Mike Ringrose and his wife, Elaine, had long imagined building or buying a cabin to enjoy with their family and friends. The couple live in Edmonton, Canada, and they both grew up kayaking and snowshoeing while vacationing at lakes in Alberta. They wanted their two children, aged six and three, to have the same formative experience.

Mike owns an escape-room company called Escape City, and after being cooped up inside their Edmonton home during the pandemic, you might say he and Elaine were looking for an escape of their own. Wabamun Lake, just 45 minutes away, became their focus.

“We could pick the kids up after daycare or school, rip out there, and spend most of the weekend there before heading back, or even go just for the day,” Mike says.

At first, the couple considered purchasing an existing house. “But a lot of places on the lake were quite large, out of our budget, and not necessarily the style we were looking for,” Elaine explains. “I really like modern design, mostly because I find it more relaxing. So, we decided that building was our best bet.”

After purchasing a property near the northeast corner of Wabamun Lake in 2021, Elaine and Mike decided to take their time thinking through the house they wanted. But they already knew just the architect for the job: their brother-in-law, Josh Kjenner, whose wife is Elaine’s twin sister. Josh had spent years designing energy-efficient houses at local firms (he’s trained in engineering as well as architecture) and was ready to start his own business.

“We definitely benefited from that familiarity. We could have a lot of chats at family dinners, sending pictures back and forth for inspiration,” Elaine recalls. “And Josh lives in a house he designed, which we visit a lot. It wasn’t hard to kind of extrapolate the style he’d bring to our house, and then add in our own kind of taste.”

“We knew that it would not be a large house, so we were super careful about the footprint: It’s only 1,500 square feet,” Kjenner explains. “We decided to direct the budget into the shared spaces on the ground floor of the house. And that’s the archetype of Canadian cabins that have come before it—shared spaces are where the bulk of the square footage is, and the sleeping areas upstairs are really modestly sized.”

Given the couple’s love of the outdoors and entertaining, it also made sense to create outdoor spaces that could be used year-round, with a variety of seating types and a firepit.

As the couple and Kjenner were exploring design options, post-pandemic price fluctuations created uncertainty. “They came to me before stuff really went crazy price-wise, and then everything just went absolutely mental,” the architect recalls. “The framing cost spiked to this super high level, and then it came back down, like, 25 percent, but even then, it seemed to be changing on a daily basis.” (In the end, they spent about $51,000 USD on structural framing.)

Once the basic floor plan was laid out, Kjenner kept its scale modest by tightening the clearances between floors. “It was the first new cabin that had been built on that street in a while,” he says. “We didn’t want this new cabin to be looming over all of the existing ones."

Working with builder Dave Etcheverry of Etchbuilt, Kjenner prioritized inexpensive, durable materials, elevated through attention to detail and color. Fiber-cement panels and corrugated metal clad the exterior (about $52,000 was spent on exterior siding, insulation and membranes), while the common areas feature concrete floors, pastel tile, and lavender lacquered wood cabinetry.

Tilted slightly to face Wabamun Lake, the two-story cabin’s simple form is enlivened by a subtle series of kinetic moves. The three second-floor bedrooms (one is currently set up as an office) are topped with a dramatically sloping roof. It’s conducive to shedding snowfall, and it partially cantilevers over the first floor to shelter an outdoor gathering area.

“Every corner has a little something kind of carved out of it,” Kjenner says. “We were able to cram a fair bit of visual interest into a pretty small footprint, and that’s one of the things I like most about it.”

The lower-level floors are already proving their value. “We had over 30 people in our house last week, and you can imagine all those adults and little kids tracking in snow—but I didn’t have to worry about anything getting wrecked from water damage,” Elaine says. “The concrete was just the perfect material for that.”

$19,289 Site Work	$29,591 Foundation	$51,090 Structural
$52,056 Exterior Siding	$40,937 Wall Finishes	$6,042 Flooring
$6,634 Roofing	$1,458 Hardware	$14,896 Electrical
$12,147 Plumbing	$12,208 HVAC Equipment	$28,802 Landscaping
$7,614 Lighting	$3,860 Countertops	$6,836 Appliances
$16,572 Windows & Glazing	$19,396 Millwork	$8,123 Tilework
$11,175 Furnishings & Decor	$516 Permitting	$53,456 General Contractor Fee
$9,350 Fireplace	$125 Waste/Debris Removal
Grand Total: $412,173 USD (Approximately $560,634 CAD)

The living room ceiling is covered in knotty Douglas fir, a relatively affordable material, and the upper-level flooring is a “pub grade” of the same timber, which has natural imperfections like knots and splits. “Honestly, it fits the aesthetic really well,” Mike says. “It has some character to it, for sure.” Overall they spent about $6,000 on concrete and wood flooring.

One of the couple’s splurges was a Stûv fireplace set atop a plinth made of Ikea drawers outfitted with new metal faces (to meet code requirements for the nearby stove) and custom pulls.

“The stove definitely was worth it—we use it all the time, and it heats the whole house quite easily,” Elaine says. “Josh made sure the interior was well insulated with a good R-value.”

The abundance of storage also makes clean up easy. “You can’t tell from the pictures, but those drawers are full of children’s toys,” Elaine confides. “Before we leave, or at the end of the night, we just can throw all the toys in there and close the doors.”

Whether they’re visiting in summer or winter, the couple love the home’s indoor/outdoor flow, which makes it easy to host large groups of relatives or friends.

“That outdoor space gives you a different feel depending on what area you’re using,” Mike says. “If you’re using the deck, you can peek at the lake through the trees, and it’s nice for lounging and entertaining and waving to neighbors. And then if you retreat a little bit further back on the property into that area with the firepit, it’s almost like you’re in a clearing in the woods.”

Working with family members in a professional capacity doesn’t always go smoothly. But it’s probably a testament to the project’s success that Kjenner and his family regularly spend time at the cabin with Elaine, Mike and their kids.

“Josh is very professional, and very good at setting boundaries, and we recognized through this project that our relationship had this dual dynamic,” Elaine says. “I think it worked out really well—he understood that we had to work within our constraints, but he always had an eye on the most important things to maximize for long-term use.”

More Budget Breakdown stories:

Their $464K Cabin Can Produce Way More Energy Than It Consumes

They Built a Home in Newfoundland for Retirement. Until Then, You Can Book a Stay

An Aussie Architect Builds a Beach House With Million-Dollar Views for $270K

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: Josh Kjenner Architect / @joshkjennerarchitect

Builder: Etchbuilt

Structural Engineer: Wynton Engineering

Cabinetry: iKustom

Also Appears In

Budget Breakdown: They Built a Lakeside Canadian Cabin With a Twist for $412K