New York Upstate Home

The fireplace that Lake|Flato designed for the deck is the compound’s focal point. “People can go tuck their small kids into bed and then creep back to the fire pit area and be gregarious late into the night,” Wallace says.

PROD Architecture + Design created a farmhouse in Penafiel, Portugal to fuse the aesthetic of traditional homes in the region with contemporary, floor-to-ceiling windows that respond to the environment. Made up of four distinct structures, the home takes on the shape of an existing gabled-roof structure on the site. To complement the stone building, the home incorporates a series of muted materials including granite for the base, zinc for the roof, and Scandinavian pinewood for cladding.

Three small pavilions connected by a deck form a summer retreat that balances privacy with a panoramic view—all in less than 900 square feet. Among the three pavilions are the standard comforts of any home: a kitchen, living space, and dining area are situated in an open floor plan in the main cabin, where a collection of vintage pieces—including leather lounge chairs from Belgium and a modern fireplace by Preway (whose chimney stretches into the tall ceilings)—mix with white Bertoia wire chairs and Noguchi table lamps.

The dark exterior wood cladding ensures the home blends more seamlessly with the site, while the flat roof is meant to recall "midcentury precedents," said the architects. The “sharkfin clerestory roof” feature transmits light into interior rooms.

Set behind a gate and up a private half-acre drive, the home enjoys expansive westward views to the ocean.

In the master bathroom, the cement floor tiles are by Mosaic House; the glazed subway tiles are from Daltile; and the trim is honed, vein-cut Montclair Danby marble. The Signature Hardware tub sits in a custom wood cradle designed to match the home’s timber frame; the fixtures are by Waterworks. The Twist stool is from Classic Country in nearby Hudson, New York.

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“The client wanted an interior space where you could read the materiality of the building elements like understanding the ingredients in a recipe,” principal architect Elizabeth Webster explains. The extension features distinctly textured materials: an exposed timber ceiling, painted brick walls, and polished concrete floors. Warm lighting by Brinklicht unifies the space.

This kitchen in Austin, Texas, was designed by Royce Flournoy and expertly combines black, Shaker-style cabinets, white subway tiles, Carrera marble countertops, and wooden floors to create a balance between rustic warmth and industrial simplicity.

The Sydney home of Leanne Carter-Taylor and Trent Carter-Brugman via the Design Files.

In ARCHITECTUREFIRM’s James River House, the 28-foot-long Series 600 Multi-Slide door is comprised of five 10-foot-tall panels of dual-paned, low-E glass, which helps keep the house warm during Virginia winters. All windows and doors feature thermally broken aluminum. “Western Window Systems,” says architect Danny MacNelly, “does a great aluminum product that isn’t very expensive. The details are minimal, clean, and refined.”

Full-height sliding doors blur the boundary between the interior and the garden outside.

An open-plan kitchen and dining area within the addition feature white cabinets.

Completed in 2013, the roughly 1,500-square-foot cabin provides an open living area framed by white trusses and concrete floors. The dining table was acquired by the owner from a local inn, and is surrounded by the Eames molded plastic Eiffel side chairs from Design Within Reach. The kitchen features a Grohe faucet, a wood bowl from a shop in Harbert, and an Ikea vase.

The Rush House at Sea Ranch followed the typical material palette of wood and glass; windows were located specifically so that they took advantage of views of the water and the surrounding landscape.

“Durability drove the selection of metal panels,” Schaer says of the home’s industrial exterior. Manufactured by AEP SPAN from corrugated cladding, it looks like zinc but costs significantly less. It also contrasts nicely with the natural siding and trim. “All of the wood inside and out is Douglas Fir, the predominant wood species in the northwest,” Schaer explains.

"The cedar siding is simply stained with a black semi-transparent oil stain [from Cabot], which allows the color of the wood to still emerge through,” architect Robert Hutchison says. “We love how the black color makes the building recede into the background, and how it in turn allows the trees on the site to emerge as the highlight.”