Our Ridgewood Estate project is a new build custom home located on acreage with a lake. It is filled with luxurious materials and family friendly details.

Custom wood and metal gates, rails and grillwork, and masonry arch were added to the wall. The new entry gate used wood salvaged from cut-off sections of the new trellis added to the garage. Large nail heads in the gate and details in the railing duplicate the detail on the new entry door. Photo by Frank Baptie Photography.

© Andrew Pogue

This entry foyer lacked personality and purpose. The simple travertine flooring and iron staircase railing provided a background to set the stage for the rest of the home. A colorful vintage oushak rug pulls the zesty orange from the patterned pillow and tulips. A greek key upholstered bench provides a much needed place to take off your shoes. The homeowners gathered all of the their favorite family photos and we created a focal point with mixed sizes of black and white photos. They can add to their collection over time as new memories are made.

This cottage style mudroom in all white gives ample storage just as you walk in the door. It includes a counter to drop off groceries, a bench with shoe storage below, and multiple large coat hooks for hats, jackets, and handbags. The design also includes deep cabinets to store those unsightly bulk items.

This home is in a rural area. The client was wanting a home reminiscent of those built by the auto barons of Detroit decades before. The home focuses on a nature area enhanced and expanded as part of this property development. The water feature, with its surrounding woodland and wetland areas, supports wild life species and was a significant part of the focus for our design. We orientated all primary living areas to allow for sight lines to the water feature. This included developing an underground pool room where its only windows looked over the water while the room itself was depressed below grade, ensuring that it would not block the views from other areas of the home. The underground room for the pool was constructed of cast-in-place architectural grade concrete arches intended to become the decorative finish inside the room. An elevated exterior patio sits as an entertaining area above this room while the rear yard lawn conceals the remainder of its imposing size. A skylight through the grass is the only hint at what lies below. Great care was taken to locate the home on a small open space on the property overlooking the natural area and anticipated water feature. We nestled the home into the clearing between existing trees and along the edge of a natural slope which enhanced the design potential and functional options needed for the home. The style of the home not only fits the requirements of an owner with a desire for a very traditional mid-western estate house, but also its location amongst other rural estate lots. The development is in an area dotted with large homes amongst small orchards, small farms, and rolling woodlands. Materials for this home are a mixture of clay brick and limestone for the exterior walls. Both materials are readily available and sourced from the local area. We used locally sourced northern oak wood for the interior trim. The black cherry trees that were removed were utilized as hardwood flooring for the home we designed next door. Mechanical systems were carefully designed to obtain a high level of efficiency. The pool room has a separate, and rather unique, heating system. The heat recovered as part of the dehumidification and cooling process is re-directed to maintain the water temperature in the pool. This process allows what would have been wasted heat energy to be re-captured and utilized. We carefully designed this system as a negative pressure room to control both humidity and ensure that odors from the pool would not be detectable in the house. The underground character of the pool room also allowed it to be highly insulated and sealed for high energy efficiency. The disadvantage was a sacrifice on natural day lighting around the entire room. A commercial skylight, with reflective coatings, was added through the lawn-covered roof. The skylight added a lot of natural daylight and was a natural chase to recover warm humid air and supply new cooled and dehumidified air back into the enclosed space below. Landscaping was restored with primarily native plant and tree materials, which required little long term maintenance. The dedicated nature area is thriving with more wildlife than originally on site when the property was undeveloped. It is rare to be on site and to not see numerous wild turkey, white tail deer, waterfowl and small animals native to the area. This home provides a good example of how the needs of a luxury estate style home can nestle comfortably into an existing environment and ensure that the natural setting is not only maintained but protected for future generations.

Rustic entrance - Photography by Marty Paoletta

Praktisch ist es viel Stauraum zu haben, ihn aber nicht zeigen zu müssen. Hier versteckt er sich clever hinter der Schiebetür.