Fireplaces

The cabinetry and the rebuilt fireplace—with an asymmetrical hearth and curved mantel—give the music room a retro vibe. “We spent so much time getting that right,"”says Jacoby. “The original fireplace had these curves; we wanted to echo them in the redesigned space.” The glossy green tiles surrounding the fireplace are double-glazed Heath Ceramics 2x4s in a luminous Jade hue.

A fireplace in the living room features glazed clay bricks from Swedish manufacturer Tegelbolaget. The dining table and chairs are by Kristensen & Kristensen.

Deep blue Heath Ceramics tile accents the fireplace surround, which was relocated from the back room.

A wood-burning stove in the corner of the tree house offers warmth for the interior.

Vintage bent plywood stacking chairs by Roland Rainer are purposeful and can be moved to suit any situation.

The fireplace is one of the few, if not the only, original features preserved in the renovation. Gallacher painted it a brick red that complements the kitchen’s blue and yellow color palette.

The couple updated the kitchen with Samsung appliances and maintained the cabin's original oak cabinetry and stair rail.

Julie and Malcom arranged an Ikea corduroy-wrapped sofa, a table lamp from Schoolhouse, and a vintage coffee table in the living room, where there's a vintage Kent wood-burning stove.

The ceilings throughout the home are made out of cross-laminated timber created from antiqued spruce.

“Where we let loose was on the window,” Matt says. “It’s an aluminium window frame, which is bushfire compliant and easy to install, but the way that we detailed it was about hiding the frame so that the eye is drawn into the space.”

Interior designer Heidi Lachapelle chose unfussy furnishings with clean lines. “Nothing should feel decorative or unnecessary,” she says. “We looked for things that would age beautifully to speak to the wabi-sabi concept.” The oak daybed is by Bautier, the indoor/outdoor rug is by Dash & Albert, and the trapezoidal cushions on the concrete bench nod to similar ones that the wife saw at Georgia O’Keefe’s home and studio. The Scandinavian-inspired fireplace throws heat from two sides.

"This was the best decision I have made for myself in a long time,

The main room's cathedral ceilings reach 30 feet high.

Upstairs, the living room fireplace surround extends to the ceiling with Fireclay’s Thin Brick tile. A trio of rectangular skylights replaced the oddly large square that previously capped the room, and a new built-in desk and shelving add a cozy finish to formerly wasted space.

For Gabriel Ramirez and his partner Sarah Mason Williams, following the Sea Ranch rules—local covenants guide new designs—didn’t mean slipping into Sea Ranch clichés. The architects love Cor-Ten steel, with its ruddy and almost organic surface, and they made it the main exterior material, along with board-formed concrete and ipe wood. The Cor-Ten, which quickly turned an autumnal rust in the sea air, and the concrete, with its grain and crannies, mean the house isn’t a pristine box, Ramirez says. His Neutra house “was very crisp and clean,” he says. “This house is more distressed, more wabi-sabi.”

The living room is furnished with vintage items, including a leather-and-chrome chair by Suekichi Uchida and a stacking stool by Florence Knoll.

A vast departure from the original wood-burning fireplace, this modern fireplace allows for other elements in the room to share the attention.

The living room in the existing home had wood ceilings with exposed beams. Johnson wanted to maintain these and other historic details, so he decided to keep the existing house in tact and build the addition floating above it.