The clients for this modern stucco and masonry house had lived for 18 years in a smaller house on this same site: a level, corner lot with many mature trees. They wanted generous living spaces for the family of four to be able to be together and entertain while still allowing each person private spaces for sleeping, recreation, and study. The house is designed in two wings creating an "L" along the site's corner and around a courtyard with a lap pool. The shape of the house allows the longest view of the site as a captured quiet space, now fully landscaped. The "L" wings accommodate the bedrooms, dens and studies. In the crook of the wings sits a higher family and public entertaining space that overlooks the garden and pool. My clients now enjoy maximum urban privacy and full-site enjoyment of their property in their close-to-downtown neighborhood. Materials, selected from a subtle-range color pallet, give the house the solidity and tranquility the clients originally desired. Paul Hester, Photographer

The French polished anigre paneled Library frames a majestic view of Central Park. A pocket door leads to the Master Bedroom on the right and as with the other main rooms the ceiling is expressed with plaster band-work that echoes the layout of the room. The central and flanking medallion are subtly sculpted to enrich the ceiling. The compressed mutular entablature draws inspiration from the Laurentian and New York Public Libraries. Photographer: Nick Johnson

This room is the perfect space for gatherings. Inspired by the discovery of the New World. This homage to the Spanish Conquistadors sets the tone for gatherings, special events, study hall, working space and enjoy the games in the television at the bar area. The bathrooms were framed with images of the royalty. Once you open the door you are in for a big surprise...

This room is the perfect space for gatherings. Inspired by the discovery of the New World. This homage to the Spanish Conquistadors sets the tone for gatherings, special events, study hall, working space and enjoy the games in the television at the bar area. The bathrooms were framed with images of the royalty. Once you open the door you are in for a big surprise...

Builder: Falcon Custom Homes Interior Designer: Mary Burns - Gallery Photographer: Mike Buck A perfectly proportioned story and a half cottage, the Farfield is full of traditional details and charm. The front is composed of matching board and batten gables flanking a covered porch featuring square columns with pegged capitols. A tour of the rear façade reveals an asymmetrical elevation with a tall living room gable anchoring the right and a low retractable-screened porch to the left. Inside, the front foyer opens up to a wide staircase clad in horizontal boards for a more modern feel. To the left, and through a short hall, is a study with private access to the main levels public bathroom. Further back a corridor, framed on one side by the living rooms stone fireplace, connects the master suite to the rest of the house. Entrance to the living room can be gained through a pair of openings flanking the stone fireplace, or via the open concept kitchen/dining room. Neutral grey cabinets featuring a modern take on a recessed panel look, line the perimeter of the kitchen, framing the elongated kitchen island. Twelve leather wrapped chairs provide enough seating for a large family, or gathering of friends. Anchoring the rear of the main level is the screened in porch framed by square columns that match the style of those found at the front porch. Upstairs, there are a total of four separate sleeping chambers. The two bedrooms above the master suite share a bathroom, while the third bedroom to the rear features its own en suite. The fourth is a large bunkroom above the homes two-stall garage large enough to host an abundance of guests.

​​Likened to the reshuffling of a parliamentary cabinet at the start of a new term, we transformed this kitchen by repurposing the existing cabinetry into a seemingly all-new composition. Accenting the refinished and relocated cabinetry exists a new clean-lined wall of built-ins that bridges the space effortlessly to the modern facelift of the remaining home. Interior Design: Ella Scott Design, LLC *This is a sampling of the home in its entirety. Additional photographs will be available upon publication of this project.

Publications 200 Houses, Images Publishing Group, Septemeber 2011 Pacific Houses, Loft Publications, May 2004 KAZA Magazine, Sao Paolo, Brazil, 2004 Another 100 of the World's Best Houses, Images Publishing Group, November 2003 West Coast Rooms, Rockport Publishing, April 2000 Inspired by California coastal lifestyle, this custom residence and guesthouse are situated on a 1.2 A. site in the gentle sloping hills of Montecito, CA, with panoramic ocean and mountain views. Main House office. Erhard Pfeiffer, Benny Chan Photoworks

This shingle-style home is one room “deep” throughout, so that every space has views of offshore island and rocky coastline. Casual family living spaces embrace a busy-but-barefoot lifestyle. The bright and welcoming kitchen-dining-living area is the center of the home. Formal rooms flank the front entrance hall, including the living room, interconnected dining room and library-study. Beyond the public area is fully appointed kitchen and butler’s pantry, then the casual family wing with its informal eating area, family room, porch and screened bluestone patio. Contractor: Carl Anderson, Anderson Contracting Services Photographer: Dan Gair/Blind Dog Photo, Inc.

The clients for this modern stucco and masonry house had lived for 18 years in a smaller house on this same site: a level, corner lot with many mature trees. They wanted generous living spaces for the family of four to be able to be together and entertain while still allowing each person private spaces for sleeping, recreation, and study. The house is designed in two wings creating an "L" along the site's corner and around a courtyard with a lap pool. The shape of the house allows the longest view of the site as a captured quiet space, now fully landscaped. The "L" wings accommodate the bedrooms, dens and studies. In the crook of the wings sits a higher family and public entertaining space that overlooks the garden and pool. My clients now enjoy maximum urban privacy and full-site enjoyment of their property in their close-to-downtown neighborhood. Materials, selected from a subtle-range color pallet, give the house the solidity and tranquility the clients originally desired. Paul Hester, Photographer

This shingle-style home is one room “deep” throughout, so that every space has views of offshore island and rocky coastline. Casual family living spaces embrace a busy-but-barefoot lifestyle. The bright and welcoming kitchen-dining-living area is the center of the home. Formal rooms flank the front entrance hall, including the living room, interconnected dining room and library-study. Beyond the public area is fully appointed kitchen and butler’s pantry, then the casual family wing with its informal eating area, family room, porch and screened bluestone patio. Contractor: Carl Anderson, Anderson Contracting Services Photographer: Dan Gair/Blind Dog Photo, Inc.

Atherton has many large substantial homes - our clients purchased an existing home on a one acre flag-shaped lot and asked us to design a new dream home for them. The result is a new 7,000 square foot four-building complex consisting of the main house, six-car garage with two car lifts, pool house with a full one bedroom residence inside, and a separate home office /work out gym studio building. A fifty-foot swimming pool was also created with fully landscaped yards. Given the rectangular shape of the lot, it was decided to angle the house to incoming visitors slightly so as to more dramatically present itself. The house became a classic u-shaped home but Feng Shui design principals were employed directing the placement of the pool house to better contain the energy flow on the site. The main house entry door is then aligned with a special Japanese red maple at the end of a long visual axis at the rear of the site. These angles and alignments set up everything else about the house design and layout, and views from various rooms allow you to see into virtually every space tracking movements of others in the home. The residence is simply divided into two wings of public use, kitchen and family room, and the other wing of bedrooms, connected by the living and dining great room. Function drove the exterior form of windows and solid walls with a line of clerestory windows which bring light into the middle of the large home. Extensive sun shadow studies with 3D tree modeling led to the unorthodox placement of the pool to the north of the home, but tree shadow tracking showed this to be the sunniest area during the entire year. Sustainable measures included a full 7.1kW solar photovoltaic array technically making the house off the grid, and arranged so that no panels are visible from the property. A large 16,000 gallon rainwater catchment system consisting of tanks buried below grade was installed. The home is California GreenPoint rated and also features sealed roof soffits and a sealed crawlspace without the usual venting. A whole house computer automation system with server room was installed as well. Heating and cooling utilize hot water radiant heated concrete and wood floors supplemented by heat pump generated heating and cooling. A compound of buildings created to form balanced relationships between each other, this home is about circulation, light and a balance of form and function. Photo by Philip Liang Photography.

This shingle-style home is one room “deep” throughout, so that every space has views of offshore island and rocky coastline. Casual family living spaces embrace a busy-but-barefoot lifestyle. The bright and welcoming kitchen-dining-living area is the center of the home. Formal rooms flank the front entrance hall, including the living room, interconnected dining room and library-study. Beyond the public area is fully appointed kitchen and butler’s pantry, then the casual family wing with its informal eating area, family room, porch and screened bluestone patio. Contractor: Carl Anderson, Anderson Contracting Services Photographer: Dan Gair/Blind Dog Photo, Inc.

Atherton has many large substantial homes - our clients purchased an existing home on a one acre flag-shaped lot and asked us to design a new dream home for them. The result is a new 7,000 square foot four-building complex consisting of the main house, six-car garage with two car lifts, pool house with a full one bedroom residence inside, and a separate home office /work out gym studio building. A fifty-foot swimming pool was also created with fully landscaped yards. Given the rectangular shape of the lot, it was decided to angle the house to incoming visitors slightly so as to more dramatically present itself. The house became a classic u-shaped home but Feng Shui design principals were employed directing the placement of the pool house to better contain the energy flow on the site. The main house entry door is then aligned with a special Japanese red maple at the end of a long visual axis at the rear of the site. These angles and alignments set up everything else about the house design and layout, and views from various rooms allow you to see into virtually every space tracking movements of others in the home. The residence is simply divided into two wings of public use, kitchen and family room, and the other wing of bedrooms, connected by the living and dining great room. Function drove the exterior form of windows and solid walls with a line of clerestory windows which bring light into the middle of the large home. Extensive sun shadow studies with 3D tree modeling led to the unorthodox placement of the pool to the north of the home, but tree shadow tracking showed this to be the sunniest area during the entire year. Sustainable measures included a full 7.1kW solar photovoltaic array technically making the house off the grid, and arranged so that no panels are visible from the property. A large 16,000 gallon rainwater catchment system consisting of tanks buried below grade was installed. The home is California GreenPoint rated and also features sealed roof soffits and a sealed crawlspace without the usual venting. A whole house computer automation system with server room was installed as well. Heating and cooling utilize hot water radiant heated concrete and wood floors supplemented by heat pump generated heating and cooling. A compound of buildings created to form balanced relationships between each other, this home is about circulation, light and a balance of form and function. Photo by John Sutton Photography.

The clients for this modern stucco and masonry house had lived for 18 years in a smaller house on this same site: a level, corner lot with many mature trees. They wanted generous living spaces for the family of four to be able to be together and entertain while still allowing each person private spaces for sleeping, recreation, and study. The house is designed in two wings creating an "L" along the site's corner and around a courtyard with a lap pool. The shape of the house allows the longest view of the site as a captured quiet space, now fully landscaped. The "L" wings accommodate the bedrooms, dens and studies. In the crook of the wings sits a higher family and public entertaining space that overlooks the garden and pool. My clients now enjoy maximum urban privacy and full-site enjoyment of their property in their close-to-downtown neighborhood. Materials, selected from a subtle-range color pallet, give the house the solidity and tranquility the clients originally desired. Paul Hester, Photographer

Set in the garden beside a traditional Dutch Colonial home in Wellesley, Flavin conceived this boldly modern retreat, built of steel, wood and concrete. The building is designed to engage the client’s passions for gardening, entertaining and restoring vintage Vespa scooters. The Vespa repair shop and garage are on the first floor. The second floor houses a home office and veranda. On top is a roof deck with space for lounging and outdoor dining, surrounded by a vegetable garden in raised planters. The structural steel frame of the building is left exposed; and the side facing the public side is draped with a mahogany screen that creates privacy in the building and diffuses the dappled light filtered through the trees. Photo by: Peter Vanderwarker Photography

The clients for this modern stucco and masonry house had lived for 18 years in a smaller house on this same site: a level, corner lot with many mature trees. They wanted generous living spaces for the family of four to be able to be together and entertain while still allowing each person private spaces for sleeping, recreation, and study. The house is designed in two wings creating an "L" along the site's corner and around a courtyard with a lap pool. The shape of the house allows the longest view of the site as a captured quiet space, now fully landscaped. The "L" wings accommodate the bedrooms, dens and studies. In the crook of the wings sits a higher family and public entertaining space that overlooks the garden and pool. My clients now enjoy maximum urban privacy and full-site enjoyment of their property in their close-to-downtown neighborhood. Materials, selected from a subtle-range color pallet, give the house the solidity and tranquility the clients originally desired. Paul Hester, Photographer

The clients for this modern stucco and masonry house had lived for 18 years in a smaller house on this same site: a level, corner lot with many mature trees. They wanted generous living spaces for the family of four to be able to be together and entertain while still allowing each person private spaces for sleeping, recreation, and study. The house is designed in two wings creating an "L" along the site's corner and around a courtyard with a lap pool. The shape of the house allows the longest view of the site as a captured quiet space, now fully landscaped. The "L" wings accommodate the bedrooms, dens and studies. In the crook of the wings sits a higher family and public entertaining space that overlooks the garden and pool. My clients now enjoy maximum urban privacy and full-site enjoyment of their property in their close-to-downtown neighborhood. Materials, selected from a subtle-range color pallet, give the house the solidity and tranquility the clients originally desired. Paul Hester, Photographer

Our clients wanted a built in office space connected to their living room. We loved how this turned out and how well it fit in with the floor plan.
Example of a small transitional built-in desk medium tone wood floor, brown floor and wallpaper study room design in Denver with white walls

Sq. ft.: 3,368 - 4,124 Beds: 4 - 6 Baths: 2.5 - 5.5 Key Features - Impressive foyer expanding toward the back of the home into the spacious study & family room with 2-story window wall - Dramatic, swooping staircase for curved feeling as it wraps around the family room to the 2nd floor balcony overlook with 2-story window wall vista - Elegant rear access staircase for privacy, functionality and separation of public & personal areas - Lavish Owner’s Suite entered through sitting room with half walls and columns - Fabulous options including Spa Bath Suite 2000 and expansive rec room without obstructions or supports on the lower level