Collection by Julie F Cohen
kitchen
In Hanna Bui’s Sausalito houseboat, designed by architect Craig Steely, sea creatures seen through an enormous back window animate bay views. Walls of plank siding dry out easily if they get damp, and different levels of bleached oak floors demarcate living areas and a sunken kitchen. Red Line Roset Togo sofas are paired with a suspended bamboo seat.
Early in the design process, Diane had considered a dropped ceiling over the kitchen to distinguish it from the living/dining area. “Our builder Trevor said he liked the feel of the interior space and advised against it,” reveals Diane. “We’re so glad he did!” He also made other small suggestions, including the stepped trim around the door frames. A piece of the original boxcar was salvaged by Diane’s son and daughter-in-law and turned into a key rack hanging by the main door.
Fifteen years ago, the “rickety” cabins that the family had built over the years on their lakeside property were reassessed as lakeshore homes, and the family’s taxes soared. They decided to subdivide the lots—they sold two, and three of her brothers took lakeside lots, while Diane and another brother took back lots. The old boxcar has been preserved and encased in one of her brother’s lake homes. “I didn’t want to build a lake house,” she says. “I wanted to give my grandchildren the old boxcar experience of freedom and simplicity. I wanted them to be able to hear the wind, feel the rain, and be one step from nature.”
Diane Douglas’s family has owned five acres of land by the lake since 1933, and her grandfather had dragged an old boxcar to the side of the lake by tractor. “When we came as kids, we’d turn off the paved road and drive on a dirt track through a ponderosa forest to the lakeshore,” she says. “I couldn’t wait for that first scent of pine.”
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