Roof-raising draws a crowd

A tall crane looming over a quiet residential neighborhood on Port Washington’s north side last Thursday brought traffic to a crawl and had neighbors setting up a watch party.

That’s when Brittany and Adam Ward more than doubled the size of their home at 138 Antoine Dr. in a few short hours, adding a 1,000-square-foot second story to their former ranch-style house.

The second story, which extends over the house and garage, was built by Vertical Works in a factory in Racine and trucked to Port for installation last week.

It came in two pieces, Brittany said, with the crane lifting each off a truck and painstakingly placing it atop their house.

“It was really interesting to see,” she said. “Part of our house was parking on Wisconsin Street at one point. We live off Lakeview, and that road was quite well traveled last Thursday.”

It was such a sight that a crowd gathered to watch, she said, and their neighbors held a watch party complete with snacks across the street.

“It’s kind of a once in a lifetime thing,” Brittany said.

While most people who need more space would either build an addition or move to a larger house, Brittany said raising the roof was the right answer for she and her husband.

The couple initially thought about buying a new house, Brittany said, but “with the housing market four years ago, you had to make a decision even before you saw the house. We’re not like that.”

Besides, she said, the neighborhood suited them. Her husband has lived in the house for at least 15 years, she said, and she moved in when they married seven years ago.

“We love where we live,” she said. “We’re really close to the bike trail. We’re close to Lincoln Elementary School. And my mother-in-law lives two houses away.”
So they looked into adding a second story to their home, something she said was less than half the cost of a new house and allowed them to live in their home throughout the process.

“We started the process before our 4-year-old was born,” she said, adding they signed the contract when he was almost 2.

But the pandemic, supply chain issues and labor shortages meant the house took longer than they expected to be built.

Construction of the second floor began about a year ago, she said. Throughout the process, the couple visited the Vertical Works factory to see it being built — something made even more intriguing because the company also makes tiny houses there.

“We joke that our house probably took over the space of four tiny houses,” Brittany said.

Their second floor was completed in January, she said, but some foundation work needed to be done at their home to ensure it could bear the extra weight.

February didn’t work for installation because a key person at the factory was busy and couldn’t be there, she said.

And rain and snow this month kept delaying the installation.

Last week, things looked good so on Monday and Tuesday a crew tore the roof off their existing house, and Thursday the second floor arrived.

Brittany and her husband took the day off of work so they could watch, and their son found the entire experience entrancing.

“Our son is a construction nut,” she said. “They let him ride in the crane and maneuver the switches. He got to sit in the semi and honk the horn.”

But just because the second floor has been installed doesn’t mean it’s ready to be used. There’s still some construction to be done — including building a staircase to the second floor.

The new second story contains three bedrooms, a bathroom and a large living room space, Brittany said. The couple plan to convert their existing living room into a dining room, she said, noting they don’t have enough room for everyone to sit at their kitchen table right now.

It will probably be a couple months before they can occupy the new space, Brittany said.