all but three rooms of the house. In addition, a large part of the rear second-floor ceiling was removed, creating a dramatic vaulted kitchen, further letting light into the home. There are several other natural light features in the house, including a custom cantilevered staircase from the first through the fourth floor with an enormous skylight above that floods light into adjoining spaces.

The combination of these natural light-producing elements creates the illusion one is in an open loft, rather than a downtown townhouse. The large-scale structural changes and excavation seem natural to the surroundings. The front of the house is in fact landmarked and behind it is a modern retreat from the city. See the project here.

The New Reality of Architecture, Technology and Construction was a panel discussion on the integration of technology, design and construction featuring Reis’ Chief Technology Officer Shaun Frazier, Colin Slaten of Peter Pennoyer Architects, Adam Lowenthal of Robert A.M. Stern Architects and Lindsey DuBosar of Hart Howerton. This panel discussed how to leverage technology for a higher level of dynamic communication and collaboration with your design teams, consultants and contractors.

Program Overview:

Terms like Building Information Modeling and Integrated Project Delivery have been around for years. Despite their advantages, we often find ourselves working in isolation and in linear workflows and communication throughout design and construction. This is in part is due to legacy workflows, intellectual property practices, lack of client awareness, or simply the challenge of technological implementation. 

Since the advent of COVID, we are seeing more firms lean towards cloud modeling software with points cloud technology, hosting coordination review meetings over a web conference and communicating clash avoidance with contractors. Whether using CAD, ArchiCAD or Revit, the opportunity is ever more present to take full advantage the “I” in Building Information Modeling and foster a closer partnership with our consultants and contractors.

This panel of Technologists from classical architecture and high-end residential design and construction will gather to discuss design coordination, collaboration tools and workflows that can be utilized to better leverage a higher level of dynamic communication and collaboration with your design teams, consultants and contractors.

The Reis Los Angeles leadership — Jim Schram as Director of Project Development and Engineering, Rene Ocampo as Senior Estimator, Alisun Woolery as Director of Business Development, West and Wilson Rodas as Senior Project Manager. Reis has brought together one of the most talented teams in Southern California with decades of experience building large-scale and complex private homes.

Throughout their careers, the team has partnered with LA’s leading architects and designers including Adjaye Associates, Belzberg Architects, Gehry Partners, Hart Howerton, Jamie Bush + Co., Lake|Flato, Magni Kalman Design, Olson Kundig, Peter Luthor, RIOS, ShubinDonaldson and more. While the team specializes in the high-end residential market, they also have built civic, hospitality, museum, and retail projects that required the softer touch of a high-end residential builder.

We share an approach to business as the devotion to service as craftspeople and builders. United in the belief that construction projects are eminently knowable, that through deep collaboration with our designers we can budget, develop and sequence a project for maximum quality while maintaining rigorous controls on cost and time. Learn more about their individual backgrounds and the rest of the Reis team here.

Examples of LA team past work:

We’re excited to announce two new additions to our senior leadership team in both our New York and Los Angeles offices. 

Meet Zack Secilmis

Zack Secilmis comes to Reis with over 25 years of experience in construction as an Estimator, Owners Representative, Project Executive and Site Foreman. His role at Reis is to bridge the gap between estimating and operations, overseeing our estimating department and meeting with key partners and clients to develop project strategy. Zack’s residential construction expertise reaches across the entire life cycle of a project, from schematic budgeting and site logistics to material sourcing and contract negotiation. Zack is also an adjunct professor in construction at both the NYU Schack Institute of Real Estate since 2006 and Fordham University School of Professional studies since 2017. 

Meet Dave Pearson

Dave Pearson, Senior Project Manager at our LA office, has over 35 years of construction experience as a Senior Superintendent, Project Executive and business owner. He has extensive experience building high-end homes, as well as commercial buildings and historical restorations. Dave’s residential work includes hillside and beach homes, estates in excess of $50 million, and architectural styles ranging from traditional to contemporary. He is also fluent in CAD and is known for his detail-oriented processes across budgeting projects and pulling together trades across the construction stages. 

Reis’ event in Los Angeles on July 10, 2021 brought 80 of the area’s top architects and designers to Topanga Canyon at the home of Jim Schram, Director of Project Development & Engineering at Reis, and his wife, Teal Brogden of HLB Lighting. Guests enjoyed pizza fired on-site, drinks and a special performance by Heidi Duckler’s dance troop. A special thanks to our cosponsors, Audio Command Systems, HLB Lighting and K2D Engineering.

On June 19, 2021 we hosted an elevated summer BBQ in honor of Open House New York at the former home of Marcel Breuer in New Canaan, CT, which was later reimagined by Toshiko Mori. In partnership with our generous host, Stan Ponte of Sotheby’s International Realty, and our cosponsor Bob Capoferri of Marble Crafters, more than 100 industry friends came together to celebrate mid-century design and enjoy an afternoon of food by chefs Ben Walmer of the Highlands Dinner Club and Sean Gray, former Executive Chef at David Chang’s Momofuku Ko.