The Times

His carpentry was a labor of love . . .

By KAY SEVERINSEN Staff Writer When Mel Gerds and his family first bought their South Dade home in 1973, it was just an ordinary house with three bedrooms and two baths. But Mel got busy with a hammer and saw and today the house has 17 rooms, four baths and is still growing. First, he took out the sliding doors between the living room and the Florida room and made a work room. Then he added a big dining room onto the other side of the living room and built a large bar out of the kitchen. Near the dining room he built two hidden closets, one with a freezer in it and one to be used as a pantry. Next, he opened up one wall of the master bedroom and added a sunken foyer, which he has carpeted in red and paneled with dark wood. Actually, it won't be a real foyer until he adds a set of large double doors to the outside, but that's another project. He also wants to line the steps leading into the foyer and upstairs with white wrought iron railings. On the other side of the upstairs steps is a small organ room, also carpeted in rich red. Gerds said he likes the organ there "because when I play, it echoes up the stairwell." When he gets the front door completed, the master bedroom will be converted into a music room for the organ. The next room is a small, intimate bar, complete with a fireplace, dimmer lights and a glass paned window looking into the foyer. Gerds said it is his favorite room and he spends a lot of time there doing paper work. Then, on the back of the house, Gerds added a small windowlit room that leads to the outside. When the Gerds bought the house, it had no second floor, but now it has three upstairs rooms, the beginnings of a balcony and is not finished yet. Gerds added a study, a bath, a completed kitchen and a studio with sliding glass windows overlooking the back yard. He plans to add a solarium leading out from the studio with a carport underneath. Gerds just finished screening in a pool in the backyard, but admitted it was one of the few things he did not build himself. The rest of the improvements, including electrical wiring and plumbing he did entirely on his own in See next page

Afternoon sunlight shines in on the Gerds' downstairs living room, just one of 17 rooms in the spacious South Dade home.

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