The Chain Bridge Residence is a complete gut renovation of a ranch home from the 1970s in a northern Virginia suburb. The house had wonderful existing “bones” and sat against a lovely, wooded ravine that runs down to the Potomac River. Our initial goal was to “strip” the house back – remove the overgrown landscaping on the outside of the house as well as to simplify and refashion the existing flow of spaces inside. There were two large 100-foot plus tall American birch trees that pressed up against the back of the house, and although we knew we wanted to expand the house to the rear, we did not want to lose those two trees. In order to save the birch trees, we designed a steel-framed addition with a helical pier foundation and a cantilevered steel and concrete structure that allowed us to minimally affect the trees’ root systems, and we opened up the house to what became a beautiful, private wooded rear escape.