Eichler: No Walls, On A Slab…. Run The Wires (and Water) On The Roof!

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This is what the roof of an Eichler should look like. Or, at least, an Eichler with a foam roof that is a couple of years away from needing recoating.

Aside: Eichler’s, by the way, were a mid century modern design by Joseph Eichler. Mostly post and beam (though not all) with an emphasis on an open floor pan facing the outside with an open to the air atrium in the middle. Sort of Levitt-with-style for the west coast. Eichler owners get Eichler specific spam and there is an entire network of web sites devoted to Eichlers.

Fairly smooth, unbroken, sea of off-whiteness. Reflective. Waterproof. A solid roof over our heads to keep us dry, out of the sun, and warm in the winter (sort of).

Of course, being an Eichler, the roof is much more than just a shelter over the house. Since there are no unbroken walls — just windows — between the walls, almost all electrical and any re-routed plumbing ends up on the roof.

Or, more specifically, in the roof.

I feel Bbum’s pain. We also live in an Eichler, a fairly early (1956) model. Great little houses, and we’ve taken pains to try to keep the thing in as close to original state as we can (pretty much everyone in our neighborhood has either added a peaked roof or closed in the beams with a drywall celling and insulation, we’ve done neither)

On the other hand, we had to reroof shortly after we bought it, and we went tar and gravel, and don’t regret it a bit. We ALSO added R14 insulation under the roof, which was a godsend at the time and even more now (and a good reason why we can leave the open beam ceilings). My one regret there was not insulating the garage roof, too. oh well.

But the one real chore with Eichlers is running the infrastructure. With a slab underneath and a flat roof above, getting wiring and piping from here to there is a massive pain; ultimately, you either chew up the slab, mess up the roof, or open up the walls. In our case, our house was redone in the 70s with copper plumbing, so that’s not an issue with us, but I’m not looking forward to the ultimate need to rewire some areas of the house…

But I know a lot of people who really love Eichlers, and I have no regrets owning one. Too many of them have been “remodeled” until they have no personality left…

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