This Logan Square residence began as a frame two-flat, built in 1896 and later divided into stacked apartments. Affectionately named for the two primary residents of the household: a michievious old golden retriever and a stoic mutt. This project is the second of four phases the same owners have entrusted to Integro, each one building on the work before it. Returning this building to a single-family home — combining the two floors and reconfiguring the upper level into a luxury primary suite and guest bedroom — meant confronting a familiar cost problem: municipal code treats a deconversion as a trigger for mandatory upgrades, and preliminary preconstruction pricing landed well above the clients' budget. Rather than force the number or surrender the quality, the clients chose to adapt the scope, working with Integro to value-engineer the project around a single question: which moves trigger an upgrade requirement, and which do not?

The discipline of that work is holding design intent and build quality steady while the scope around them contracts. At the perimeter walls, stripping the original plaster to run new conduit would have exposed the exterior framing, triggering insulation and furring requirements and a cascade of demolition and carpentry cost; Integro instead upgraded the wiring in place, trading added electrical labor for the larger carpentry scope. Where the spend earned its keep, the team committed fully — taking the ceiling down so new framing could carry the details that define the home: a custom millwork screen wall flanking the freestanding tub in the primary bath, millwork wainscot and sconces along the primary hall, and ornamental steel at the interior staircase.

One decision surfaced a problem no drawing had predicted — removing the entry vestibule between the former units to open the new foyer into the living room revealed framing far weaker than assumed, and the opening required structural reinforcement. Rather than bury the new timber beam behind finishes, the design pulled it into view, letting the reinforced structure read as a deliberate feature. Around it, the full scope — utility upgrades, a new vented fireplace, refinished historic hardwood, complex tile, and custom millwork and stone — was delivered without disturbing the already-finished basement and first floor.

Nothing in the finished home announces what it cost to get there — only a single-family house that reads as though it had never been two