Exterior Inspo

Casa Dosmurs is decorated sparsely with furniture by friends and local designers. The couple also collect prints from Benjamín’s brother, who works as a photographer.

Brutalist materials like concrete and steel are balanced by the gentleness of the wooden carpentry. Ash wood is used for the cabinetry throughout, from kitchen cabinets to storage units.

In the kitchen, minimalism prevails. Jared notes that the use of plywood was loosely inspired by design seen in the 1960s Sonoma County Sea Ranch community. "It's something that one of my heroes, [architect] Barbara Bestor has done very well," he says.

Custom kitchen cabinetry with a stone countertop is made of the same ash wood sustainably harvested in Canada.

Fusion Landscape Design worked with PATH to remake the backyard into a grown-up playground. Under the stairwell sits a tiny custom cedar sauna and an outdoor shower—just a literal hop, skip, and jump away from the sprawling in-ground eight-by-ten-foot hot tub. Down three short stairs, Gloster’s Elan dining table from Design Within Reach is surrounded by Spark chairs by Don Chadwick for Knoll and a built-in fire pit and DCS grill by Fisher & Paykel—all resting on a smooth surface of bluestone pavers.

"Like the old farmhouses and barns of the Champlain Valley, the Foote Farm House has a clearly ordered wood frame on a sturdy foundation, an exterior skin made of local materials, an economy of form with tried-and-true proportions, a central fire place, and a common-sense relationship to the sun and the weather." - Architect John McLeod

Waechter Architecture reimagined a traditional gabled home in southeast Portland without significantly altering the original building. A simple coat of red paint abstracts the century-old structure, creating a residential work of art.

With the nearby coastal cliffs reflected in their sharp rooflines, a vacation home and guesthouse play on the gabled structures of Canada’s Magdalen Islands. Residents Vincent Morel and Jan-Nicolas Vanderveken adapted a local custom by installing recessed entrances to keep strong winds at bay.

A wraparound veranda bordered with glass give additional outdoor space.

Front facade from across the street

Lauren and Brittan Ellingson, the owners of Notice Snowboards, a custom snowboard and wakesurf company in Whitefish, Montana, approached Workaday Design and builder Mindful Designs to concoct a new lake home for their family. The brief was, perhaps unsurprisingly, focused on getting the family outdoors as much as possible.

“I wanted something bold and fresh,” Augustin says of the unit’s citrus-inspired front door, painted Tangerine Dream by Dunn Edwards. The door is flanked by horizontal Redwood slats and gray acrylic stucco.

The 1930s home in London that architect Grant Straghan remodeled for himself and his family is enlivened by blue-green cement tile exterior cladding.

, wood bumps out to allow space for stove.

The guesthouse is clad in vertical white vinyl siding. Kelli had decking constructed out of engineered wood and cedar.