Jim Schmidt
Kitchen - coastal l-shaped dark wood floor and brown floor kitchen idea in Charlotte with shaker cabinets, white cabinets, wood countertops, blue backsplash and an island

After Front House and Porch A 1938 Transitional Home that needed a facelift to make it brighter & lighter. Changing the color of the house and front door with the removal of the overgrown landscape transformed the front porch and house.

Elliott Johnson Photographer
Example of a country gray two-story gable roof design in San Luis Obispo with a metal roof

Front of the new pool house, with 3 sets of French doors, awning windows, new hardscaped patio, flagstone coping on pool. Brian Krebs/Fred Forbes Photogroupe

Please see this Award Winning project in the October 2014 issue of New York Cottages & Gardens Magazine: NYC&G http://www.cottages-gardens.com/New-York-Cottages-Gardens/October-2014/NYCG-Innovation-in-Design-Winners-Kitchen-Design/ It was also featured in a Houzz Tour: Houzz Tour: Loving the Old and New in an 1880s Brooklyn Row House http://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/29691278/list/houzz-tour-loving-the-old-and-new-in-an-1880s-brooklyn-row-house Photo Credit: Hulya Kolabas

The client’s request was quite common - a typical 2800 sf builder home with 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, living space, and den. However, their desire was for this to be “anything but common.” The result is an innovative update on the production home for the modern era, and serves as a direct counterpoint to the neighborhood and its more conventional suburban housing stock, which focus views to the backyard and seeks to nullify the unique qualities and challenges of topography and the natural environment. The Terraced House cautiously steps down the site’s steep topography, resulting in a more nuanced approach to site development than cutting and filling that is so common in the builder homes of the area. The compact house opens up in very focused views that capture the natural wooded setting, while masking the sounds and views of the directly adjacent roadway. The main living spaces face this major roadway, effectively flipping the typical orientation of a suburban home, and the main entrance pulls visitors up to the second floor and halfway through the site, providing a sense of procession and privacy absent in the typical suburban home. Clad in a custom rain screen that reflects the wood of the surrounding landscape - while providing a glimpse into the interior tones that are used. The stepping “wood boxes” rest on a series of concrete walls that organize the site, retain the earth, and - in conjunction with the wood veneer panels - provide a subtle organic texture to the composition. The interior spaces wrap around an interior knuckle that houses public zones and vertical circulation - allowing more private spaces to exist at the edges of the building. The windows get larger and more frequent as they ascend the building, culminating in the upstairs bedrooms that occupy the site like a tree house - giving views in all directions. The Terraced House imports urban qualities to the suburban neighborhood and seeks to elevate the typical approach to production home construction, while being more in tune with modern family living patterns. Overview: Elm Grove Size: 2,800 sf, 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms Completion Date: September 2014 Services: Architecture, Landscape Architecture Interior Consultants: Amy Carman Design

Michael Heller
Pool house - coastal backyard concrete paver and rectangular pool house idea in New York

For the William Cook House (c. 1809) in downtown Beverly, Massachusetts, we were asked to create an addition to create spatial and aesthetic continuity between the main house, a front courtyard area, and the backyard pool. Our carriage house design provides a functional and inviting extension to the home’s public façade and creates a unique private space for personal enjoyment and entertaining. The two-car garage features a game room on the second story while a striking exterior brick wall with built-in outdoor fireplace anchors the pool deck to the home, creating a wonderful outdoor haven in the home’s urban setting. Photo Credit: Eric Roth

A summer house built around salvaged barn beams. Not far from the beach, the secluded site faces south to the ocean and views. The large main barn room embraces the main living spaces, including the kitchen. The barn room is anchored on the north with a stone fireplace and on the south with a large bay window. The wing to the east organizes the entry hall and sleeping rooms.

The Yin-Yang House is a net-zero energy single-family home in a quiet Venice, CA neighborhood. The design objective was to create a space for a large and growing family with several children, which would create a calm, relaxed and organized environment that emphasizes public family space. The home also serves as a place to entertain, and a welcoming space for teenagers as they seek social space with friends. The home is organized around a series of courtyards and other outdoor spaces that integrate with the interior of the house. Facing the street the house appears to be solid. However, behind the steel entry door is a courtyard, which reveals the indoor-outdoor nature of the house behind the solid exterior. From the entry courtyard, the entire space to the rear garden wall can be seen; the first clue of the home’s spatial connection between inside and out. These spaces are designed for entertainment, and the 40 foot sliding glass door to the living room enhances the harmonic relationship of the main room, allowing the owners to host many guests without the feeling of being overburdened. The tensions of the house’s exterior are subtly underscored by a 12-inch steel band that hews close to, but sometimes rises above or falls below the floor line of the second floor – a continuous loop moving inside and out like a pen that is never lifted from the page, but reinforces the intent to spatially weave together the indoors with the outside as a single space. Scale manipulation also plays a formal role in the design of the structure. From the rear, the house appears to be a single-story volume. The large master bedroom window and the outdoor steps are scaled to support this illusion. It is only when the steps are animated with people that one realizes the true scale of the house is two stories. The kitchen is the heart of the house, with an open working area that allows the owner, an accomplished chef, to converse with friends while cooking. Bedrooms are intentionally designed to be very small and simple; allowing for larger public spaces, emphasizing the family over individual domains. The breakfast room looks across an outdoor courtyard to the guest room/kids playroom, establishing a visual connection while defining the separation of uses. The children can play outdoors while under adult supervision from the dining area or the office, or do homework in the office while adults occupy the adjacent outdoor or indoor space. Many of the materials used, including the bamboo interior, composite stone and tile countertops and bathroom finishes are recycled, and reinforce the environmental DNA of the house, which also has a green roof. Blown-in cellulose insulation, radiant heating and a host of other sustainable features aids in the performance of the building’s heating and cooling. The active systems in the home include a 12 KW solar photovoltaic panel system, the largest such residential system available on the market. The solar panels also provide shade from the sun, preventing the house from becoming overheated. The owners have been in the home for over nine months and have yet to receive a power bill.

Susan Teare
Example of a small mountain style two-story wood exterior home design in Burlington

A successful design build project by Red House. This home underwent a complete interior and exterior renovation including a shed dormer addition on the rear. All new finishes, windows, cabinets, insulation, and mechanical systems. Photo by Nat Rea Instagram: @redhousedesignbuild

A successful design build project by Red House. This home underwent a complete interior and exterior renovation including a shed dormer addition on the rear. All new finishes, windows, cabinets, insulation, and mechanical systems. Photo by Nat Rea Instagram: @redhousedesignbuild

Cottage black exterior home photo in Burlington with a metal roof and a black roof

Integrity from Marvin Windows and Doors open this tiny house up to a larger-than-life ocean view.
Example of a small country white two-story exterior home design in Portland Maine with a metal roof

Heidi Long
Inspiration for a contemporary white exterior home remodel in Other

Nichole Kennelly Photography
Study room - mid-sized traditional built-in desk dark wood floor and brown floor study room idea in Kansas City with beige walls

The artfully designed Boise Passive House is tucked in a mature neighborhood, surrounded by 1930’s bungalows. The architect made sure to insert the modern 2,000 sqft. home with intention and a nod to the charm of the adjacent homes. Its classic profile gleams from days of old while bringing simplicity and design clarity to the façade. The 3 bed/2.5 bath home is situated on 3 levels, taking full advantage of the otherwise limited lot. Guests are welcomed into the home through a full-lite entry door, providing natural daylighting to the entry and front of the home. The modest living space persists in expanding its borders through large windows and sliding doors throughout the family home. Intelligent planning, thermally-broken aluminum windows, well-sized overhangs, and Selt external window shades work in tandem to keep the home’s interior temps and systems manageable and within the scope of the stringent PHIUS standards.

Mid-Century Remodel on Tabor Hill This sensitively sited house was designed by Robert Coolidge, a renowned architect and grandson of President Calvin Coolidge. The house features a symmetrical gable roof and beautiful floor to ceiling glass facing due south, smartly oriented for passive solar heating. Situated on a steep lot, the house is primarily a single story that steps down to a family room. This lower level opens to a New England exterior. Our goals for this project were to maintain the integrity of the original design while creating more modern spaces. Our design team worked to envision what Coolidge himself might have designed if he'd had access to modern materials and fixtures. With the aim of creating a signature space that ties together the living, dining, and kitchen areas, we designed a variation on the 1950's "floating kitchen." In this inviting assembly, the kitchen is located away from exterior walls, which allows views from the floor-to-ceiling glass to remain uninterrupted by cabinetry. We updated rooms throughout the house; installing modern features that pay homage to the fine, sleek lines of the original design. Finally, we opened the family room to a terrace featuring a fire pit. Since a hallmark of our design is the diminishment of the hard line between interior and exterior, we were especially pleased for the opportunity to update this classic work.