Late on an October afternoon, near the Catskills village of Claryville, New York, daylight was starting to fade. Rain fell from skies the color of smoky quartz. And still the weekend house that Spanish-born, New York City–based designer Maria Milans del Bosch created for herself and her husband was anything but gloomy.

The remaining light flowed through large windows, penetrating the double-height central living space, with its plywood trim and ceiling panels, and warming the poured concrete walls and floor. Bright flames in the fireplace cut through the mellow illumination like the clear notes of a flute.

Imagine a rectangular building with a pitched roof. Then imagine slicing the building into two unequal parts and placing them end to end so that the roof now slants in two directions. This shape defines the home, which is set into a slope and cradled by a concrete retaining wall. The shou sugi ban skin lets the house visually melt into the wooded landscape. “On a clear day, you can see the mountains,” Maria says, looking west into the mist.

The long, narrow proportions meant that only five trees had to be cut down in the clearing that became the building site. The double-pitched roof sheds runoff from rain and melted snow into a French drain set under the bluestone gravel surrounding the house. Maria says her goal was to “take the least amount of space” for the house “and let everything grow around it”—the maple, oak, birch, and spruce trees and the many, many ferns.

“We did a lot of things for us that some clients are hesitant to do, like shou sugi ban. Our idea isthat the house and materials will weather over time. They will change, but that’s part of the beauty of it.”
—Maria Milans del Bosch, designer and resident

The designer oriented the building not only to preserve the beauty of the surrounding landscape, but also to regulate light. The morning sun is filtered by the forested hillside outside the high eastern windows, though in winter, the bare branches allow the sun’s warmth to come in. The lower western windows admit olden beams at sunset, with some nearby trees reducing the intensity of the afternoon sun in summer.

Maria placed the main entrance and fewer windows on the south side, where the views are less impressive. Once inside, you move along a hallway lined with two tiny guest bedrooms and a bathroom before the living room presents itself. The transition, she notes, echoes the approach to the house, which follows a road through the woods before reaching the clearing. The principal bedroom is on the second level, along with the designer’s studio, which looks out over the treetops. “That’s why I call it the nest,” Maria says.

Here you’ll find a neat row of task lamps arrayed on a long fiber-cement desk. They appear to be waiting at the ready for the fading light to finally recede.

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: Maria Milans Studio, LLC / @mariamilansstudio; Jocelyn Froimovich Hes

Engineering: LIA Engineering, LLC

Interior Design: Sustainability C., I+I Studio, and Advanced Radiant Design, Inc.

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A Designer’s Catskills Home and Studio Wears a Shou Sugi Ban Skin