Cutlers Farm Road
Monroe, Connecticut
This antique house, dating from 1660 was the original parsonage to the Methodist church across the street. It was expanded in the 1690’s and in the 1940’s a workshop with a rear entrance and a half bath was added. The structure sat close to a busy road and the short driveway abruptly ended by the side of the house. I restructured the new drive 200 feet down the road, turning the drive through stone piers and ending it in a parking area with stone walkways to the house.
I organized the usage of the downstairs rooms by their proximity to the large great room. The great room was double ended with two large old cooking fireplaces. The dining room is down a short flight of stairs from the great room and previously was the kitchen. New French doors were added to the room that opened onto a new stone patio and garden. Historic wainscoting and paneling were replicated for both the dining and living rooms. The cathedral ceiling kitchen with a glass cupola at its center and a window seat overlooking the garden was originally a workshop and bath.
Joliet Street
Oldwick, New Jersey
This house was built in 1944 and sat in a historic neighborhood of old Victorian houses with views of the local fields and woods. The top floor and roof was a wooden structure and the first floor and the basement was stucco over cement block. The inside was a series of oddly proportioned rooms with little light and the second floor in the attic was only half finished. I added a high ceiling kitchen to the east that connected to a new stone patio and built-in stone barbeque. I opened all the public spaces (living room, dining room and kitchen) creating a loft like space with open views. At one end of the living area, I placed a large multi-window seat with views to an orchard. On the opposite wall of the living area, I placed three glass doors that opened onto a new peristyle deck overlooking the patio and grounds. A bay system with columns and ceiling beams was built in the living and dining areas in alignment to the doors and windows and to draw one’s eye to the landscape. The system’s geometry began on the front porch and terminated with the aligned trusses and columns on the rear peristyle deck.
Delight's Road
Northeast Harbor, Maine
This house was a simple one-bedroom cottage on a half-acre in a Maine seaside island town. It had no foundation or insulation and had been built in the 1930’s by a well-respected local builder. It shared a communal driveway and had an awkward relationship between the back and the front of the structure. I moved the driveway to a private circular entrance off the main road and the house was elevated to build a new foundation. A new entry porch and two window seats were added to front façade and a windowed dining room addition with a fireplace in the rear of the structure. The living room was opened to the entry and an adjoining room and its ceiling raised to a cathedral height with clerestory windows. A new two-bedroom guesthouse was added and connected to the main house by a stone patio with a curving stonewall. The garage built out front provided winter storage and extra summer guest spill over. The large wood and glass garage doors had folding screen doors that could be opened to the elements for a studio, game room or a dance floor in the warmer months. Each building was treated as a simple shingled structure with individual entry porches in a composition blending with the island neighborhood.
East 52nd Street
New York, New York
This apartment was built in 1929 as part of a larger building complex and was designed by the architect, Emory Roth. A columned entry was added with an interior window seat over looking the double height living room. In the dark dining area, I constructed mirrors in wood paneling with overhead lighting to both open and lighten the space. A new kitchen was constructed and all the bathrooms remodeled.
Field Road
Bedminster, New Jersey
The house was a solid ranch with all the main rooms on one floor. Over the years the previous owners had expanded the house down into a breezeway and eventually into the garage. Their additions rendered awkward connections between the rooms and with little light or composition. I first moved the kitchen out into an existing porch to create an interior view through the main public spaces, (living room, dining room and family room). A new entry porch was added and the kitchen was refurbished and opened to the enlarged dining room below. A guest bedroom and bath were placed behind the family room and the family room ceiling raised into a cathedral ceiling with mahogany collar ties and wire lighting. Eighteen new windows were added to the rear, side and front facades and a wood-burning fireplace in the family room. The newly connected rooms made the overall space appear larger and the interior vista formed a visual pathway to the outside fields and hills.
Palm Beach, Florida
The apartment had originally been a three-bedroom apartment that was reconfigured into a large two-bedroom unit. The spectacular views onto the inland waterway were highlighted with mirror walls that enlarged the views and gave the rooms an expansive vista to the landscape.
Old Turnpike Road, Oldwick, New Jersey
This Queen Ann Victorian was built in 1882 and had been one family’s home for over 60 years. It had been vacant for about three years when restoration began. I added to the front porch and wrapped the porch around the living room and connecting it in the rear to the new kitchen. The former summer kitchen was made into a family room with a mahogany panel ceiling and collar ties with lights. The house was built before indoor plumbing was available and all previous bathrooms were added in the 20th century. All baths were redone and the master bath was rebuilt in a restored bedroom that had previously been divided into a bath and study. All seven fireplaces were dismantled, chemically washed and pieced back together to show their original slate colors. The basement was restored to its original stonewalls and radiant heat was placed in the floor.
East 22nd Street, New York, New York
This space had originally been a chandelier factory during the first part of the 20th century. In 1979 the building was converted into lofts and there had been several owners prior to the last conversion. The new floor plan is organized around two open slots that are centered on windows at opposite ends of the space. Glass and transparent pocket doors slide open or disappear to change the rooms from an open space or closed for more privacy. The plumbing, bathroom and kitchen, are all combined on a large center platform. This allowed for a flexible placement of plumbing fixtures and created an open central kitchen that would be unattainable in the previous layout.
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