About
Nova Designs + Builds believes it is paramount to create partnerships with our clients and our employees, and we strongly encourage joint venture development. Likewise, we pride ourselves in our innovative philosophy to invest our own capital in a project and believe this commitment is evidenced in the quality of the work, the timeliness, and the cost control of every project.
Constantly striving to be a leader in our industry, Nova Designs + Builds actively pursues a wide variety of projects while assimilating new techniques, materials and pricing structures. This dynamic approach to our work offers us a unique ability to utilize a vast array of design, cost-effectiveness and quality-assurance techniques in all projects we undertake.
We welcome the opportunity to learn about your design and construction objectives, and we invite you to take a moment to review our portfolio of completed, current and future projects.
OUR TEAM
John Schrader, Principal
Licensed General Contractor – Certified Green Builder.
John attended West Valley College and San Jose State University with a double major in music composition and classical studies.
After college he pursued a career as a composer and professional musician as well as an art-oriented entrepreneur. In 1975 he founded Studio 372 located in downtown San Jose, California. This was a 5,000 square feet performance art space and visual arts center featuring video installations, modern dance performances, electronic and jazz music concerts, as well as curated gallery shows. He was also a founding member of Camera One Theater, a repertory movie theater, and Eulipia, a restaurant and jazz club booking nationally known artists.
These various business ventures gave John an opportunity to acquire the numerous skills needed to run a business and the art activities helped him develop a sense of how to affect people through manipulating their visual environment in lighting design, color, staging, sound, and space planning.
Through relationships formed with numerous artists and musicians in New York City, John frequently performed there. At this time he also worked with a sculptor/contratctor friend on some of the early loft conversion projects in Soho and Brooklyn.
In 1985 John purchased a five-unit building in San Francisco and remodeled the units as an owner/builder. The next year he formed different partnerships with friends to purchase and renovate three more properties.
As music and art fell by the wayside, John found himself with a portfolio of work, skilled carpenters and subcontractors and in 1990 he started Nova Designs. Originally his partners were a structural engineer and a kitchen designer, both of whom went on to start their own successful practices in 1992.
Since 1990, Nova Designs + Builds has completed over one thousand projects in San Francisco, ranging in size from $20,000 bath remodels to $2,500,000 full house renovations as well as new construction. The company is currently developing a $50,000,000 subdivision in the Sierra foothills.
Fabien Lannoye
Principal Designer
Although born in Walnut Creek California in 1964, Fabien’s parents are Belgian nationals and soon after moved home to Liège, Belgium, where Fabien was raised. He received his master’s degree in architecture from the prestigious Institute St. Luc in Belgium in 1988 and in 1990 became a licensed architect in Belgium, with equivalency throughout Europe.
In 1990 he created his own private architectural firm, LYS and completed a variety of successful residential, restaurant, office and industrial projects. From 1993 to 1995 he designed and managed the construction of the $20M remodel and expansion of Tri Postal Liège X. This 150,000 square feet facility in the heart of downtown Liège, Belgium’s 4th largest city, is considered an exciting visual cornerstone of the downtown area and received accolades from the European design community as well as the local residents of Liège.
In 1995 Fabien was chosen to participate as a member of the Design Team for the renovation of the “Berlaymont”, the headquarters for the EC in Brussels, Belgium. This 2,400,000 square feet remodeling project, at a cost of $500M, has been widely published, and has become the architectural symbol of the European Community.
At this point in his career, Fabien gave in to his dream of moving back to the United States and in 1996, moved to San Francisco. He worked for various firms in the Bay Area including Hertzka & Knowles, Loving and Campos and Barrett & Quesada. In 1999, he found a permanent home with Nova Designs + Builds.
Fabien brings a rare level of sophistication in design and a profound commitment to using “honest materials” in shaping our work. Through his influence and effort Nova has been able to perform at our nationally recognized level of design excellence. He is an integral contributor to all of our development projects and brings the cross pollination of ideas and products from Europe as well as a deep understanding of green building processes throughout Europe. We are lucky to have Fabien as a part of Nova Designs + Builds.
Fabien is the proud father of two children, Milla and Viggo.
