KEVIN KITTREDGE The Roanoke Times

Artist Ann Glover's doghouse was still a work-in-progress Wednesday.

Lucky dog.

Some fortunate pooch will actually get to live in this cool new canine crib, with its century-old brick entryway, heart pine floor, slate roof, antique molding and porch light.

And he's not the only dog in the valley about to get a housing upgrade, either. More than a dozen home builders, business owners and others, including area artists, are contributing custom-made doghouses to BARKitecture, a silent auction fundraiser to be held at the Fall Home Show in Salem this weekend.

The annual Fall Home Show is "a one-stop shopping center for all your home building, remodeling and enhancing needs," according to the Roanoke Regional Home Builders Association, which sponsors it.

But this fall's show is also something more -- an offbeat fundraiser for the Roanoke Valley SPCA.

The birth of BARKitecture

According to SPCA board President Barbara Dalhouse, BARKitecture began with a phone call from Pete McKnight, a builders association member, a few months back.

McKnight, she said, had heard about a doghouse exhibit at a home builders show in Colorado and wanted to try it here.

"It got my ears up, no pun intended," Dalhouse recalled. "I said 'That would be wonderful.' "

"We actually learned of a few other such Home Builders Association projects in other markets, and thought it would be a great idea for Roanoke," McKnight explained. "So far, it's been a ton of fun."

The houses, which were donated to the fundraiser, will be sold by silent auction. The highest bids win. The minimum bid for each house is $100. Visitors will also pick a "Best in Show."

The original idea was for area home builders to make the doghouses, organizers said, but not everyone warmed up to the idea.

"Frankly, we didn't have as much builder participation as I would like," McKnight said.

But SPCA supporters from other walks of life have stepped up, which may have added some variety to the designs. Dalhouse herself is contributing a house made from plaster and foam. "It even has a weather vane," she said. It's shaped like a bone.

Some of the houses remained works in progress earlier this week. Artist Ann Glover was still putting the final touches Monday morning to an indoor doghouse that looks like a dog.

"I'll have the ears back like this," she said, demonstrating with a hand on either side of the doghouse's doggie head. "It'll be white with spots. It'll have eyes."

Glover, a well-known Roanoke artist and winner of the 2008 Roanoke City Art Show, said she envisioned the piece as an indoor house for a dog or cat and as an art object.

What will the dogs think?

Some of the doghouses have been weeks in the making, and at least one involved an architectural firm.

Building Specialists' environmentally sensitive Green Canine Cabin was a team effort, with architecture by Clark Nexsen Architecture and Engineering and materials from Green Roofs of Virginia, Mountain Roofing, Jesse Dalton's Professional Painting, Surfaces, Sherwin-Williams and Ideal Building Supply.

With its recycled materials, planted roof, passive cooling and natural light, "it is designed and constructed with sustainability and environmental responsibility in mind," according to a Building Specialists release.

The folks at Invisible Fence Brand of Virginia have contributed a (mostly) invisible plastic glass doghouse, with a heated bed that gives doggie massages. For classically minded mutts, meanwhile, Chuck Cain of Moneta has made a Greek Revival doghouse complete with pediments and columns.

"We're calling it the 'The Paw-thenon,' " after the Parthenon in Greece, Dalhouse said. The doghouse also includes glass-tiled flooring in the portico, aluminum gutters, weatherproofing and vents.

"This is for the spoiled rotten dog," Dalhouse said of the Paw-thenon.

Some doghouse builders seemed a little chagrined at how much time had gone into making them.

Over at Black Dog Salvage, makers of the aforementioned doghouse with the century-old bricks and the heart pine floor, co-owner Mike Whiteside said one employee, Bozo Jerkovic, spent four days working on the project. The Black Dog doghouse is made entirely of salvaged materials, save for a Black Dog Salvage logo and a light bulb.

Of course, it remains to be seen if the dogs themselves will appreciate the effort.

Whiteside's own black Labrador retriever, Sally, hadn't warmed up to the Black Dog doghouse as of early this week, he said -- though Whiteside did manage to coax her inside for a photo op.

Whiteside noted he once built a doghouse for his previous dog, who burrowed a hole beneath it and slept there instead.

"People build doghouses for people," he said. "Dogs don't care."