Areas served
Interior Design and Renovation in Shaker Heights
Shaker Heights was drawn before it was built. Beginning in 1905, O.P. and M.J. Van Sweringen laid roughly 1,200 acres of curvilinear streets against the natural grade, ran greenbelts along Doan Brook and the Shaker Lakes, and controlled the result through deed restrictions that governed lot arrangement, house size, cost, and construction material — slate, wood shake, clapboard, brick, stone, stucco. Their company published Shaker Village Standards in 1925 and permitted three architectural vocabularies: English, French, and Colonial. Demonstration houses on Parkland Drive, Moreland Boulevard, Courtland Boulevard, and South Woodland set the standard, designed by Philip Small, Howell & Thomas, and Bloodgood Tuttle. A century later that discipline is still the reason the neighborhood reads the way it does — and it is the reason a Shaker renovation is not a straightforward project.
What a Shaker Heights project involves
Most of the city sits inside the Shaker Village Historic District, listed on the National Register in 1984, which covers roughly seventy percent of Shaker Heights.
More consequentially for a renovation, the city's Architectural Board of Review must approve any new construction, addition, or alteration that changes the exterior appearance of a building — before a building permit is issued. The board is composed of three Ohio-licensed architects who live in the city. Routine maintenance using matching materials is exempt. Almost nothing else is.
The practical list is longer than most homeowners expect. Re-siding requires review. Roof replacement covering more than 25 percent of the roof requires review. Windows or doors that vary from the original require review, and replacements are expected to replicate the size, style, color, and appearance of what is there. Distinctive roofing — slate, copper, tile, wood shake — is expected to be preserved where it can be, and asphalt substitutes carry a minimum 30-year warranty and a color drawn from an approved palette weighted toward darker tones. Additions must be compatible in scale and proportion, though the board does not require an addition to replicate the existing architecture.
None of this is an obstacle. It is a brief. It rewards a designer who understands the original fenestration pattern before proposing a window, who knows what a leaded casement costs to reproduce and when a sympathetic substitution will pass, and who has the drawings prepared to measurable scale the first time. The board recommends a preliminary submission on larger projects. We plan for one.
We have worked with architectural review boards across northeast Ohio, and the review calendar goes into the project schedule at the start rather than being discovered halfway through.
Inside, the constraints are different and just as real. Plaster walls that will not tolerate a casual demolition schedule. Radiator lines running where an island wants to go. Third floors and sleeping porches that were designed for staff and now want to be something else. Kitchens sited at the back of the house, away from the light and the view, because that is where kitchens went in 1924.
How we work
We take on a limited number of projects each year. That is a deliberate constraint, not a marketing line — it is what allows Robert Oriti to stay on every project rather than hand it to a coordinator.
Engagements begin with a Discovery Call — thirty minutes, by phone, at no charge. If the project is a fit, a $5,000 retainer books you into our calendar and is credited against your final invoice. Design fees are scope-based rather than hourly guesswork, and we quote them after that call, once we know what the house needs.
Plan on booking eight to twelve weeks ahead of the date you want design work to begin. From there, a Shaker renovation of any real scope runs four to six months of design and six to eight months of construction — ten to fourteen months end to end, with board review sitting inside that, not on top of it.
On construction, we will recommend contractors we trust in the Heights, or work alongside the contractor you already have.
We work by email, phone, Zoom, and in person, Monday through Friday, 9am to 7pm. We ask clients not to text.
Our studio and client meeting space is at 5900 Detroit Avenue in Cleveland. Shaker Heights is regular working territory for us; travel is billed as part of the engagement. We do not keep an office in Shaker Heights.
Scope and investment
We are looking for whole-house and multi-room work: gut kitchens, primary suites, additions, full-floor reconfigurations, and new construction.
Our minimum is a total project investment of $100,000. As a guide, kitchen renovations begin at $125,000, full-home renovations at $350,000, and new construction at $1.5M. Those are total project figures — construction, cabinetry, materials, furnishings — not our fee. Design fees are quoted separately, to the scope of the work.
We are not the right firm for a single-room refresh or furniture-only purchasing. If that is the project, we would rather tell you on the Discovery Call than six weeks in.
Start the conversation
If you own a house in Shaker Heights that deserves better than a piecemeal approach, tell us about it. We will be direct about whether we are the right firm.
HIM&HIS Design · 5900 Detroit Avenue, Cleveland, OH 44102 · (216) 236-3883
Also close by
Our studio is at 5900 Detroit Avenue in Cleveland, and the practice reaches well past it — Florida, the Great Lakes, the Northeast and the Mountain West. We travel to every project.