Down East Magazine

August 2001

Window Magic
Oversized Windows and plenty of them make this modest house in southern Maine seem as big as the salt marsh it overlooks. By Paul Doiron

Photographs by Sandy Agrafiotis Down East Magazine

Limited to building on the footprint of a tiny nondescript cottage practically abutting a neighboring house, the owners and their design team hit on the idea of maximizing the window space on the sides of the house facing the marsh. The result is a home that seems both remarkably spacious and private.

This house never gets boring," says the owner of a small but spacious new residence overlooking a tidal marsh not far from Kennebunkport. With windows for walls, the compact year-round home certainly has no need of artwork to liven up its decor. Not when there's an ever-changing tableau in the spartina grass and salt pans outside. Snowy egrets, hooded mergansers, and white-tailed deer are all such common sights it's hard to believe that this surprisingly private retreat is only a few streets away from one of the most popular beaches in southern Maine.

"Our dream was to live close enough to the ocean to be able to walk there," says the owner, who with her husband, began looking for a "pre-retirement home" on the coast six years ago. "We knew we couldn't afford to live on the beach," she says. At best, they hoped to live nearby, in an existing home that was adequate to their needs, if not everything they desired.What they never imagined, on such a tight budget, was creating their own dream home.But that's exactly what they did,
building an elegant sun-filled living space that has the airiness and grand touches of a large house but at a fraction of the size: a mere 2,000 square feet.
Essentially a two-story shingled box, dressed up with gables and Doric columns, the house consists of a single open kitchen and living room down-stairs and a master bedroom, bath, guest room, and office upstairs. Not an inch of space is wasted. In its love of light and ease of maintenance, it perfectly represents a couple who knew exactly what they wanted.

Aside from offering dramatic views of wildlife and weather around the clock, the size and simplicity of the house make it easy to maintain.

Natives of California, the owners had lived for many years in inland New Hampshire where he worked as a sales representative in the food industry . After their son and daughter left the nest for college, they began looking to simplify their lives. "We just wanted to downsize and get rid of every tool we owned, any-thing to do with yard work," says the owner. Given the nature of the husband's work, relocating was an option, provided an airport wasn't too far away.
Says the wife: "We took about a year just driving the coast, starting in Rye, New Hampshire, and going as far north as Falmouth, just looking." But all the houses the
couple saw seemed either too dark or too compartmentalized. "We knew we wouldn't use a dining room or a living room. We just needed one big room."
Then, one day they were out driving with their real estate broker when they chanced upon a boxy cinder-block cottage at the edge of a salt marsh. 'The Realtor just happened to drive us down this road to turn around," recalls the owner, "and she laughed when she got to the end and said, 'Well, I know you wouldn't be interested in anything like that."'
They weren't interested. But the setting, overlooking a quiet tidal river,
was so beautiful it gave them an idea. They told their agent that, provided they could obtain permission from the town and the Department of Environmental Protection, they would purchase the building, demolish it, and rebuild on the spot. "We didn't even go into the house," says the owner. "In fact, we never went into that house until after we owned it." The couple's design team supports their story: 'They told us, 'We don't want to see that house again. Call us when it's down,"' remembers Olivia Sanderson of The Great Room Company, a custom home design and building firm in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

The downstairs is basically a kitchen and living room. On balmy summer days with all the windows open, the place feels like one great, screened porch.

The couple had seen a beach front residence that Sanderson and her associates were building in a nearby southern Maine resort and were intrigued by both its design and by the unconventional nature of the firm. At Great Room the designers and builders are all on-staff and collaborate on everything from blueprints to finish work. "People are sometimes taken aback because they get all of us," says Sanderson of the unusual partnership.
The couple saw the arrangement at Great Room as a guarantee against cost overruns. Having already built two earlier houses, they had been burned before by expenses that grew out of control during construction.
"With our first house, the architect's idea of what it would cost was vastly different than the contractor's idea, " recalls the owner. "Thousands of dollars different, which was a real eye-opener."
The couple also found in Great Room a collaborative spirit they hadn't encountered before. For instance, the owners had furniture, including a handmade butcher-block table and an apothecary cabinet, that needed to be fitted into the design. "They were so open to my ideas;' says the wife. "They never laughed at what I wanted. I drew a floor plan of what I wanted on graph paper, and I said, 'This is what I want, but I don't know how to package it.' Then [former Great Room architect] Doug Cogger
put a design together using my floor plan."
Olivia Sanderson says that she and her associates prefer to work with clients who know exactly what they want. "We work best with people who really want a house they can call their own," she says. "If somebody's in a hurry, it's not a good blend for us. . We typically take six to nine months to build a house. To get it right takes time."
In the case of the house on the marsh, says Sanderson, the first challenge came from the lot itself. Since the original cinder-block home abutted a fragile wetland, environmental regulations required that the new home occupy the same twenty-by-fifty-foot footprint.

The upstairs are the master bedroom (above), a guestroom, office, and bath.

Moreover, the house next door is less than ten feet away. How could they make the new home feel both spacious and private? "When the owners walked into their house, they wanted it to feel as if it was part of the out-of-doors," says Sanderson. "They didn't want to be confined. What we came up with were the biggest design features: the ten-foot ceilings, floor-to-ceiling
''If it's a sunny day,
it doesn't matter how
cold it is, the sun heats
the house. Sometimes
we even have to
crack a window in
the winter. "
windows topped with transoms, no upper cabinets in the kitchen."
White walls and blond maple floors were chosen to direct the eye outside to the marsh.
" All we have to do is open the windows and it's like a screened-in porch," says the owner, who notes that in the winter the south-facing windows have another benefit, "If it's a sunny day, it doesn't matter how cold It is, the sun heats the house. Sometimes we even have to crack a window in the winter. There are times in this house when you have to wear sunglasses, it gets so bright. We sit around in sunglasses looking ridiculous."
Given the importance of the windows to the design, the owners decided to invest in buying the best they could afford.
The owners and their design team made sure that windows were concentrated on the south and west sides of the house, away from their next-door neighbor and from the street, giving the living spaces both upstairs and down the illusion of being removed from the nearby neighborhood.
Another challenge, says die owner, came from finding storage places, since the house lacks a garage or shed: "I told them, 'Don't you dare frame over any space that can be used for storage. I want every nook and cranny and every inch of space I can have:' Architect Cogger, accordingly, put in two pantries beneath the staircase. (Continued below)

A cabinet featuring beadboard, French doors, and low-voltage lighting was built into another wall to accommodate a collection of antique glassware.
Other touches added a hint of grandeur . The owner wanted a four-foot-wide front door to exaggerate the entryway and make it seem larger than it is. Upstairs, a cathedral ceiling lends a pleasant loftiness to a small office. Says Sanderson: "Because we are custom designers, because we build what we design, to put in the extras -cathedral ceilings, cabinets - that's our norm. We expect to do the extras."
One extra the owner decided on midway through the process was a raised brick foyer that could double as a low-maintenance mudroom. She recalls being surprised at Great Room's willingness to accommodate her
even though it meant, among other things, reframing the front windows. " A lot of people would have talked you out of it, but [the builder] Paul DeMars said. 'That's what you want, and you're not going to be happy unless that's what you have, so we'll do it.' And they did it. I'm very pleased and, I have to say, surprised at their service and workmanship. Everything cost what they said it would cost - except tor the upgrades that we chose to do."
Sanderson says she's also pleased the house continues to suit its owners. But she knew virtually on the completion day that the couple was going to be comfortable. "Right after they moved in there was a terrible storm" she says. " I remember when I came into work the next day, there was message from them and my heart sank. Then I listened to it.
'We don't have any water coming in,' they said. 'We're as snug as can be.' Actually they had called simply to say thank you."
For the wife, whose dream it was to live I near the beach, gratitude is an emotion she feels often. "Some days," she says, "if the wind is off the ocean, I'll open the front door in the morning to get the newspaper, and the blast of salt air hits you, and it's just like perfume. I wish I could bottle it."
Living on the marsh, with its sunsets and wildlife and ever-changing views, she has the best of both worlds. She can walk to the beach or just relax and watch the deer graze across the river. "It's an easy house," she says, "You do have to wash the windows, but as long as you do, the house gives a lot back to you. It's nurturing. You wake up to beauty and go to sleep with it."

If you would like a copy of this Down East Magazine article with magazine quality pictures of this home, fill-out our GUEST BOOK and check the info. wanted box.

Visit this home in our Gallery of Homes for more pictures and commantary by clicking Marsh View

Top of Page

Home Page Gallery of Homes What's "NEW" ?
Guest Book Open House Info Our Philosophy
Company Info Site Map

The Great Room Company
Designers & Builders of Custom Homes
407 The Hill, Portsmouth, NH 03801 -- Phone 603-431-3800 Fax 603-431-4550

Home Page	Gallery of Homes	What's "NEW" ?
Guest Book	Open House Info	Our Philosophy
Company Info		Site Map