Orlando’s Designing a New Redwood Deck for His Parents

What started as a loose conversation about me (Orlando Soria, not Emily…HEY GUYS) getting free Bertazzoni appliances for my parents almost two years ago has ballooned into a full-house makeover that is slowly turning their whole entire house into the beautiful, perfectly designed home they never knew they wanted (but I always thought they deserved). If you know me, you know I love my parents, so it should come as no surprise that I want to help them make their home (NOT the picture above…that’s just inspo for the deck) into a place they can be comfortable in and take some pride in. Since family functions often happen at their house, I wanted to create a space where they could easily host everyone (including their grandkids who all live close by and come over often for slumber parties).

My parents both come from big families that didn’t have a lot of money, and they worked their whole lives being frugal and saving money. This was very frustrating when I was a teenager and wanted fancy clothes but I definitely respect it now. I don’t remember a time from my childhood where they weren’t talking about retirement, planning for it, or just generally being very conservative with their money. So I see this life they have now as something that they’ve worked very hard for and I want it to be as glamorous for them as possible. Which is why when we went about designing a deck to replace their old one, I wanted to do something really special for them that elevated the design of their entire home.

A few small story notes for those of you who don’t know what’s going on. Firstly, I used to work for Emily years ago, after we met shooting her TV show “Secrets from a Stylist” on HGTV. We love each other and have remained friends, though I don’t see her nearly as much as I want to because whenever I’m in town, she’s gone and whenever she’s in town, I’m gone (we both have to travel a lot for work and we live on opposite ends of town). I do my own design and content work now, but will collab with Emily until I die, so that’s why I’m here. I grew up in Yosemite National Park and my parents moved from the house I grew up in five years ago but were gunshy about doing any renovations (see above about them being frugal). We have been working on a kitchen renovation for over a year (that will be revealed here ASAP) but are also doing a number of projects around their home.

Okay! Now that we got that squared away, here’s what’s happening with the deck. Basically, in order to expand the kitchen to the size we wanted (which was doubling its size), we had to go out onto a pre-existing deck. Just a disclaimer here: There’s kind of no such thing as “expanding onto a deck,” unless you have some kind of magical deck that’s somehow already to code as an interior space, which is highly unlikely. Building “onto the deck” meant completely ripping off the ugly previous deck, building an entirely new part of the house, then creating a new structure for orMOMdo (my mom) to read and BBQ on while orlanDAD stares at her out the window.

Luckily, about the same time Bertazzoni reached out to me about doing a glamorous kitchen makeover, Humboldt Redwood Company reached out to me about doing an outdoor collaboration. I’m not sure if Emily has talked about this before, but sometimes it feels really awkward and selfish to receive luxurious items for your own home in exchange for coverage on social media (even though it is a TON of work, and definitely not anywhere close to “free” unless you think my time, work, and creativity are free, which I don’t). However, I have absolutely no shame in asking for the most luxurious things ever for my parents. They are the greatest and they deserve nothing but the best. So while I’d feel weird asking for the super expensive range or the fancy redwood beams we used on the deck for myself, I have no issue with sourcing them for my parents. I think I could write an entire blog post on the nuance of sponsorships (and I know Em could, too) but I think for now, all I’ll say is that I was elated that I was able to get such amazing sponsors for my parents. They’ve given me a great life and a wonderful education so this is the least I could do.

OH MY GOD, WE HAVEN’T EVEN STARTED TALKING ABOUT ANYTHING YET.

First, let’s discuss the previous state of the deck. This is what it looked like before:

Yeah. I know. It’s terrifying. Before you get all disgusted at my parents’ house, just know that it’s been completely repainted now and looks TOTALLY different with the new deck (which is done btw, but I haven’t gotten the pics back. We’ll be revealing it HERE in a few weeks so hang around/stalk the site until its up). My parents actually made a pretty great purchase when they bought their house. It’s a very cute, hilly neighborhood filled with large trees and their house was one of the uglier ones (or at least it used to be). Now that it’s getting cute, it’s value is definitely going up. In fact, even pre-renovation, pre-expansion, this home has almost doubled in value since they bought it in 2012. Not that they’re thinking of selling or anything, just letting you know this isn’t all a huge waste of money on a terrible property. PS: If you don’t live in California and are thinking of moving here, DON’T. Everywhere is too expensive and those of us who live here can’t even afford to buy houses so the last thing this state needs is more people.

I actually already did a makeover on this deck a few years ago (above), trying to make it look as good as it could considering the constraints (ugly corrugated metal roof, terrible/totally boring railing, etc). orMOMdo loves it out there, so even this ugly deck was a favorite hangout spot. So I imagine it’ll be even more loved once it’s beautiful. Here’s what it looked like when they’d just moved in and everything (LITERALLY EVERYTHING) in their house was beige or brown. Like not cool 20-year-old-model-in-a-“nude”-outfit-with-a-“nude”-lip beige, hideous-’90s-McMansion beige.

We knew from the beginning that we wanted to use redwood for the deck/shade structure (above is an inspiration shot for the project), so Humboldt Redwood (about 40 minutes north of where my parents live in Sonoma County) was the perfect partner. I’ve taken my parents’ project as an opportunity to meet the people who create the things I sourced for their house. I wanted to make this project as personal as possible, so I toured the factory where their Bertazzoni range was made in Italy, the Cambria countertops factory in Minneapolis, the Central Coast Fireclay Tile factory, and the Humboldt Redwood forests where the lumber for their deck originated. I’m really doing my homework here. A+ student.

Basically, I didn’t know a lot about the lumber industry before this project. I assumed that all lumber companies were evil corporations that clear-cut forests and left owls with nowhere to live. However, what I learned touring the Humboldt Redwood forests is that they actually plant more trees than they cut, they do not clear-cut, and they have hundreds of scientists on their payroll whose job it is to track wildlife and make sure it isn’t being harmed by tree harvesting. This made me feel better about using wood in general because I’d always had a weird sense that I was somehow murdering a forest by using anything made out of wood.

A tip I learned on this trip is that you should look for wood that is FSC Certified. This basically means that it’s passed a set of international standards relating to how the wood is harvested and how forests are taken care of. Okay, now onto the actual design. Sorry for all those asides and all that info about wood you never knew you needed to know.

I’m gonna be honest and basically admit I stole this whole design from Kelly Ripa. I’ve always been a Kelly Ripa fan but I had no idea she had such great taste in shade structures until I went down a Pinterest hole and found this image below (which apparently is her former New York penthouse):

Basically, I just loved the slatted roof on that guy and wanted to do something kind of similar. The roof definitely elevates the whole thing and the thick beams give it a strong presence. So when I started planning the design, I knew I wanted to incorporate this type of roof as well as strong, rectangular lines and an overall look that was simultaneously modern and traditional, like a combo of these:

My parents’ house is a bit of a style question mark. It was built in 1977 in a semi-contemporary style, flipped in 2011 to look as traditional/suburban/Mediterranean as possible, and we’ve been trying to figure it out ever since. My solution was to create a design for the deck/shade structure that was simple enough to feel Mediterranean but with a material you might see on a more traditional home (like redwood!). My mom is pretty into contemporary stuff while my dad leans more traditional, so this combination was kind of perfect for them.

I created the initial plans for the structure and layout for the deck, which is very simple and straightforward, and then a Berkeley-based architect named Betty Li created the architectural plans shown here. She took all my sketches and ideas and turned them into a reality. Many people have reached out to me asking about how this whole process worked. Basically, I created the concept, then Betty drew it, we had to go back and forth with an engineer to figure out things like wind resistance and weight bearing (these giant posts weigh A LOT), then the plans had to be approved by the city. So what seems like a simple project was actually pretty involved. I think the architect/engineer fees added up to around $7,000 and the contractor bill was a bit over $30,000. Not a cheap project as that doesn’t even include the cost of the material. I’m trying to be pretty transparent on cost with this project because a lot of the type of content I’m seeing right now seems to show completely unrealistic pricing for home renovations and that helps NOBODY.

The below plan shows the layout of the kitchen and the deck, which is used most often as a place where my mom grills dinner (since it’s easily accessed from the kitchen) and as a place to read, so it’s important that it have a lounge space and a cooking space, though it is tight up there.

The build-out of the kitchen has made a HUGE difference to how the kitchen and family room feel. It makes so much more sense as an interior space and makes me wonder why there was ever that carve-out on the side of the house before. You might be wondering why we didn’t expand the lower portion of the house too. There’s a reason that’s too complicated to explain here, but basically, it would have made a really weird shaped room with no window if we did so we just kept it as-is. Construction is actually finished now, but for the sake of fun let’s pretend it still looks like this:

I’ve already started planning what to do with the space below the upper deck, which is going to become an outdoor dining area. I sourced an AMAZING table from Article (it already arrived and my parents LOVE it), a very sweet pendant from Rejuvenation, and some outdoor dining chairs also from Article. Check out the Get the Look below for what I’m looking at:

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1. Starburst Pendant | 2. Outdoor Sectional | 3. Outdoor Coffee Table | 4. Sconce | 5. Pendant Light | 6. Concrete Planters | 7. Grill | 8. Drum Stool | 9. Dining Chairs | 10. Dining Table

Construction finished at Casa Soria about a month ago and I shot all the updates I made up there with Zeke Ruelas a few weeks back. The space is totally transformed and even the way my parents interact with it is so different. I can tell my parents are relieved their kitchen project is over, as that was incredibly long and wrought with delays, frustrations, and a bajillion change orders. But they’re also just really enjoying how functional and beautiful their new spaces are. I can’t wait to share how all these different rooms/spaces came out, especially the deck, which has made such a huge difference to what the backyard looks like. It has basically made the house look 100% better from the outside. Until next time…

Okay, bye!

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