When a Party Designer Renovates an Old Garage

The design of the Meraki Market is not beyond what he usually does as a designer, Mr. Gatti said but is vastly different in that parties last only for an evening.

“My thrill and joy is in creating something for the moment,” he explained. “In this case, I needed a design I could live with for a long time.”

The Meraki Market is a high-end shop in the Tenderloin, a diverse, historic downtown neighborhood between Union Square and the Civic Center. The Tenderloin happens to be where Gatti first lived upon his arrival to the city, a section of the city that he loves. The market is his second renovated property there.

Originally built as a car garage, the 1920s wood-frame structure was rebuilt from the inside out. With one story below ground and one story above, the basement was reinforced with a new foundation for seismic loads. The existing pink-and-white aluminum storefront, an artifact from the 50s, was removed to expose blond brick, and the window openings enlarged.

“It was a really great project for us because of the thoroughness of it, as much work outside as inside,” said David Copperman of general contractor Plant Construction Company of San Francisco.

To create terrazzo-clad walls without divider strips and a poured-in-place appearance, six- to seven- foot square or rectangle terrazzo wall panels were precast and finished offsite. The terrazzo contractor then installed them and patched them together in place for a seamless appearance, explained Eddie Lourenco of Associated Terrazzo Company.

Pre-casting the panels allowed for tight, sharp and true inside and outside corners, a detail requested by the owner. A 3/4-inch radius on inside corners is typical in cast-in-place terrazzo because of the challenge of grinding a perfect 90-degree corner once it’s in place.

The wall sections were attached with epoxy glue over a plywood substrate that was screwed to wall studs. The edges were chiseled to avoid straight lines, then the joints between the separate panels were patched, hand-ground and hand-polished.

The epoxy mix was modified with a thickening agent for the vertical application so that it wouldn’t run when applied. Because both the thickener and the grinding speeds of hand tools affect the color of the terrazzo, a divider strip is typically placed between the vertical terrazzo and the horizontal terrazzo floor, which is generally enough to trick the eye from noticing any difference in color between the two according to Mr. Lourenco. On the walls, the thicker formula was used throughout in both the offsite precast and in the field vertical patchwork to keep the color consistent.

Using precast panels also helped speed the process in the field. The crew spent about two weeks casting in shop and two weeks onsite.

“Polishing in the field is an extremely exhaustive process and very challenging to achieve the finish,” observed Mr. Copperman. While machine polishing on a floor is aided by the force of gravity, hand-polishing on walls, where any imperfection would have been evident, presented a double challenge. “The contractor spent an enormous amount of time to get it perfect.”