Leslie Seaberg has lived in the Longfellow neighborhood for nearly 30 years and loves her 1926 bungalow.
There’s no place she’d rather be.
“I have incredible neighbors who are really connected with each other and engaged in the larger community,” she said.
Working from home during the pandemic, Seaberg began to wish for a little studio in her backyard so she could still leave the house to go to work. Then she realized, with this new remote work reality, she could work anywhere and travel more.
That’s when the idea of a lower-maintenance home began to take root.
“Having greater flexibility to work elsewhere became an attractive proposition I couldn’t put down,” Seaberg said.
With no desire to move from her neighborhood, she decided to replace her single-car garage with an accessory dwelling unit (ADU). Seaberg interviewed a handful of architects for the project and selected Carl Gauley of Grayspace Architecture after being impressed with other ADUs he had designed. One of Gauley’s challenges with Seaberg’s property was its relatively short lot, which meant the new ADU would have to be closer to the main house than Minneapolis zoning code allowed, requiring a variance.
To soften the scale and impact of the structure and provide a continuous side-yard buffer, Gauley designed the ADU the same width as the house. He also didn’t take it to the limit.