This story is part of Everyone Loves an A-Frame, our week-long celebration of simple structures with a cult following.

Darrel Maxam has always had dreams of becoming a real estate developer. In fact, that was one of the first things the Jamaica-born, Connecticut-raised hotelier told his now wife, Patrice, when they first met in 2012. “He had these big, lofty dreams, which was exciting, but also kind of scary,” says Patrice, who grew up near the small town of Sodus, New York, and worked as a nurse before pivoting to building tree house–style vacation rentals, then resorts, with her husband.

The story of the couple’s growing hospitality brand, Maxam Hotels, takes root in Atlanta. In 2013, Darrel, who’d recently obtained a master’s in construction management after serving in the U.S. military (and earning a degree in visual arts and marketing years many prior), took a job designing small-scale projects at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Darrel says he “used construction as an outlet for his mind” after returning from combat with PTSD. A seed was planted.

In 2014, Darrel took $16,000 and turned a small shed into a getaway retreat prototype on the couple’s 2.5-acre woodland Atlanta property, where they already operated a small Airbnb unit. With the success of that rental, the Maxams went on to build a total of seven tree house units on their property: There’s a spaceshipesque tree house with a spiral staircase, a 25-foot-high tree house on stilts, and a a “Young Wild and Tree(House)” with an elevated 1956 Airstream. Darrel helmed the bulk of the construction, with friends stepping in along the way to help with heavy lifting and looking after the couple’s young children, when needed. Patrice managed the finances and interior design for all of the projects.

In 2022, the couple launched a Youtube channel and announced their plan to quit their jobs and build “20 tree house Airbnb hotels”—all of them A-frames. Last July, Darrel and Patrice debuting Finger Lakes Treehouse, a series of five aligned A-frame cabins situated on 48 acres in, of all places, Sodus, not far from Patrice’s hometown. The resort is the couple’s eighth project of its kind, the largest to date, and undoubtedly the most sentimental. It was crafted as a tribute to Patrice’s mother, Beverly Waterman, who lived near the site and long admired it. Beverly’s devastating terminal cancer diagnosis fueled Patrice and Darrel to work vigorously to bring the hotel to fruition, starting construction in 2022 and documenting the process on Youtube.

We spoke with Darrel and Patrice about their inspiration for Finger Lakes Treehouse and how they found motivation to complete the project while facing one of the most challenging times of their lives. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Dwell: What prompted your interest in architecture and design? And...why A-frames?

Darrel Maxam: My mother emigrated to the U.S. when I was about two years old and sent back for me and my brother when I was six. We dealt with poverty my whole life, but one thing she always preached to us was the importance of going to school, though she didn’t give much guidance in regards to what to go to school for. During the summer, she would send me to art camp because it was free, unlike football and basketball camp. Between ages 13 and 15, I began drawing buildings and I had this innate ability for creating structures and things that were different. So, that’s what I wanted to do. I didn’t know what an architect was at that time but that’s essentially what I wanted to be and my mom instilled that in me.

What initiated the fascination with tree houses and A-frame structures was their timelessness and simplicity...but that they also present challenges when building.

Let’s talk about your connection to the area and why you chose this site for Finger Lakes Treehouse?

Patrice Maxam: There is a really cozy private house that sits on the property and it was my mom’s dream house for about 30 years. My mom was a single mother of six kids and we had a very modest upbringing in Sodus. She was never able to afford to buy a house and she rented her whole life. We would often pass by this house, which sits on 48 acres, and that was her “made it in life” thing. We would hear her talk about this house at least once a month and she’d be like, “Whoever can buy the house has money.”

One day Darrel was driving around the countryside of Sodus and he came back out of breath. He tells me I have to get in the car right away. The house apparently hit the market but already was pending sale. Darrel decided to knock on the door and ask the owners if we could bump the offer, which I thought was insane and no way the owners would go for that. Fast forward and 30 days later, the house is ours. We definitely overpaid but we wanted this house to be for my mom. A day after we closed, my mom tells us that her cancer diagnosis is terminal and she only has another 30 to 60 days with us. She knew we were planning to build a hotel in Belize but she told us that she really wanted us to put those plans in New York. The pandemic really decimated upstate New York, where I grew up, and she said “I think you guys can bring hope back.”

All of a sudden the energy of my mom about to die turned into figuring out how we leave a legacy in her name. How do we build something in the place that she raised her kids and how do we really turn this sad occasion into something that will make us smile whenever we touch foot on that property? So it’s very special to us.

You mentioned having plans in progress to build a hotel in Belize—did you apply those designs to this property instead?

DM: I completely scrapped those building plans and designed the new set of plans in a matter of months. I met a designer from New York City named Joseph Sayre and he invited us to go see his current projects in Idaho. [On that trip], we went out to a place called South Fork Lodge, which is owned by Jimmy Kimmel, and we loved it.

Following that visit, inspiration hit me at 3 a.m. and I jumped out of bed and drew out my new plans for the Sodus project on a napkin. One month later, we had blueprint plans. We decided to do something that would also help us scale and create a model for similar types of structures in the future.

Let’s talk about the interior design. What inspired the finishing details?

PM: I would say that my style is a mix of modern and Finnish aesthetics. We took a trip to Finland and I was so inspired by their color palettes, so you’ll see a lot of wood tones. I really leaned into the Scandinavian vibe and sourced furniture from brands like Blu Dot, Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams, and West Elm. I found the wall panels and chandelier pendant lights at Moderny.

Each one of our tree houses also has unique and interesting wallpaper. My mom loved wallpaper, but she didn’t have great taste in it. The first thing she said to me was that whatever we built had to have wallpaper, so we found really cool and chic options from Magnolia Homes. I decided that everything about these tree houses would scream my mom when I walked into one, so there are floral curtains in each room that I got made by a local seamstress. I also took a pillow making class to get the pillows to match the wallpapers and curtains. Whenever I walk into one of the cabins, it reminds me of a particular time. If I’m being honest, there were a lot of tears shed during that eight-week construction and design period, but I took my grief and used it as energy. It turned out to be healing for me.

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Top photo courtesy of Finger Lakes Treehouse

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