Gray and stark white. That will never get dated, will it? (How about in the next six months?) LOL.
106
I would love to see these pictures but the text obscures most of the photo when I am reading the NYT on my phone.
I used to be able to tap the photo to remove the text but this no longers works after my last NYT update.
can you please tell me how to view the photos on my phone?
Thank you.
21
In all honesty, it would've been cheaper to knock the old house down & just build the new one to their specifications.
By the time they finished there was nothing left!
72
everything's black and white
22
Nice Slide Show. How much extra do I have to pay to go without advertising? It kind of ruins the experience considering I pay to read the NYT.
70
nice house before and after
10
It was nice. Now it's ugly
81
all the fiddle leaf figs in the world (that they certainly don't care for themselves) can't cover up this misguided sterilization. in their defense, affluenza has spiked this cold and flu season...
92
This story reminds me of the kind of excessive, relentless plastic surgery work some people have. They may look a bit younger, but the character is their faces is gone. And I wonder why their plastic surgeons didn't say no - you are quite wonderful as you are. Rethink this. Money? I suppose.
This couple paid a small fortune to destroy the quirky loveliness of their home. It was sui generis. Now it is simply generic. Why didn't the architect say no?
134
The mechanical room's main electrical panel appears to barely meet code for clearance requirements.
From https://www.ecmweb.com/national-electrical-code/code-basics/article/20898893/determining-working-clearances :
Are you protecting yourself from electric shock and burns? You're not if you fail to comply with the following three clearance requirements in Sec. 110-26 of the National Electrical Code (NEC): 1) at least a 3-ft clearance in front of all electrical equipment; 2) a 30 in.-wide working space in front of equipment operating at 600V or less; and 3) minimum headroom clearance of 6 ft or the height of the equipment, whichever is greater. Let's look at these three clearances in detail.
32
I really don't see why this renovation got a full spread? Show me one instant where there's real creativity at work.
71
I like the cat.
100
I see a stand mixer in the kitchen. How do they plug this in? Apparently, all the outlets are in drawers?
33
They completely lost the soul of that house. It’s cold, sterile, uncomfortable, excessive, and impractical. What a shame.
93
Ruined it by replacing wood with garbage. No attempt to reclaim anything
54
Before
is better
than After
80
Well, at least the NY Times isn't pretending the dollars for this work came from a highschool teacher's salary--or the earnings of a lawyer and his designer wife.
Did they do anything about the flat roof? They're a really bad idea in the Northeast unless you have huge drains and the capacity to easily, and safely, walk out on to them to clear say 5 inches of slush from a storm.
I'm sure a skilled cabinet shop could have built replacement wooden French doors, but that would have been more expensive. Aluminum doesn't stay smooth once it starts to corrode. It's also quite soft so once gouged, any protective coating would be compromised. A better metal would have been stainless steel, of the correct type, welded by someone who knows how to weld it without ruining the "stainless" capacity. Right, like wood that stainless steel would have cost more than the aluminum. But better resale value, and a valid reason for going stainless--unlike the kitchen.
There's concrete that is completely waterproof without any additives, unicolour if you desire, and can be polished. Look into geopolymer concrete. Right, it challenges accepted "history". Yes, it's available IRL.
Concrete does NOT dry. Paint drys. Clay drys, and is then usually fired. Concrete and plaster cure. The hardening process is a chemical reaction, not an evaporation of water, or paint thinning agents. This error is not a small one. I'd explain why but that would decrease the likelihood of my comment being permitted.
59
This long litany of mostly acid, unkind comments is indicative of what is happening in our country at present. People with money to spend, spending it on themselves? How dare they. Young, affluent professionals not producing or adopting children, thereby having more money to spend on their desires? How dare they. People who dress in black and collect art being persnickety about every darned thing in their showcase house? How dare they.
So much resentment! A poke in the ribs is okay, but not hatred.
Granted, the Times did these folks a disservice by making them sound difficult and a tad bit pretentious. But it is their house, their money, their renovation contract. So back off.
I have participated in a design blog for years, and have noticed that no house gets people so riled up as a MCM house. It’s kind of funny how protective uninterested can be. Emphasis on uninterested.
Back in the 1980s I lived in an Eichler home that had not been renovated. It was drafty and freezing in winter, boiling hot in summer. The fact is that a house is living thing. It sometimes needs major surgery to keep living, and remain livable. As did this house.
If they had a pantry, I’d be happy living there.
84
everything is painted gray these days I'm wondering when that's going to start to look as dated as a 50s kitchen. I think this goes to show that affluence doesn't necessarily by taste.
31
Wow. just wow. So they essentially told their contractors 1) scrub away all trace of nature 2) search and destroy sources of natural light 3) throw gobs of money at the supposed problems 4) sterilize with bleach 5) remove any and all hint of soul (imperfections) 6) score article with the NY times 7) make sure it can be turned into an airbnb in case we wake up and realize that spending time inside of it leaves us feeling like we just woke up hungover and broke in Vegas.
72
Mrs. Barnes is, according to the article, a former restaurant owner and an accomplished chef. She went to the trouble of making sure top-of-the-line appliances (a Wolf stove! a Miele dishwasher, etc.) were installed in the kitchen. Yet, her husband says they usually eat out or only buy what's needed for that night's dinner.
I have a tiny kitchen, with much humbler stove, refrigerator, and dishwasher. However, I manage to turn out grand meals, as well as baked goods and other treats, if friends and family are to be trusted. Mrs. Barnes can give me her fancy appliances any day!
61
Can’t rally be called a rehab...it’s a gut
No mid century modern left...just a generic modern house
57
'dated granite countertops' -- god help us!
69
@roger :
I was shocked too. /s
Go through the the before/after photos, there's captioning like that.
13
wow! pics are sooo revealing. the house really lost a lot of its identity and coziness with this black patterns and stainless steel new look. very impersonal, cold. loses all its mid 50's charm and character! too bad... and the money they poured into this.... oh my!
47
Does the cat live there year round?
18
Who knew that granite counters were "outdated?"
46
Looks like a very very nice and comfy soho loft reno job.
17
What a terribly uncomfortable looking house (house, not home). And at almost $1.5 million, the old adage "a fool and his money...", comes to mind!
33
Interesting house, beautiful setting. The changes are nice. But most of the "artwork" does no justice to walls that were carefully redone. Not what many people would consider good art.
12
Does it have a garage?
11
Looks like they ruined the house.
50
1.35 million dollars.
17
The movie Beetlejuice comes to mind.
8
'Mid-century Modern' two words that go together as well as 'Nausea and Vomiting'.
Please. I had one of those. never again.
12
What kind of art collector does not know that many windows create limit wall space, and the glare from natural light can damage the artwork and make it hard to look at.
28
How many American couples can afford to spent more than 1.3 million on a vanity house project ?
With stories as this you just feed Trump voters
36
@Carol Probably not a lot of those reading the NYT
16
@Carol
why do Trump voters hate freedom?
7
Where are they going to put the cat litter boxes?
74
I could barely get through the article but the Comments are a good read. The only reason I clicked on the article was the large number of comments. The photos prove that a picture is worth a thousand words. This house isn't my cup of tea.
33
And you wonder why people call the NYT elitist.
Most of my friends read the NYT on a daily basis. They're some of the smartest, most creative people I know. Here's a sampling of stories from their real estate lives: One, an adjunct professor, can't enter the housing lottery because she doesn't make enough money. Another, a social worker, pays 50% of her salary to live in an apartment with gaping holes in the floor. She's not pressing her landlord to make repairs because she's afraid they'll raise the rent. There's the mom who's sleeping in the living room while her small son takes the one bedroom. The father, her ex, lives a few blocks away in the brownstone he's keeping because it was his money and they were never married.
I'm just wondering when we can open the NYT real estate section and read about the real spectrum of NYers and the ways they're coping in their homes? To me, that would be infinitely more interesting and much less nauseating than reading about people who have $600,000 to destroy the whole principle behind their midcentury modern and make it look like an expensive IKEA rehab. You've got a pretty wide range of readership and they all deserve to be represented in the real estate section.
197
Prefer the warmth of the “before.”
55
They ruined the house.
40
~Todd and Margo~ Vers• 2.0
9
How sad! The house had such a warm feeling with the earth-toned granite countertops, the warm brown floor with wood dividers, the cozy L-shaped seating nook in the kitchen, and lots of natural wood touches...Now it's all cold and inhospitable, done in flat gray and black, with all the warmth sucked right out of it!
60
They spent about $1.4 million for a house with only 7' ceilings!? My mom's 1948 house has 7'10" ceilings. I find them oppressively low. In my 1892 Brooklyn house I'm used to ceilings that range from 11'6" to 8'6".
I was wondering what land costs in Weston. And what they would have spent in building something new. Now they have a pond. So I looked for land with a pond. This one is $249,000 and has a pond:
https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/202-Steep-Hill-Rd-Weston-CT-06883/57408817_zpid/
They could have built something as perfect as they want for somewhat less than they spent. And something they could get their money back when they sell. I can only imagine how much they will lose when this house is sold.
23
The article is interesting as a document of renovation but the result is not really respectful of MCM spirit.
29
The windows........”They are unique in the way that they undulate,” Mr. Reidy said. “Most doors don’t do that.” “That’s the whole reason for the house — it’s those windows,” Mr. Barnes said.
Yet, they eliminated the most important components of the original design. What were they thinking!
56
To misquote The Devil Wears Prada, "Bright white paint for 2019? Groundbreaking."
17
Ho hum...nothing is perfect.
4
The before had warmth that the after is lacking. Everything is white, black or grey. Even the cat!
35
Congrats on your new/renovated home!
8
The much-praised architect is not mentioned,I believe.
9
What on earth is a "dated" granite counter top? Anyone who cooks and cleans, knows that Formica is the material needed to avoid breaking china and glass and to clean. It sure is cheaper than replacing $50 a sq. ft granite after 10 years because the color is "wrong." And when invented it was placed in the most up scale houses. A kitchen is not a signed original painting for snobs. It is a tool for cooking. Or am I wrong, is a kitchen just a showpiece for people with shallow lives and eat in restaurants or buy prepared foods from Whole Foods? 2 million Americans do not have running water and this couple needs to replace a granite countertop. God help us all.
39
@Steve delapp Calm down. The world is full of people whose opinions, and countertops, are different than yours.
16
My goodness. Granite countertops have been around long enough to be considered “dated”. I have re done 3 properties in the past 15 years and opted out of granite on each one due in large part to the expense. Looks like being a cheapskate paid off.
29
"It resonated with who we are" ...and with what we can afford.
I admit I just looked at the photos, o I don't know why they designed the kitchen the way they did, but it's clear that nobody ever cooks there. Little artworks right next to the kitchen hobs? Please. Obviously they don't fear splatter.
Generally this house looks a whole lot better in the before photos. The second set is clinical and unliveable and boring boring boring.
37
I hope NYT publishes the second article in several years to describe all of the newly discovered problems the owners regret. And the third article when the owners discover that resale value does not cover any renovation costs (in fact, the renovation has likely made the house LESS valuable)
27
Why buy very high end kitchen appliances when you neither cook nor eat in?
The couple rejected all the advice they were given, from the floor to the kitchen cabinets and never considered function. You have to wonder how they make it through life - let alone earn the amount of money this project required. Maybe, as others have suggested, they inherited it.
They must have been horrible clients.
39
"...there's no food in the house." Then why did you install a chef's kitchen?
40
This is the most bourgeois nouveau riche thing I've ever read. I bought a house and did a complete gut renovation for less money than their concrete slab. Makes me sick. If you have any questions about "liberal elites" then this is a pitch perfect example. So much vanity and for what? To have a fussy custom home that you dont like. Way to make the perfect the enemy of the good.
32
@Bob B Hey Bob, what leads you to call them liberal elite. Elite yes, but you also have conservative elites who move along similar lines when they have the money. Yes, they might have made mistakes but on the whole they were on the spot for a number of architectural design flaws that required correction after all of these years. You hear the same about FL Wright homes. The thing that gets to me, I suppose is something that I see more and more of, which is no signs of life I'm the kitchen. Hiding outlets is a new one on me, and so wonder when they set up a toaster to they have the cord running out of the draw onto the counter top?
21
Taxman loves it too!
5
“Art collectors”
“Weekend retreat”
“Don’t keep food in the house”
Give me a break.
45
What a poorly conceived project. They would have done better to raze the whole structure and start from scratch. They spent $75k on a kitchen because she had strong ideas and justifies the inadequacies of the finished product by saying they eat out a lot. Obviously they have more money than brains.
32
I was surprised to learn that granite countertops are now considered to be dated.
27
@EN I was thinking the same thing! I'd kill for granite. I have "dated" ugly dark ceramic tile on the counters AND wall, but will not pay for ripping it all out, nor live with no kitchen for a while. I curse the previous owner who put in some high-end appliances in a tiny galley kitchen, but left a small white frig. She put in extra tall cabinets too, so the stove had to be raised up and I am 5'2" tall, so everything is above my waist! Ridiculous. Oh, I guess the blond wood Shaker cabinets are outdated too.
9
I like the old house better.
24
Beautiful job! Renovating an architectural gem like this one is an expensive labour of love, but we need to keep these mid-century houses as reminders of that particular time, instead of tearing them down and building yet another banal McMansion.
11
It takes a lot of gall to spend so much money to make a house look worse, in fact -look bad- and then make it non-functional as well (like the kitchen). The only thing one likes about the renovation is the rain chains that have been left alone. Concrete and money have been poured with a heavy hand, both pointlessly.
34
@Alfred Neuman Have you ever done a major home renovation? If you had, you would know that everyone makes mistakes.
9
@joanne Joanne, you are absolutely correct-everyone makes mistakes and most of us get swept up in the process as we try to resolve each problem presented to us as we go. But we do our best. Its hard to read so much unkindness and disdain in some of the readers comments. Many seemed to be ticked off for a variety of reasons.
21
This story left a bad taste in my mouth like it did for so many others. I wonder why. I guess we’ve come to accept these types of dilemmas ($160,000 windows or not?) from the moneyed class, but perhaps it’s because this couple seemed somewhat relatable, that their choices and use of money really just grated.
13
@Shyamela All I kept thinking was, I hope they live long enough to enjoy it all! I love decorating and redecorating too, but it's on a tiny scale and I keep it all in perspective. I have friends with chronic health issues, and I'm thinking, if one of these owners faces a sudden health crisis, they might never get to enjoy what they spent all that money on. Maybe I'm just a pessimist or too realist, but I don't see the logic in striving for such ridiculous perfection. The VIEW would have been enough for me. I have a small house, but love the large windows that bring nature in every moment.
7
Being fickle people, I suspect the house will soon be on the market. I imagine prospective buyers asking... "where are the closets? Where are the cabinets and electrical outlets in the kitchen? Did they run out of money before finishing the floors? How would one get furniture up the stairs and their's out?". And to the realtor ... "I thought you said this was a restored authentic MCM home?"
26
I have a mid century flat roof home, designed by Sim Bruce Richards. The flat roof (4 separate flat roofs!) are a nightmare when it rains. They sag and collect a tremendous amount of water. I’ve had many highly recommended roofers over, each telling me there is no way to “fix” the problem without ruining the architectural look of the house. Quite a dilemma - in the past I’ve climbed up on the roof and swept the water off . . but at 70 I’m becoming reluctant to do this. Also, sweeping water is kinda hard!
24
“We go out to dinner a lot, or just buy food to eat that night. We don’t have kids, so there’s no food in the house. We keep everything very simple.” So the black matte mixer is a prop. Why did they have to have certain expensive appliances when they don't even cook? I'll take my 2009 renovated kitchen with dark granite countertops, hickory cabinets and slate back splashes and my Bertazoni gas range which was half the price of the high price ranges and has six burners, two ovens and an electric griddle. My kitchen is very much lived in and lots of entertaining, eating, drinking and laughing goes on there. This place just seems like a status symbol to me.
35
If, conceptually, a house is a "machine for living", doesn't the featured home suggest the owners are "living for the machine"?
12
It's sort of sad. They redesigned the entire house with a focus on aesthetics, and only in hindsight are discovering that their living space is not very functional, even for displaying their art, which over time will hinder their pleasure in the visual appeal. After the hundredth time or so one of the recognized irritation factors pops up, loathing for the house will creep in. It's a good thing it's not their primary residence and they probably won't have much trouble selling it.
11
Proves the old adage:money doesnt buy taste or common sense. The grey will look dated in 10 years, whereas the original design was beautifu and warm.
32
As the saying goes, "Rich or Poor, it's always good to have money."
16
This article made me understand what must have brought on the French Revolution.
36
Doesn't every weekend getaway need a SubZero? I mean when you're chilling your import beers you want to know that they aren't just cold, but upscale cold.
45
There are times when "less-is-more" just becomes too much.
This is a case in point.
20
I appreciate the detail in this story. Hope you can write more like this.
17
Bet they spend a million dollars. To weekends of paint and a little new trim and flooring would have accomplished the whole thing for under $50K
8
Sigh . . . the trials and tribulations of the affluent are more than I can bear.
22
It looks like they also replaced a very furry brown cat with a sleek gray cat.
31
love the neatness of the house. in anticipation of a move i have pored over countless houses East & West. The amount of clutter, overdone features, grand staircases, nick nacks of all kind cheap and expensive became nauseating. this house is sane.
9
What a laugh...total fluff piece. Making everything sound like a big deal. I am a builder in lower Fairfield County for the last 30 years and we routinely perform far more complicated tasks without any of this drama. Digging a trench by hand around roots and no machine access? Common practice. Realized you should have listened to the pros about the kitchen cabinets? Rookie error. And the island top? Literally NOT the largest slab (do the math..less then 9') and BTW, using a crane to get it into the house (I know because been there done that) requirers the roof to be open, and they apparently did not touch to roof (another bad idea, kinda very important) but not surprised as it was not a visual item to be seen. The architect had the new doors set in silicone! Wow how high tech. And ordering aluminum frames and insulated glass from separate suppliers is total standard operating procedure. People enjoy a warm home with hot water and plenty of power for everything and anything, but for some reason won't provide the required space to install and maintain the equipment. One look at the utility closet and my first thought is..no permit on this job. Most likely accurate since they were not expanding the footprint or making structural changes and "only" replacing windows, remodeling the kitchen and making repairs. Not impressed.
73
What a sad and sterile home - the original was at least warm and full of character.
29
I dont see any real originality here with this renovation. I do think the contractor was very competent and seems to have done a thorough job as far as the construction goes but as far as what the buyers did to the original design- meh.
The original architecture was far and away more inspired than this tired renovation. Every single piece of furniture is formulaic. Ugh, boring.
26
For $1.4M they could have found a nice weekend property by a pond and have gotten 25% more in space and aesthetics.
16
The terms “wealth gap” and “income inequality” come to mind. Some people have too much money and bad taste to boot. Not to mention an exorbitant carbon footprint. Some people are housing insecure and live in encampments under bridges.
22
I thought I was opening up an article about something spectacular ... neutral tones and minimalism are just too easy these days.
10
Nothing about energy efficiency. Instead these architects throw out perfectly good material and appliances and putting in new stuff because they want clean lines. Keep on consuming and wasting your oil or gas or wood to heat your great looking home.
14
"If you see a material that you love, order it. What’s on the shelves one day could be gone by the time you need it." Words to live-and-die by in construction and furnishing
Substitute the word "material" for tile, wainscoting, "just enough" granite or flooring. I worked at The Home Depot, often suggesting folks follow the 10% Overage Rule.
"What? That style is discontinued? B-b-b-but we haven't finished the bath! We broke sooo many . . ."
12
I grew up in a mid-century Modern home, also in Connecticut, but not in as prestigious an area as Weston. I’ve come to think they are hideous and would never want to live in one again. I don’t understand the fascination with them. But then, people probably thought of Craftsman style homes as hideous and outdated fifty years ago.
11
They ruined the house. Why people buy a distinctive house and then cluelessly wreck it is beyond me. They ought to build from scratch somewhere else.
20
I wonder if the couple realizes how spoiled and rich they sound. Is that the goal of the article? The loss of those French doors looking out to the woods is just so sad...
41
a second home. what a lovely first world problem.
21
In the “before” photo showing the patio and water chains we see in the foreground a “mitered” glass corner. The structural column is held “back” from the corner such that the corner consists of two panes of glass brought together at 90 degrees. This detail is central, I think to Architect Flood’s exploration of how space might flow, inside to outside; how the roof above might be made to feel “light.” Of course, in the remodeling this detail is lost to a column placed right solid at the corner. I think the meaning of this house has been shifted from an essay in the flow of space connecting everyday life with nature, more towards being a precious object which contains precious objects.
39
Wow. I like the "before" pictures SO much better. It was warm and cozy, now it's sleek, gray, and cold.
21
Does the Times realize that most people don't have hundreds of thousands of dollars to redecorate and renovate their home? It's interesting to see what the Barnes's did, and I am by no means a pauper, but spending that amount of money is an unrealizable fantasy for most of us.
15
How to destroy an (albeit aging) warm, thoughtful, charming home.
btw: Brutalism is raw concrete not an adjective about style. The style attributed to Brutalism is not "charmless, boring, straight, plain."
This remodel is what happens when bougie boho owners get the local architect who 'listens' but instead of being faithful to ideals, they cheapened the whole process with suburbia panache. Matte finish and all.
The house is surely more modern comfortably livable now. But it's a shell of the beauty it once was. Fallingwater is not a comfortable home. Do you want comfort or the art.
I'm not saying they won't enjoy it. Just expect 'brutal' honesty if you want kudos for a dull remodel.
18
Oops, sorry... I preferred it the way it was.
18
I liked the before pictures better.
18
Whoa! I much prefer the original house, it had beautiful proportions and colors, so inviting. The new one is sterile and charmless.
18
This is what you get when people who have more money than sense. "Oh, we had no idea the touch latch doors in the kitchen would be a a problem" despite multiple professionals telling them it would be.
Oh, and this is the weekend house. Must be nice...
Mid century modern at $1.5 mil and it still looks like a camper home with a cap on top. Enjoy.
What they learned: nothing
16
I'm not east coast money so I'm aware my opinion doesn't matter. However, the fact that they spent 600,000 on THAT remodel is wild. The pre-remodel was warm- at least as warm as mid century modern allows. And now it's just so very stark and cold. It's fine. It's nice enough. Come out to the midwest and see some of these old farm houses people are doing real major restoration (not this light restoration FOR OVER 600,000-- still so crazy to me it cost that much) to for 100,000-200,000. Obviously they are well connected to have this meh restoration featured in NYT
16
Reading the comments, the old adage "everyone's a critic" seems to apply. I must be as well, since I agree with most of them
18
Seems a very sad story.
9
Subterranean home renovation blues, anyone? Sakes alive, you’d think someone had done monstrous plastic surgery on some of you or your kids! The owners appear to have gotten a lot of what they hoped for in this well-executed renovation. What reads as cold to some is exactly at the other end of the scale for others. Since it’s only a weekend getaway (nice if you can get one of your own!), I expect they’ll enjoy it for years to come, and will avoid any future publicity!
14
sadly they kind of wrecked the place, the before pictures have so much unique charm, the remodel is "expected" and seems to water down the original architects vision, it went from wow to Ikea.
14
If I've learned anything from watching more than a dozen seasons of Grand Designs; Old concrete floor needs gutting? Need to replace all windows with bespoke steel? Flat leaky roof?..... Run away! Should have ordered a German kit house instead.
6
About $1.4 million spent for a modest ‘weekend retreat’ that looks great in a Times photo shoot but less than comfortable to spend much time in.
Meanwhile homelessness spreads like an epidemic.
Is this a great country or what?
12
I’ll take the before over the after any day.
14
Wait. They bought it for the amazing floor to ceiling windows then removed the windows?
And, not for nothing, but black and grey are not a mark of great design- just a great lack of imagination. Boring.
20
They took a terrific home in need of love and gave it boring.
12
The comments section of this article just goes to show that a large segment of the NY Times audience is as mean spirited, self righteous and rude as those they are so quick to condemn. What happened to civility?
Thank you to the Barnes for sharing their experience. I'm sure this will be the last time.
23
It’s cold. Sterile. Looks uncomfortable. I’m glad it’s not mine.
6
“Oh, we’re art collectors, so we got rid of this wonderful wall of glass doors so we could hang exactly as many pieces as were hanging before” - Unhappy Hipsters
12
Is it wrong of me to say that I dislike every single one of their changes?
17
So... they bought a house in the country, but closed up windows because the sun interrupted their TV viewing.
They bought a house in the country, but the sound of the driving rain on the roof makes them crazy, so they installed a *single slab of concrete* on the floors to absorb all of the noise.
They bought a house in the country with wide open cooking space for a professionally trained chef, but eliminated the pantry and food storage areas (and outlets?) because they mostly carry out.
They bought a house in the country. They were young and moneyed. They had little idea, if any, that they sounded dumb and petty.
Good luck with reselling a house with foundation issues, zero storage, and the charm of a cool sarcophagus!!
36
Save some energy to shovel the snow off that flat roof! (We have same)
7
As every home renovator knows, you obsess over the tiny things that seem unsightly while you're doing the job. No visible wires. No visible AC outlets. A too shiny finish on the floors. And so on. But after you've finished the job and lived there for awhile, these blemishes disappear. Practicality and comfort take precedence over aesthetics. Yes, God is in the details, but so is the Devil. I hope the couple is happy with their "new" home, but to me the results look tailored to an architectural magazine layout rather than to daily living. And if you don't keep food in the house, why buy an expensive Sub Zero refrigerator? More sleekness for the sake of sleekness?
18
As a lifelong lover of mid-century modern architecture, I have to say that this is a prime example for a 'remuddle': "To remodel a building or room in a way that obscures or destroys key aspects of the original design."
I thank the MCM hype for highlighting this particular architectural style, but it also attracts people who buy these homes for the wrong reason/s. Unfortunately, the new owners had most of the home's MCM charm removed and turned it into a contemporary modern dwelling. I'm glad the ceilings are so low and couldn't be drywalled for a cleaner look.
20
Amazing how these mid-century modern houses are so alike. My mother-in-law had one until last Tuesday, when my wife sold it for her. It had tons of picture windows, looking out on a large lot. It also had a flat roof, and a built-in sofa, which this house appears to have as well. The flat roof also didn’t leak, but had spots that needed to be fixed. My wife agreed to pay for that and some other things, which, in effect, knocked a good chunk off the selling price. The buyers had a professional do a thorough inspection before buying. In late 2018, early 2019, my mother-in-law put in a new remote-control gas fireplace and paved the driveway. But I don’t think that enhanced the value much. Moral: If you’re selling one of these, don’t make last-minute changes to suit your tastes. If buying, first inspect, then negotiate. And, personally, I’d prefer practicality over aesthetics.
7
I grew up in a MCM home, in California. Most of the time, the weather was mild. The large windows and glass doors enhanced the connection to the outdoors. It was loud when it rained. I loved it; however, the windows were drafty, the flat roof leaked, it was always cold in the winter. Our house was built on a slight slope, so the rainwater passed under the house on its way to the street. I wish the new owners of this MCM home fortitude and patience, for they will have the same issues my parents did, but in snowy Connecticut.
7
I recently remodeled my kitchen and removed the overhead cabinets and I absolutely love the open feeling when I work at the counters. However unlike these people I devoted one entire wall to pantry cabinets. When closed they present a sleek wall with an inset fridge and long smooth doors. Open, with pull out shelves they hold more easily accessible food, dishes and small appliances than the old cabinets. Pans and baking equipment are housed in under counter drawers close to where they are needed. I love cooking in my new kitchen that is functional and aesthetically pleasing with room for art on the walls. Planning works. Oh, by the way I used IKEA grey cabinets and design and installation services and did the whole thing for under $30k, less than half the price quoted by the kitchen design store.
14
It upsets me when I see people undoing architecture just to be, in their minds, up to date. The original kitchen in this house was beautiful and certainly didn't need to be done over to resemble every other one we see on home remodel shows. The architects who designed these houses were really onto something - a sleeky modern style that was indicative of solidly creative, forward thinking of the era. Redoing leaky windows, of course. Getting rid of original floors just to have today's concrete mass, I think not. Good luck to them, as their kitchen cabinets continue to open on their own.
28
The owners are to be congratulated on achieving their vision. The article itemized many of the problems regarding structural remodeling of any dated building, and the dangers of making costly errors by changing plans along the way, an of not heeding the advice of experts hired to steer the project.
I admire the owners for defending their choices and acknowledging their mistakes, but most of all for exposing themselves to the inevitable criticism and condescension of some readers.
I found the article interesting and informative a glimpse into the realm of MCM architecture.
23
I appreciated the fact that the homeowners lived in the house for a period of time before making choices. The angle of the sun, the view after the leaves drop, the neighborhood noises that you did not know existed can now all be taken into account. I sell window coverings and there are times that nothing is the best choice for a window, this in regard to their master bedroom. Privacy is or is not a concern with different persons. I took 6 months to make a "most best" decision in our house at one time with some door choices and this is what I do for a living. Ultimately, I agree or disagree with choices that my customer/client will make, but again, it is their house. As our newley remodeled kitchen revolves around a 1957 GE pink refrigerator, I will say that it makes me happy and ultimately it is our house. But, yes, you should be jealous...whether you like it or not.
6
Good gravy! Thank you for showing me my imaginary future home. Great job. Wonder restoration. I would have hung on to a few things, but it's always interesting seeing what's of importance to renovators.
3
Lovely, but not replacing those amazing wood floors was a mistake. They were the perfect balance for warmth and personality in a midcentury design.
29
A few years ago when doing a small renovations in my condo, a friend shared wise words from his dad - always assume the work will take twice as long, cost twice as much and you’ll find something else you want or need to do during the project. I have yet to see a renovation project that doesn’t live up to those words.
21
@Annette Hunt
As a DIYer all of my projects come in on budget, and (almost) on time. :)
2
Sorry, but this is awful. They have taken every ounce of character from the original house and turned it into a sterile box. All the elements that made the house feel part of the surrounding environment have been stripped out and replaced with jarring white walls and cold concrete floors. Nothing they did was sympathetic to the spirit of mid-century modern design. My last house was an original MCM from the same year and had also been updated by an architect about 10 years ago—but mine chose to carefully choose materials and enhancements that would build on the original architect’s vision, and ensure seamless connections to the land around it.
61
@Sally I disagree- kind of. The house was not so architecturally special that remodeling wasn't warranted and the end result is not too bad and apparently fit the owners' personalities. Concrete floors are never warm and inviting and the risk of eventual cracking is almost 100% so I would have gone in a different direction there both for aesthetic and functional reasons. As for the rest- they had their own idea of what it should be and they brought it to life.
Myself? I would NEVER try a remodel on a house that old- either you are disturbing architecture that should be preserved but is no longer totally utile or you are taking on a very expensive job that could cost more, for a less customized end result, than a new construction.
2
“Chose to choose”...sorry. Need more coffee.
1
Beautiful work. I've consulted on concrete sealants, and have had great success with some unconventional finishes. Once my wife had the task of sealing concrete in a food-processing facility. I suggested that she quietly seal the floors with shellac, which comes in food grades. I said, "quietly," as the resin comes from secretions of lac beetles, which sounds unpleasant, but is the source of shiny finishes on delicious pastries!
While I'm a scientist by vocation, I turned to construction work for daily exercise, after President Kennedy's programs whipped us all into good shape. I've enjoyed the exercise my entire life, and haven't complained that I was well-paid either.
And I have an unfair advantage, being a scientist and engineer. Construction is largely applied sciences, so my knowledge only increases with time and experience. I'm always looking for another challenge, though age has slowed me down.
Good work on the project, and kudos to New York Times.
13
My husband and I renovated and expanded a 1948 CA bungalow. The home was set on post and piers with a dirt floor and was incapable of supporting a larger structure. The lot was narrow and the home built on a down slope and for various reasons expansion of the original footprint was not practical. Therefore, we expanded by digging down, pouring a new foundation, replacing the supporting structure, opening up the 'basement' space and pouring a concrete floor. We were concerned with water intrusion so did many things to mitigate that risk. We put a thick layer of gravel down first before pouring the floor, added xypex in the concrete, coated the exposed portion of the exterior of the foundation with more xypex, installed french drains along the front of the home and created a drainage system that allowed water flowing from front to back to collect and flow out to an ephemeral creek. In short we went to extraordinary lengths to manage the possibility of water seepage. Our efforts paid off as we never had any evidence of water intrusion. I can't imagine pouring a concrete slab directly on the ground when a 'waterfall' is sending water directly toward your home without taking similar steps. It's asking for trouble.
16
Funny, but as I am of the period that built this house, with mid century modern interior purchased decades ago as part of simply setting up a household. - the BEFORE photos attract me much more than the after. Surely there was a need to upgrade the parts of the home needing repair, but the result is cold and sterile - possibly due to the very picky nature of the owners.
62
It seems like the couple hired several professionals and then ignored their advice in crucial areas. I wonder how much of the ballooning cost was attributable to the clients. The concrete floor seemed to be one area where the aesthetic details the clients demanded overrode good sense and created unnecessary drama and expense.
34
I enjoyed reading this article and sharing it with my husband. There is a lot to take away from it. The owners recognized their own mistakes, such as the popping open appliances and the lack of practicality of some aspects of their design. We may not all be doing remodeling on such a pedigreed piece of architecture, but we all learn from our mistakes. The house is very beautiful as a bijou; it would not work for me. That wasn't the point, was it? It is not a house for children, for artists, for cooks, for wild and crazy guys. Frankly, most of us would have difficulty fitting our lives into someone else's habitat. But it's great to have this glimpse.
13
I’m puzzled by their decision to destroy the most alluring features of this home. The original flooring was magnificent as were the original French doors. Their decision about the French doors in particular have damaged the art of this home. They claim to be art collectors, but they obviously did not value this home as a piece a of art. Hopefully it will be restored one day.
67
The average price for the construction of a 2,000 square feet house is 300K.
So,for 629K, they could have built a fake mid century.
19
Actually, they could have had a brand new midcentury modern that uses current materials and technology throughout.
They would have to pay the cost of demolition as well.
4
Perhaps if the former Chef had thought about this house as a dish; locally sourced, savory/sweet, crunchy/soft, interesting base and room for happy accidents, they would have journeyed on a creative endeavor instead of this result.
18
I don't understand. On the one hand, they talk about needing a chef's kitchen, with all of the latest, high-end appliances. And then a few paragraphs later they justify the lack of cabinets because they bring in food or eat out most nights. While at first I thought these obsessive 'aesthetes' were interesting, by the end I concluded eh, not so much.
87
Form following functionality is a paramount design rule that was not followed in critical places. The house looks better and some aging problems are addressed, but some of the changes don't work well if someone intends to live there. The kitchen (drawers need to remain open and devices plugged in then unplugged to make toast and make/keep warm coffee, open a can?), the constrained utilities, and removing storage in an already small space all lower the livability and maybe the resale value. I'm glad the owners like the look and that they have another abode so this new place can be used as a gallery/retreat rather than a home.
19
Having raised a family in a MCM house we feel incredibly lucky to have, I’d say if you don’t love the sound of rain on the roof or the windows that bring the outside in, you should probably have chosen another style.
55
I have done major renovations in my 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and just last year as I entered my 60s, I did a semi-big Renovation. Nothing goes exactly as imagined. At some point you need to stop hemorrhaging money, regardless of the budget, and the timeframe will be twice as long as estimated. It just happens. In the end, you hope you get something you love and that works for you. The key is having really talented workers, a realistic budget and lots of patience. In my last renovation, I wish I had spent an extra $20k in my master bath for a larger shower. At the time, I just needed it to end. Absolutely a first world problem, and I love what I have, but it could have been better with more money and patience. I had neither in the moment. One other observation, think about what has to be perfect. For me that is the kitchen. I will spend and wait for the right appliances, counters, and storage. I don’t go out to eat. And I do like granite. Honed granite is quite gorgeous.
19
Thanks to Justin and Samantha Barnes to share their story.
It looks like this was a bad combination of detail obsessed owners and a young architect who could not talk them out of some things to get a better and cheaper overall result.
The concrete floor will have the cracks soon or later and the sleek kitchen is just sleek but you can't even use it properly.
But when it's all said and done, we don't live there and they will enjoy their new renovated weekend home.
26
I think the clients hired professionals and then mostly ignored them.
11
I’m feeling inspired! Although not exactly as I would have done the house, I really like many of the ideas. And I hate visible AC outlets, good for them for removing them! Having compromised many times in my life, I know it’s good to take chances and, within reason, spend the extra money to get what you want.
I would love to see a video walkthrough of the whole house.
4
I'm a big fan. My parents built two, beautiful, architect designed, mid-century modern homes when I was a child. Both were amazingly imaginative, one built in the early '60s, the other in the late '60s. The problems related in this article are familiar to me. The first house had a notoriously leaky roof. Regardless, they both expressed the imagination and creativity of my parents, and I am glad I got to grow up in them.
12
I think the finished product is very attractive and calming. It seems to me like overall cost would have been much less if the clients had simply purchased a 2 acre parcel of land, and built from the ground-up, however.
16
I’m a big fan of mid century modern and I like many of the improvements made to the house. Also, refreshing that they shared both the good and the bad points of the DIY design/renovation process. Perhaps more use of off-the-shelf and less custom components, would be more aligned with the MMM design ethos (like the Eames house in CA). I might consider a woodsy exterior color instead of white.
7
This certainly is a gorgeous home and it truly was a labor of love to do this renovation. It is good to see a piece of our history restored rather than razed. I hope this couple is able to enjoy it for many, many years. In my experience, these kinds of extensive repairs to the a home's fundamentals are rarely more than fractionally valued on the home resale market. Seems that nearly everyone substantially underestimates the cost of fundamental repairs: realtors, appraisers, prospective owners, etc.. It all works out if the owners can hold the home for many years and extract the value through their enjoyment of the home.
9
@fafield
I don't see this as a "restoration"...too many radical changes.
13
Electrical Outlets inside kitchen drawers...I'm trying to picture how they plug in their mixer, coffee maker, and leave the drawer open, and then the drawer pulls the wiring back and forth? Sounds unsafe as well as impractical.
If they installed vents for AC, why not add heat? Then avoid the floor radiant heat remake, and paint the floor the color they prefer - white? Just make every visitor leaves shoes outside.
Oh and they should get flood insurance.
18
@js Apparently, the electrical outlets themselves are stationary, as shown in these photos:
https://dockingdrawer.com
3
Many people may be familiar with the unusual homes in Roosevelt, NJ initially known as "Jersey Homesteads". This was a semi-utopian town built in the late 1930s and intended to be sort of an artist community. As with this house, the Roosevelt homes were "40s modern" and had flat roofs (and many still retain this feature, thought some have been "updated").
I designed and built a home during the Jimmy Carter administration, taking advantage of a low-cost loan program for energy-efficient homes that our 39th president was promoting. Mr. Carter's wonderful legacy lives on with his generous work at Habitat for Humanity.
I hate to say it but the house in this article looks like quite an "energy-waster" and I hope others would not emulate it.
The house I built also looks somewhat "different" with lots of glass (on one side) but overall, is fairly low-tech and quite practical. Ours has thicker 2X6 insulated wood walls, extra roof insulation (and roof venting...very critical) plus lots of south facing, double-insulated glass. I built most of it myself during summers when I wasn't teaching, so unlike this house, our overall cost was very moderate. Over the years our house has typically provided at least 50% of its own heat energy. Our house was built with a lake view and these days we keep it as our summer getaway in western, rural NJ.
10
Shocked at all the criticism of the design and remodeling of this house. I prefer minimalist interiors and this is beautiful.
As far as the incredible wealth disparity, the couple is obviously a victim of the legislation over the decades and the lobbying on behalf of the “haves” so they can receive more of the US economic pie. They were in the right place (income category) at the right time (since, what, Ronald Reagonomics?) to really cash in. Can you blame them?
We all voted, or more likely didn’t vote, over the years to make our current economic reality possible. And now it’s sour grapes being fermented for this couple.
6
@Lauren Sour grapes are all I can afford.
6
The renovation looks like one of those apartments you see on in movies or on tv where the character who lives there is devoid of any humanity. “American Psycho” comes to mind. Cold, stark, no soul. The one slide looks like a doctor’s waiting room.
Concrete floors? I get that it was a practical solution to a real problem, but concrete? Hope it is heated under there.
The MCM furniture is nice but looks terribly uncomfortable. Where is the gorgeous wood MCM furniture with its sleek curves?
And who can keep a white couch clean? With a gray cat? The cat and plants are the only things with any personality. As for wanting the art to take center stage? I guess... museum walls are sometimes white, but many are rich colors, which can bring out the vibrancy of the art itself.
Seems like at least some natural materials might have worked in tandem with the black and white. if minimal color. The black and white is not by cup of tea - it is harsh. I would enjoy being outdoors rather than in the uninviting house. But that’s just me. Some like it cold.
35
They stated it is heated by radiant underneath.
3
If the kitchen outlets are in the drawers the only way to plug anything in is to leave the drawer open. Open drawers will fill with crumbs, etc. as well as catching on clothes when you walk by. Clean lines but not too practical.
38
@Paul the Biker I agree with crumbs in the drawers, except the owner said they don't cook -- they just bring in food for that day. Sounds like not a lot of crumbs to collect. I'd personally prefer a home with a warm kitchen, appliances perhaps visible but working to produce great food for family and guests. Sounds like guests would just get fingerprints on their precious home. (Not a fan, if you can't tell.)
11
They got what they wanted and they paid crazy money for it. Most of us would never buy this difficult home that looks like the hill it is sitting on will never stop having problems with water drainage and soil erosion.
The spiral staircase to the bedroom....why would anyone think that is a good idea. You can't move furniture in or out! How many buyers will want this house when they go to sell it?
It's a good thing they don't cook, as the abundance of steps up to the house would make a challenge to bring home the groceries. Which have no place to be stored anyway.
Where is the garage? How do you get furniture into or out of this home, up all those stairs leading up to the house? While it may be a beautiful lot, I shudder to think what living there in the winter would be like, with those stairs outside covered in ice and snow.
Thankfully, they can stay in NYC when the weather is bad.
17
Our friend's dog can't climb the spiral staircase.
Neither could her elderly mother.
5
I hope that the beautiful elements which were removed were taken to the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore, and boy, do I wish I could have been there to relocate those treasures to my MCM, especially now that I hear that MCM is giving way to Granny Chic - oh no! I still have nightmares about antimacassars and horsehair divans...
16
So they got rid of a lot of doors so the sun would not hurt their artwork? So then why did they buy the house in the first place? The whole point of the original was to blur the boundries between indoors and outdoors. This was not a good "updating".
63
They were also shocked that furniture and large artwork can’t be brought up a spiral staircase. Too often wealth is wasted on the wrong people.
14
To all who say there are “no kitchen cabinets”, I am confused. I see bottom cabinets and drawers, just not uppers which, they may have thought, could crowd the space and obstruct sight lines. Keep in mind this is a house they plan to use on the weekends, and the wife was a professional chef, I am sure this house fits their needs. I agree, as a full time kitchen I would need more cabinets and storage solutions. But not my house. (As someone living in a 1926 Spanish bungalow with an old dysfunctional kitchen, this kitchen would be a major improvement.)
4
@Stefanie Oddly, they are apparently eat out most of the time so this high end kitchen is a puzzle to me.
26
I wish I had a 1926 Spanish bungalow. If your kitchen is original and not a later remuddling, it is very functional in the true sense of that word.
3
It takes courage to open one’s decisions to the public. Kudos for that. My advice to the couple: in your dining room you have a subset of Terry Winters’ “Fourteen Etchings”. It is one of the most beautiful, moving and spiritual works of it’s time and one of Terry’s very best print series. But, this work is the entire series. As a couple making decisions for the sake of art, Try to find a wall which allows you to live with the entire work and I promise it will give back to you and any viewer much, much more than any excerpt could.
17
A house without a functional kitchen isn’t a home.
I would like to the Times to return to this structure in 10 years to see how it has aged. My suspicion is that by then the house will have been sold and then renovated again to undo some of the dreadful interior design and engineering decisions. A kitchen without cabinets? Putting the HVAC equipment into such a tiny space? Future owners, unless they also want to live in an art gallery, are facing several hundred thousand dollars of work to make this house livable.
41
@Kelly That mechanical room would be a nightmare to work in. I'm a retired electrician and I have done troubleshooting in those cramped type of quarters. And adding circuits to anywhere in the house, exposed conduit your only option.
17
@Paul the Biker That is it exactly. My dad is a retired electrician and I used to come with him on jobs. And as you say, any changes whatsoever will mar the surface of this house, much like the footprint in the concrete floor that was referenced in the story.
I’m still puzzled over where they keep their dishes, pots, pans, and food. There are a few cabinets as referenced in the story. However, does any sort of cooking - even making a cup of coffee - require getting everything out of storage and then replacing it when done?
All of that said, I do recognize that this really isn’t supposed to be a place where people live. It is a weekend retreat for a couple of apparent wealth without kids or a dog. They have the ability to make design choices that work for them. It’s their lives. Good for them.
But I truly would like to see the Times revisit this story in 10 years.
13
@Paul the Biker:
PBS could start a new TV series: "This New House". The series would feature newly-installed nightmares, such as miniature mechanical rooms, and radiant heating systems buried under a single slab of concrete.
10
The results of the renovation are spectacular. The Barneses have not only preserved a midcentury modern home, they have improved it and extended its life. Well done.
7
I realize that the cost of such an undertaking is immense. But I am not sure why the present owners wanted the house in the first place. Regardless the problems, the house, based on the before pictures, was a work of art that was bathed in light and its connection to the outdoors. Now they have simply have a place to hang their art which may never measure up to the original house.
Sadly the house needed owners who truly valued it for what it was
70
Here in my adopted country an exceptional house, designed in 1948 by a distinguished architect in an audacious and coherent way, could have been protected under the historical preservation scheme. Necessary renovations could then have been subsidized if they had preserved and respected that architect's wishes. Unfortunately, the aesthetic and documentary value of the original house have now utterly disappeared. A criminal act and a very bad investment.
54
While I appreciate the struggles that went into this house, the owners were their own worst enemies. They needed a first-rate architect, experienced GC and well-researched plans in place before they ever started. A better team could have anticipated some of these issues and given them better advice.
I built a house by a famous architect and it was exhausting, frustrating, and, in the end, worth it. There is a learning curve to building a home and I, too, made some mistakes. "Twice as long and twice as much," is not a cliche'. It's frequently the truth. So, I do have some empathy for their travails.
Personally, I don't agree with many of their design choices. They transported a NYC aesthetic - black, white, grey - to a rural setting. And it feels mismatched. The previous palette was warmer and the brown floor echoed the surrounding woods. Urbane taste should, perhaps, remain urban.
The kitchen choices were, unfortunately, among their worst. Practicality matters and need not be traded for good design.
They also fell for the brand-name trap; paying for the status appliances they don't really need.
The owners will probably be frustrated reading these comments. It's easy to second-guess. I went through many of the same issues, but did a bit more homework and planning.
101
@Jlasf Whats worse, the upscale kitchen appliances they chose are among the worst rated for reliability and function. They are expensive, yes, but if you don't have even heat in the oven or reliable temperature controls in the refrigerator, what good are they?
7
I'm surprised that they didn't eliminate the entry door to the house with another full-length window. All in the name of aesthetics of course :)
14
To the commenters who hate the sleek, minimalist style of the After photos, I say, To each his own; it’s none of our business.
Some like Victorian, others prefer Arts and Crafts, still others adore MCM.
I myself like any thoughtfully designed house, ideally by a good architect, with good flow, and that reflects the times when it was built.
There was a long time when MCM houses were not at all valued. E.g. I still don’t like a 90s house as it’s so blah. I dislike fake old houses too.
Imagine a Greek Revival house with Doric columns built in 2007 or 2017; that is embarrassing for the owners. Our local building authorities need to be staffed with qualified people who’ll stop the nouveau ruche from making expensive mistakes with their new constructions.
We can’t impose our will on others but we also have to try to save them from 1) ridicule; and 2) marring our beloved neighborhoods (bring down desirability of a block or a neighborhood).
As for what they do with the inside of their houses like this nice young couple, that’s completely up to them. It’s what they want and where they’ll be happy.
Conclusion: Live and let live as long as others won’t be hurt in the process.
14
@BB
It's none of our business? Then why did this couple allow their renovation to be featured in the NYT? If they didn't want criticism of their renovation, they should have kept it private.
9
@BB
It is none of our business, except they made it our business. If you are showing your house (or anything else) and expecting/inviting comments, you can't complain when you get them.
9
I was genuinely disappointed by this before and after piece because the warmth and the life that had been in this 20th century house in the wood, the granite, and, yes, the old floor, was washed away by a preference for lifelessness-- black, gray and white, the esthetic of a doctor's bland waiting room. The owners don't cook at all, yet bought high-end kitchen appliances.They removed the food storage from the kitchen so they could hang high-end art. What does this choice of coldness over warmth say about the evolution of style in the 21st century?
77
I spent five years planning my dream home in Hawaii, built it, enjoyed it, and after two years flew away to Provence and never looked back.
We built another home in France as our final living space. Every room is designed just for us.
But we’ve never gotten attached to material things.
9
@Michael Kittle Vous avez de la chance. Hawaii et Vaison-la-Romaine. Pas mal.
2
@Michael Kittle Ha! ... Just perfect. Love it. J
3
I think it is lovely that they shared their successes and their disappointments so honestly. I believe it will affect how I think about renovating my "mid-century ranch" house. Trade-offs are everything. Windows vs art, storage vs clean lines, particular tastes vs existing. I feel lucky to learn.
29
@Aaron, I don’t think these nice sounding owners would be deeply in debt with this house because a) banks have become stricter re lending after 2009, even after some loosening up recently; b) they own a business in nyc, which is tough to do.
Nothing wrong with inheriting money from boomer parents who worked hard, invested wisely, lived prudently.
I’d be upset if the parents they inherited money from were El Chapo, the Gambinos, Marcos or Zuma, among others.
6
So happy to read the comments and see that I wasn’t alone in liking the pre reno version better.
Congrats. You bought a house with MCM character and made it not much different from modern urban condos. Drab, and uninspiring.
And I haven’t got to the article yet, and might not after what I learned here.
51
As I see it,
Pros:
The owners are young and monied, hence there’s no need to regret any decision they may have made with regard to this project.
They have time and resources to recover from their mistakes.
They created jobs for their service providers and suppliers.
They are evidently pleased with the result even if only for now.
Weston, CT is a very fine town to live or weekend in.
Con:
Ceiling:
Since 7-ft ceilings are not up to code for new builds in most places, house purchase price reflected a pricey piece of land with a teardown house; or a home for short persons that should’ve been left as it was with only minor and system upgrades. The old house looked fine to me.
They didn’t ask me but....
If I were them I’d have torn down the house, esp the incongruent additions, and built a a modern glass box on original footprint.
Re professional integrity:
Don’t architects have an obligation to tell would-be clients what would be a wise investment, do what’s right by them?
If the clients fired them for not following their professional advice to renovate this way, they will have abided by their profession’s code of ethics, move on to next client pitch and keep their reputation intact.
From the story the professional providers didn’t do such a great job and I doubt they’ll get clients from this publicity anyway.
Good luck to all concerned. Let’s hope I’m wrong.
16
I am a licensed architect and I do agree with the comments on how they transformed a charming simple house with modern lines and interesting details into a very expensive bland one.
People come to architects with preconceived ideas of what should be done and what they hate and want to remove at any cost, And it seems that they didn’t really like this house that much. They should have simply used it as inspiration for a building something completely new.
The original house was an architectural gem, A sensitivity to spaces, flow, and it’s setting on the site. It no longer is special what they have built suits them but it’s very bland and common developer design. Note that the architect recommended simply replacing The wood framing around the 16 inch thick concrete pavers but they wanted a Solid concrete pad with no joints, something that is unrealistic and does not adhere to the standards for construction and longevity. This is replaced something special at a great cost, Without understanding the material of what they were working with which is concrete. In all likelihood the architect warned them and suggested sensible alternatives to a concrete slab with no joints. The pavers were not understood by the owners is being special - How they aligned with the windows and other framing elements. It is sad but I’ve seen this before where owners remove architectural elements and design that is special to replace it with stuff they see on HG
52
I will advise my grand kids kids to look for the update on this house when the next moneyed couple buys it in 75 years for a small fortune and again pours a small fortune into restoring it. Snark aside, it will be very interesting to see how long these renovations last before they too look as woefully behind the times as the original house did before these renovations.
15
Interesting that I heard an ad on the radio how a contractor was noting that they were responding to the popular trends in my area of metropolitan Boston in terms of doors windows and cabinets that were more in the farmhouse and arts & crafts style by stocking these components. Sounds 180 degrees from the design choices made her that seem more like a mini museum than an actual residence.
11
Interesting that I heard an ad on the radio how a contractor was noting that they were responding to the popular trends in my area of metropolitan Boston in terms of doors windows and cabinets that were more in the farmhouse and arts & crafts style by stocking these components. Sounds 180 degrees from the design choices made her that seem more like a mini museum than an actual residence.
1
That a 40-year-old and 35-year-old with a company I’ve never heard of had a preexisting art collection with work from major artists, bought this house in addition to a home in Manhattan, and had the cash for this extensive renovation tells me they are either deeply in debt or, more likely, inherited money (or received it from living relatives). It might have been nice to actually talk about how they paid for this; the article makes it seems like the money fell from the sky.
61
Where the money came from is none of our business. I applaud their will to reuse rather than tear down and build a big ego house - which BTW they apparently could afford.
17
Really none of our business
2
Nice work. I think some folks might have torn it down and rebuilt. They would have gotten a new home but you have a classy home. I think the house is a treasure, not many people - architects, builders, buyers - thought like that In the 40s.
6
The renovation is very impressive, in many ways improving on the original, particularly in terms of durability (wood framed doors on a narrow plot with water cascading - hello?).
However, I couldn't help but come to a similar conclusion to many (even before reading the comments) that in five or ten years if the present owners decide to sell, the design will (once again) look dated.
Being on the cutting edge is all well and good, but it's wise to avoid getting stuck there.
18
My preference is the old design. The new house is very "cold" looking. Too much gray and black. I understand needing to fix the radiant heat and windows. But I liked the warm floors, French undulating doors and the original design concept of the kitchen.
66
@Philly girl I agree! The older design was much more appealing to me.
4
Those cats were adorable, but it creeps me out how well each one matched the interior. What happened to the first one—did they put it to sleep after discovering that it didn’t “go” with the stunningly expensive remodel?
42
@Will
People do definitely choose cats for their decorative value and people abandon or euthanize cats for all kinds of reasons, including "It doesn't match my living room." (Not saying these people would do that, just a point of info.)
5
@Will I wondered whether the paint was chosen to match the cat, or the cat to the paint.
3
@Gloria
The cat chose the paint.
10
One problem with modernizing the looks of a house, gutting Victorians, painting all the walls white or gray, replacing kitchen cabinets and countertops, is that in ten years all of that looks out-of-date. Why not leave houses looking like their original time period? If you don't like the looks of an original time period, buy a different house.
70
Congratulations on the finished beautiful project and your marriage survived the process. Shout out to your contractors for giving you what you wanted. There were many items I liked from the original home: the front wall of doors/windows so you can view the natural world and the open glass front door. Loved the old spiral staircase to give warmth and character. Too bad on losing kitchen cabinets and outlets. Function and beauty need to come together. Every house needs to feel some warmth from floors or cabinents or furniture otherwise to sterile. Water flowing off the hill in those once every 50 events that now come every year is concerning. I hope things work out. Thanks for being honest on the difficult decisions during the process. Enjoy now!
26
Was the cat chosen because she/he fits the minimalist palette? An orange tabby or a calico or a black and white would never do; the gray cat is just perfect.
31
Too bad the old decor and infrastructure were no longer feasible. The house looked far better before the renovations
94
Folks, this renovation experience reminded me of a very funny movie with Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, and Melvin Douglas, "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House," from 1948. Contrary to these folks, the fictional Blandings did end up with a very nice CT home (not just a weekend getaway), but the journey they took is hysterical. Watch it for some priceless scenes and wonderful acting. (The movie is based on the book of the same name by Eric Hodgins, who chronicled his own experiences in the book.)
45
@Anne Great movie and a classic one that not everyone is aware of.
3
@Anne Yes, "Mr. Blandings" is the best movie about the foibles of building a house. Everything that happened to Cary Grant, happened to me. Except he got Myrna Loy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_jjKs06-UY&list=PLWtfqaSdQ2igjlscao2c6nrq1Zdp6pTEs
1
@Anne
I'm reminded of the scene where Myrna Loy chooses paint colours every time I try to decide on colours for **anything**.
2
“Somehow a footprint ended up on the surface”.
I would have brought the gray cat in for questioning about that.
75
Did these people have a thorough home inspection performed, by a knowledgeable local contractor, before they purchased this “money-pit”? I wonder whether this was a typical, rushed impulse buy, followed by the harsh reality of what actually needed to be spent to achieve their personal aesthetic.
19
I'd rather live in the house as it was and keep the $630,000.
80
A lot of the radiant heating was either not working or on its way out. What would you do, use space heaters? Probably you would not have bought this house in the first place, which is fine.
7
@Miriam
I might source some old cast iron baseboards. Or use a wood stove.
3
@Billy Me to.
4
Folks, this renovation experience reminded me of a very funny movie with Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, and Melvin Douglas, "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House," from 1948. Contrary to these folks, the fictional Blandings did end up with a very nice CT home (not just a weekend getaway), but the journey they took is hysterical. Watch it for some priceless scenes and wonderful acting. (The movie is based on the book of the same name by Eric Hodgins, who chronicled his own experiences in the book.)
11
Um..looking through the photos, I actually found myself liking the original designs more than the renovated final product.
104
Loved the before house. I love this part of CT. I had family there for 50 years and saw many changes (on the shoreline actually) but always loved the older homes. That hill behind the house is like the hill behind our house on the shore and makes me homesick.
But I sincerely hope the owners enjoy what there is now.
17
I saw the photo and I really wanted to like this article and this renovated house and these people. I ended mildly disgusted by all three. In this age of repurposing materials and making our built environment more practical and longer lasting, this a nearly obscene example of money over common sense and good conscience (taste is subjective, and mine differs greatly). The only bright side, I hope, is that many local contractors and crew made a bundle off of these people and this project.
184
This article is a great way to highlight the economic inequality in the US right now. Spending the equivalent of 3 people's annual income on the floor and HVAC alone is just an excellent example of why people are angry. I love mid-century modern and tales of restoring forgotten gems. But this just seems so goddamed entitled.
284
My thoughts exactly. I commented that I should save this to use in class as an illustration of inequality. The excess...! And for their weekend home Meanwhile, people are trying to stay warm tonight by riding the subway.
83
How many people did they employ to do the work? And what about the supply chain? I am all for equality, but keep in mind we live in a capitalist country. If everyone stopped purchasing tools and materials and hiring labor, we would all starve.
Yes we need more balance in our economy, but don’t trash these people for fixing up a home and providing work. And honestly, this is small potatoes compared to the likes of Amazon who is driving out small local businesses and adding to pollution all in the name of more stuff.
Think before you criticize.
6
Oh, brother.
Birth control: the great leveler. My grandparents' generation had 4-6 kids; my parents' mostly 1-3.
It's how, after the Second World War, they made it into the middle class.
Immigrants tend to be poor. By being proficient in English and studying hard in school, their children do much better.
1
Lovely house—but that happy little jaunty-tailed cat is the best feature! Enjoy your blessings!
32
Congratulations. Another renovation that robbed a house of any quirkiness, charm, or warmth. They might as well have just bulldozed it and built a new one. It has all the character of a bank lobby.
211
The countertops are flush with the cabinets. Mistake. It should hang over two-1/2 to three inches so when you cook you can easily scrape food into a bowl from the counter top, ala Julia Child. I did this and the kitchen still looks modern.
Also, I would have kept the original spiral staircase. Much richer and interesting.
60
@Lois steinberg As you'll see in the article, they don't actually cook in that kitchen. I'm sure the countertop makes a fine surface for an artistic presentation, and will eventually be replaced by a future owner.
8
@Lois steinberg MY LORD. This is all so FUNNY! I've never done this before... Hysterical x
@Lois steinberg Remember, the wife studied cooking in Florence. I joke, but seriously was this tidbit of information really needed in the article.
3
I actually prefer the original version!
146
@Penelope Smith, I agree 100% and the old flooring was a beautiful color. Why on earth is everyone seemingly opting for gray, steel and white? All the warmth is gone.
45
Agree! Original version better.
6
me too
5
Good for them for trying to hew to their vision and for being brave enough to be honest about their costs and reflections - and for sharing all, here.
Their contractor sounds thoughtful; attentive and fast/responsive - adjectives that sadly don’t correspond to too many of their ilk!
Thank you for sharing and sure, some things I like; some I love; some aren’t my aesthetic but overall think it looks very tasteful and elegant—hope you are enjoying it!
31
Considering the extreme concern for integrity of materials and up to date style, and such generous resources, it is curious that the interest was limited to the structure. A site as interesting as the one pictured would offer many opportunities for elegant building and landscape connections, or shaping of landscape elements. What we see are clumsy steps, uneven paving, suburban plants, random cheap lighting, and eroding soil.
31
@drj: All that can be addressed in time. Sorry to use such an old trope, but Rome wasn’t built in a day.
I’m a huge fan of both MCM and modern. My house has a lot of blinding white and grey but also warmth, too. That said I felt that they took the warmth and what’s special about this house with the glass doors and made it sterile. What’s more is the art in the master bedroom. While it’s interest and moving I couldn’t imagine sleeping underneath what looks like a injured and beaten child on the left and a challenging parenting situation on the right. When you let the NYT into your home (your sanctum sanctorum) you open yourself up to the judgment of others. I like a lot of their art and some of their sensibilities but I do think the home could have been renovated in a manner more true to its original sensibilities. Also cheaper.
62
Restoration vs. renovation vs. re-creation.
Pick a lane.
[Or - pick a budget - then double it. ]
For myself, seeing as it's still (in many, many ways) a 70-year-old home, I'd start from scratch; locate that perfect plot/site, create (with a simpatico architect) that perfect design/aesthetic - and utilize all the (upgraded) building materials & techniques that 70-years hath wrought.
And - with all that money-&-angst saved - vouchsafe all that fine art with a simpatico interior-designer.
As the French say - Voila!
13
@Peter Ryan ....No way Pete! That house is a keeper. The French also say "bof".
Phooey; I like it a lot.
I didn't realize that in-floor radiant heat went back that far. That it lasted that long is a testament to the quality of the components. What wasn't addressed was the electrical service. I would think that it would also need to be upgraded to 200 amp GFCI specs.
13
@Joe
It could have used oil for the boiler heating the water for the radiant heat.
2
@Joe ...Frank Lloyd Wright was big into radiant floor systems - just like that, with copper. Romans did it with hot air.
2
Very nice. Of course everyone would put their footprint on this place, and I would have left the one in the concrete.
35
@charlie: I thought the same thing! A"beauty mark" of sorts. I did not see any example of counterpoint in any of the pics. There is a sameness that I find boring.
2
I prefer the renovated version. I don't like the old floors or counter tops. Most post-war buildings in NYC have blonde or brown wood floors and lots of white. White makes small place look larger. In NYC, the only wood color is the floor. Nobody ever has brown cabinets. Anything rustic looking is eliminated, Most people in NYC seem to go for a, more or less, Four Seasons look. Also,a SoHo Grand look. Manhattan's hotels capture and create the NYC aesthetic. Most homes in the Hampton (for example) look, on the inside, like Manhattan apartments. People may want a home outside the city, but they want to feel like they're in NYC when the are INSIDE their summer house. Many apartments in Park Slope look more rustic than most homes in East Hampton or Greenwich.
16
We live in Manhattan, and have brown cabinets by choice. C’est la vie.
1
Home renovations are about achieving an aesthetic, absolutely, but they are also just as much about maintaining the home and investing wisely.
It leaves me wondering; after all this change, is the house now worth over the 1.2 million sunk into it? I love everything about the home pre renos, especially the accordion doors and unique flooring, though of course the home was suffering from water inundation and decay. Now, it’s cold and, indeed, it does seem brutalist and lacking functionality. A shame.
102
I suspect the original home was a Ranch style, common throughout Connecticut during that era, along with Colonials, Cape Cods, raised ranches, and Garrisons (Victorians and Tudors before then).
The style isn't in keeping with the Connecticut landscape, but many of these people that move into Connecticut aren't interested in New England architecture or sensibilities.
The damage was done with previous renovations, so what's the harm. As long as they are happy....
Changes are they will flip it in a couple of years anyway....
I'm a native of Connecticut. I always preferred the quaintness and character of New England architecture.
11
@Gus
It was built in the modern style in 1948. Modern homes like this were built throughout Connecticut in the postwar years—Johnson’s Glass House was built at roughly the same time in New Canaan—and blend perfectly with the wooded landscape.
50
Unfortunately for towns like this one which are recently suffering the consequences of McMansions going begging and no commercial tax revenues, the cold eye of the appraiser values the after at pretty much the same as the before. Not that this inequity might bother the present owners. After all, here you can park a vintage Ferrari or ten with no more than a taxable value of $500 each.
The project: dreadful, but it’s none of my business.
36
Personally I prefer the before pictures, much warmer. I did not like the black or charcoal. Of course it is all about making the home 'your own,' but on that basis I don't find reader appeal. Personal taste is just that, personal.
68
Having just built a house, I think that the owners are courageous for exposing the costs, building and decision-making process, and to the world in this way--it will--has-- of course, invite(d) comment and criticism. We too looked at many window choices--our house is mostly windows (we sacrificed wall space, putting much art in storage, but feel that the natural world we get to see every day was worth the trade-off). My first choice was steel windows, but given the cost (the single most expensive element) I looked at other options. In the end, we went with steel--it was the most aesthetically consistent. But in the original photos of this house, the windows appear to be wood which costs a lot less than steel (the accordion doors, steel). I would have gone with that. To me, the original window proportions and spacing is much more pleasing. And, while I know that accordion doors are costly (we went with a combination of sliding and French, but we were starting from scratch), the original accordion doors seem central, to the design of the house, as does the transparent front door and adjacent windows. It is the proportions of the glass to the rest of the exterior that makes the difference. With regard to the entry area, it is the width of the window frames. The devil indeed, is in the details. Given the owners' care, creativity and art, I am surprised that the house was furnished straight from the DWR catalogue. Mostly, though, I hope they love their house.
40
@cdesser
How do you justify all that glass considering Global Warming.
Or is it heated with solar and wind?
An architect prof from University of Toronto said , a few years back, that it's hypocritical and useless to discuss
global warming when the glass sky scraper appear like mushrooms in our cities all across the Western and other worlds.
Well, I like it! It seems that, especially at night, it’d be quite beautiful.
14
Wow, just read through some of the comments. I know everybody does not like modern interiors, but the viciousness of some comments is astonishing. We have almost finished a similar remodel. We are making a starkly modern house because that is what we love. I just turned 70 and my wife 69. We are building the house we want to live in until we need to move into assisted living. We are incredibly aware of the privilege we have in being able to do so. After full careers of earning and saving, this is how we wanted to spend our money, creating an environment that to us is beautiful. If you don't like it, buy a cookie cutter traditional home with fru fru everywhere like everyone else.
To those who liked the before pictures, really? You want to live in a dumpy house that's falling apart, leaky, drafty? You equate falling apart with charm? Really?
40
@Bob Carlson, I think it’s jealousy about the wealth that often makes people mean. But you have to admit some of the existing elements were great. Those shoji doors, and the stairway, for instance. I thought the old floor was odd for indoors (besides being full of defunct plumbing). I have seen that wood and concrete grid design used on terraces or patios and around pools, or in an atrium, but never all over the inside of a residence.
It’s a beautiful, home. Certainly not for everyone. Much more suitable for a weekend home than a primary residence.
14
@Passion for Peaches
Wealth? The house is cheap for the area. Westport is, it's true, on the edge of the Gold Coast (Greenwich, Darien, New Canaan), but it's not easy to find ANYTHING decent under 1 mil (under 2 mil!) in this region. In a few years, I'll have 3 mil to spend on a new home, and even with 3 mil, I might be priced out of Greenwich (aside from Cos Cob). Nice 4 BR homes in this are start around 1.75 mil and go up (quickly). Under 1 mil for 4 BR (this is 3BR) is virtually unheard of. In this area, it's around 500k per bedroom.
5
@Anti-Marx this is Weston, not Westport. Weston is generally more affordable than the coastal areas along the Metro North. You can get a lot of home for $1 million.
And the CT market overall, is quote slow right now, due to the tax changes, and far more wealthy families staying in NYC as compared to previous decades. Families are raising their kids in NYC, and these CT towns aren't getting the same demand as in the past.
11
This is a troubled finished project. The design lacks holistic cohesion i.e., multiple designers plus the owners themselves working ad hoc never really uniting the vision into an organic whole. Measure twice, cut once comes to mind.
39
I hardly know where to begin with that redesigned kitchen.
The original update was a brilliant idea: a stainless steel backstop wall for the stove and working area - so easy to clean - and a wall of outlets for necessary appliances. So useful. Surface lighting that reflected off the steel: genius. Replaced with grey drywall that absorbs oil and splashes. And artwork to clean.
And replaced the counter with two cutting boards set above the surface rather than inset - settinging their surfaces so high that you'd need to be at least 6'4" to use them to chop easily. Two cutting boards? For competing teams?
And I note that the original granite - in a color that melded beautifully with the old floor - had a proper overhang to allow you to sweep cooking scraps off easily. The blunt-edged replacement makes sloppy drips and wet drizzling down the side of the counter onto the floor inevitable.
From a working chef, with a diploma from Cordon Bleu.
162
@Nobody, my husband and I are both enthusiastic cooks, and we keep our chopping board (a beefy John Boos end-cut board) atop the counter like that. I like having the higher surface to work on. And I like being able to pick up the enormous, heavy board and wash it thoroughly in the farm sink.
9
@Passion for Peaches, I understand how useful it is to keep cutting boards atop the counter and therefore higher for easier cleaning. I thank you for that. And I do lift mine out at home for cleaning.
But I was very interested to see that the latest Culinary Institute of America training facilities for professional chefs have lowered their countertops and stove top levels to that of a traditional kitchen tabletop - a much more practical level, allowing you to both leverage your shoulders into chopping but also to see more easily down over and into the full surface of the pots on a stove. Lower does seem to work better.
20
@Nobody, I doubt that this homeowner ever will turn on that big fancy Kitchen aide mixer but if they do won't they be surprised to find out what happens to the art directly behind it when those big whips spin. There's a reason you never find them in the Louvre.
43
One and a half mil and there’s no storage space? $75,000 for a kitchen, but no one cooks regularly? Put the spare Jimmy Choos in the Sub-Zero and Calvins in the Wolf. There, all fixed.
138
The house feels very cold and some of these changes feel superfluous (see: staircase). The lack of functionality in the kitchen was especially frustrating to see, particularly as the article describes one member of the couple as trained in the culinary arts (and a very messy art too!) Otherwise an interesting project.
33
While there are some things I would do differently, it is not my house! Kudos for taking care of the structural issues and admitting where better choices could have been made. How one spends their money and what they find esthetically pleasing is an individual choice, there is no need for bashing the couple.
I will say that I hope windows and glass protecting framed art is UV. Even limited edition Richard Serra’s are expensive, as well as a favorite of mine, Jenny Saville. I know, I used to sell them. Please protect your art work and do not hang in direct sunlight, even with UV they can fade.
22
Can someone explain to me what was either ugly, dysfunctional or unsafe about the old circular staircase with the rich warm dark oak threads that required the staircase to be replaced? The article states that the old staircase "was extremely narrow and steep." I see nothing in the before and after photos that changed the width or height of the staircase. Instead, the photos show that the dark oak threads were replaced by what appears to be light-colored plywood.
51
The new stairs extend all the way to the wall. The old one a had a hand rail
between the wall and the stairs. It widens the steps slightly which would allow someone to get there whole foot on the stair.
It’s a real subtle difference.
7
@Robert Plautz, I’d imagine they sold that old staircase for a good sum. It looks like an antique from an industrial space. They are expensive!
7
@Mona R.
Mona, after looking at the photos again, I get and see your point. But really, on the old staircase, would there ever be a time when two people would ever climb the stairs abreast of each other? Was it really worth it? Spend money for the sake of spending money, I guess. But the comment by "Passion for Peaches" seems to indicate that the owners made money off the staircase.
5
This is a wonderful renovation of a wonderful home but the cost is astronomical for the vast majority of Americans. The homes being built today will not last nearly as long as this one.
15
I always thought kitchens without any upper cabinets to store all those messy dishes and replaced with art hanging on the counter backsplash makes tons more sense as well as looking great.
16
This is such a great and helpful article--especially because it makes it clear (many such articles make renovations sound like everything went perfectly smoothly and the owners were 100% thrilled with the outcome, which is unlikely!) that there were problems, and there are a few regrets.
It was also serendipitous to see that they opted for concrete floors. I just moved into a condo in an old Hoboken brownstone. I love it but it needs a LOT of updating (the former owners were Italian-American and had lived here for 60 years before I bought it). There is a small, windowless room that we are converting into a kind of music studio for my son, and also an enormous, partially finished basement space that could also be turned into a music studio, or used as a nice recreation space. I'd read recently that concrete floors actually make the best floors for music studios, but thought, "Yuck...that will look awful." I had no idea that it's possible to make beautiful, polished concrete floors for living spaces. So that's what we're going to do, I think. I'm not sure I'd go for the completely matte, unfinished look, but the article gave me a dose of encouragement about going ahead with my little plan! Here's hoping that it all goes a bit more smoothly than it did for this couple (a footprint?!!).
The minimalist kitchen looks very nice, but I had to wonder where they keep their stuff...
I hope you'll do a lot more articles like this one as I try to figure out what to do with my place.
20
@NGB - The best studio floors are "floating" but the concrete will do just fine if you know how to treat it.
3
@tom harrison thank you! Any tips you can provide would be much appreciated. It's just a tiny, informal room where my son will do a little recording of his own work, with a Roland keyboard and room for some of his guitars, and a desk for his computer-y recording stuff and microphones (as if I know anything about it!). But the less ambient noise that comes in from the surrounding rooms and apartments, the better, and we're also looking into sound-insulating tiles for the ceiling and walls, maybe.
The basement is large enough for more of a full-scale studio, but it will no doubt take a LOT of work and know-how to make it happen. In the meantime, I'd just like to make it look nice, and at least have the floor ready should we decide to go whole-hog on it.
How would one treat the concrete to make it work best?
1
@NGB I wonder if some of the concrete floors that have cushioning underneath might be useful? Would the cushioning act as sound absorption? Dunno but an architect or sound person will. That said, without essentially suspending a room inside another room sound will escape.
4
Thanks for the before and after pictures. They are indispensable when reading about renovations and should be included in all renovation articles.
46
@NK Floor plans with dimensions would be helpful too.
4
@JimmyMac
Couldn't agree more. I LOVE floorplans, but I've given up seeing them.
2
I live in a MCM house. It is a deeply Zen indoor/outdoor living experience on one hand and like living inside the Lament Configuration from the Hellrasier movies on the other. It is not for the faint of heart.
15
The sensible trend for kitchen floors is for wood.
People went for tile because of durability and its looks.
But wood just feels better under one's feet.
As a decorator myself, I used poured concrete for tables and
countertops back in 1995, and this look is nearing its end.
The wildly popular granite really does look gross nowadays.
This house is very nice even if they sacrificed practicality for the aesthetics.
21
Anyone who cooks in a kitchen with wood floors can tell you how much easier they are on your knees and back than tile or stone floors. After Thanksgiving and the major clean up after the major cooking, I thanked my lucky stars again that my friend talked me into them. And they are beautiful.
23
@Stephen Granite countertops look "gross?" Designers love to create trends and then make them horribly outdated so everyone spends more money on yet another remodel. First world problems for sure. (Did you know that granite is a beautiful, natural stone with character and depth, unlike the currently popular manufactured materials in stark white, black, grey with no life to them.)
3
@Katy . I knew I'd offend some by calling granite countertops gross.
It might have to do with people spending so much money on them in the first place.
Style is funny that way. Depending on your age, look back twenty, or thirty years ago about clothes, hairstyles, etc., and often the thought is, "what was I thinking?".
Perhaps the word I could have used was, "passe" , because I think it is.
2
I salute the couple for their bravery and honesty in allowing this article to be written and published. But with all of those professionals taking all that money, someone of them should have had the courage to to say "no".
We owned a midcentury modern house on a hillside designed by an international architect and these houses are best left alone. Some updating is called for with elements that deteriorate if a house is to be lived in, but leave the bones alone.
With no disrespect to Mr. Flood, what if this had been a Wright house or even Philip Johnson house. It would have been labeled altered beyond recognition.
66
A home with water running under and around it with rotted doors and single paned windows is not fit for a weekend home. If you are buying a home for its intrinsic value maybe those things don’t bother you. If you are choosing a house to live in, even if just on the weekends - make it livable. They made choices differently than I would have, but they chose to go with what they want to live with. I did crack up about the cabinets in the kitchen popping open.
13
Regarding those pros who failed to say “No!”: perhaps they got fired and replaced. Much like all the MCM charm.
2
It’s a relief to read this article. We are at the very end of a similar remodel, but about twice the square footage. We’ve had exactly the same experience. Our budget ended up double what we thought. The cost of high end materials and workmanship is breathtaking. And that’s just good stuff not Trump type opulence. In our case we took a masonry block square with no views from inside and turned it into a modern house with a wall of 15’ tall windows facing a 6000’ mountain ridge a mile away. Instead of concrete floors we have meter square gray tiles that look like concrete and have turned out terrific.
19
Credit to the couple for sharing their renovation, warts and all. I commend them for putting themselves out there for our praise and (yikes) criticism. Now that I’m older I have an interior designer and a wonderful general contractor to guide me. However, throughout the years I have made many design mistakes that I cringe at. I’m sure we have all had our doozies. I wish the couple the very best in their home.
41
Oh man - I read the comments before I saw the pictures bc I didn’t have internet service. I thought the comments were too harsh, but I now that I see the pictures I agree that the before was much cozier and had more elegance and personality. Hopefully the home owners like it - since it was in such bad shape there probably wasn’t much saving it anyway.
46
Gorgeous, classic Americana. Congratulations to the owners. Love to see a mid-century beauty renovated, rather than torn down. Wishing Justin and Samantha Barnes many years of joy and happiness in their weekend retreat.
18
I liked the before living room better than the after. The before is warmer looking.
The rest of the house is a nice renovation.
15
Why did it takes months of plotting and indecision to just order the routine items in every Design Within Reach catalog?
It seems these folks have so much money, and have spent so much time on Instagram, that they've convinced themselves they have taste -- and the checks clear/the credit card limit is high enough so that nobody has the heart to tell them otherwise. This comes off as equivalent to going to H&M or Zara for fast fashion to ride the current wave. Except they spent $1.6M. And, of course, the irony of such heavy handed expression of perceived Good Taste and Culture coming at such a large environmental and resourceful cost is hilarious.
To be so utterly clueless as to the actual context and ethos of mid-century modern design is impressive. Nothing says form-meets-function and bringing thoughtful design elements to the average American home like these two try-hards.
100
@Mark S
Not sure I could have said it better. Have to agree with
one of the other readers, the living room (old ) looks better.
23
Seems like it was overpriced to begin with. Also, it cost so much because here in CT any home renovation work is ridiculously expensive. Just got a bid to paint kitchen cabinets and it was $8,500. We moved here recently from CA and have been shocked each time we get a bid.
18
If you can do it yourself, I recommend it.
It’s not fun but doing it yourself will save a lot money.
A lovely renovation, I hope the owners get many happy decades from it.
From way out in California, it's hard to imagine a contractor showing up for $37k, let alone removing and replacing the floor of an entire home. I know of one contractor who bid on a similar drainage solution to the one described, albeit through clay soil not solid rock - and at $130k, not $17k!
19
I appreciate this couple putting it all out there. They did a thoughtful and lavish renovation of a fine home, but they acknowledge their mistakes and share them, so the rest of us may benefit. I for one, picked up a few tips thanks to their candor.
Unfortunately, there are plenty of jealous readers here who are quick to criticize. Just about everything. For every ridiculous reason. But I applaud the couple for this intriguing story of bringing a home back from the brink.
59
Is anyone reminded by this renovation of the renovations made of the charming Victorian era home by the city folk in the film “Beetlejuice”? I am.
20
What was dated about the granite counters? The choice of color and type is always going to be a personal decision but I thought the counters made the kitchen cheery.
33
It's already dated, much like the old kitchen they couldn't live with.
But it's not as awful as what's happening to small Edwardian / Victorian homes in San Francisco, where the entire structure gets gutted and transformed into unrecognizable, soulless, charm-free open space with waterfall countertops and Sub-Zeros that only chill leftover takeout and La Croix water.
81
@Randy every time I see one of those "soulless, charm-free open spaces," I remind myself it's now a canvas for exciting future designs. Every time I see an ugly new building go up, I think "here's one they'll be glad to tear down some day and put up something better."
If I didn't think this way, I'd go mad!
1
@Randy I know how you feel. Why buy a beautiful Victorian home with wonderful crown molding and lovely golden oak woodwork just to rip it all out and paint everything white? And, why do so many people want their homes to look like all other homes?
2
@Randy You got that right
2
Yeah, I don't get this one either. That's an unbelievable amount of money to spend for what ends up looking like a not-particularly-great modern prefab.
76
The heating problem could have been alleviated with a change to another system. Painting over the ungodly white walls would have saved the retro stone floors & granite counter tops. Sterile & brutish it is after renovation.
29
The comments on here are too harsh! The couple took a difficult deteriorating old MCM and brought back to a new life, full of art and design. Lay off you people! It’s gorgeous!
24
@Rick Landavazo i know! I agree. I am appalled by all the nasty comments....
2
You lost me at "dated granite countertops." For a couple of decades I've been reading that granite is passe. Who cares? It's sturdy, beautiful and warm. I don't know what the new counters are made of, but they're cold. In fact, the whole house is cold. It had much more character before. This is all about trendiness and snobbery, in my opinion.
100
Looks like a DWR catalogue. Very sad indeed.
48
A real shame. They could have just bought something already lacking soul and warmth, rather than tearing it out of such a lovely space.
76
The criticism of the owners is unseemly. This is really quite a small project in comparison to the obscene lifestyles pursued by sports figures, entertainers and celebrities of all stripes. Nobody seems to complain about them. Obviously this couple owns a successful business and they are certainly entitled to spend their money as they please. It's not just money down a rat hole, it supports other businesses, craftsmen and workers who were involved in the project. So go find something else to complain about I would suggest.
35
@david
"Unseemly"? Be serious. If they like it, that's great, but if they agree to be profiled in the newspaper, they surely understand not everyone will like it. We're all entitled to our opinion.
4
@david
"Unseemly"? Be serious. If they like it, that's great, but if they agree to be profiled in the newspaper, they surely understand not everyone will like it. We're all entitled to our opinion.
To spend $600k and leave that excrescence of a second floor bedroom still sitting there --it had been added after the home was built -- is simply mind-boggling.
17
@Tony Eads Thank you for introducing me to a word I've never heard or used: excrescence - an unattractive or superfluous addition or feature.
3
With the spiral stairs up to the bedroom, it's not a house to grow old or be disabled in. I do love the views to the outside.
21
I think that’s why there are walking sticks in the “before” guest room photo. It appears the previous owner was using the downstairs bedroom as the master.
Money to burn, good taste, and not much common sense. A chef's kitchen but no food in the fridge because "we never cook." No info on closet or other storage space because, i'm guessing, there ain't much of it.
I hope they enjoy it. Me, I'd build my own from scratch.
34
I intensely dislike MCM. To me it starts out ugly and gets worse as the building deteriorates. Probably this is why I don't think the remodel job hurt the house. Start with a poor house, end with a poor structure.
This was most clearly an exercise in Conspicuous Consumption.
22
I sorta kinda liked the before better than the after.
50
Dated granite countertops. Welcome to the 2020s.
36
@Mala Down here in North Carolina, they are still very popular. I moved into my then-new house in 1993 and have Corian countertops and still love them.
1
What a shame. All the beauty and character was stripped away. Another Mid-Century Modern house is ruined by people who have no business renovating them or owning them.
52
The only thing warm and inviting about this house was the little gray cat.
104
I enjoyed reading about the remodel and seeing pretty pictures but this is really a story about people with too much money and too little common sense who don't listen to the advice of professionals.
97
In an area that sees a lot of tear downs and gigantic castles built in their place, it's refreshing to see a house restored.
36
I like the renovation & always find it refreshing when people don’t build to the “resale” formula. There’s a buyer for clean, uncluttered spaces. Also, I hope someone will pass along the idea of using some product on the ceiling like Quiet Rock. It’s heavier than regular drywall but makes a huge difference. Maybe try it in one room & see if it helps? Rainy days in such a beautiful house should be a cozy pleasure.
15
It all started when art galleries painted their spaces stark white. As I painter, I get it. The popularity of this aesthetic moved into living spaces and has become ubiquitous for several decades. By the early 2000's I noticed a museum or 2 painting walls colors in keeping with eras of paintings' origin, usually 18 & 19th century. Stark white prevails. I believe, that's the influence in this renovation. I've painted my art studio all white with natural wood doors and trim. The whiteness helps me see the clarity of the paint and light I'm working with. In living spaces it can get too icy. A balance of warmer surfaces, such as light wood floors & tabletops, would have added subtle warmth. Heated concrete & tiles translate subconsciously as hard and cold surfaces in the Northeast. Wood has some give and warmer to the touch in winter. Spiral staircases were once fashionable. I can see they couldn't replace it, but, that's a serious issue down the line. Siting a building at a hill is another issue that should have been mitigated when first constructed. This is the couple's house and we must assume they are happy with the outcome. For the rest of us, aesthetics is so personal. I'm surprised to see so many negative comments. The norm for years in the NY area is modern white ultra contemporary. Furnishings to match. Pretty much every apartment listing fits this description. Is there a rebellion brewing?
23
@ga The rebellion is because everybody's living space looks alike. That gets so dull after awhile.
15
@ Linda, exactly, I know what to expect in pretty much all metro listings on all coasts. People tend to be sheepish and so terrified of resale value that they've lost imagination. Those sheepskin things tossed around! What a 'brilliant' idea! Staged in every listing. Take a look at European countries and their time worn beautiful exteriors and living spaces.That's inspiring.
11
@ga
You might find this paint collection of interest:
http://www.finepaintsofeurope.com/Guggenheim.aspx
I'm scratching my head at every move these people made. Almost as if they bought the house for its moniker, "midcentury Pavilion."
Then destroyed the look. As another commenter stated, why not start from scratch? Corporate boardroom style is an odd sensibility for an artistic leaning couple.
74
@dave beemon Same reaction here. In particular, that front wall of operable floor to ceiling windows looking onto the stone patio was just a central element of the composition, as they were in many such modern homes in the postwar period. I actually find it a bit painful to look at those before and after pictures of the living room. I would think that rebuilding those would have been a top priority. Investing in a house like this and then closing that off is a real head-scratcher. Then again, yeah, it's kind of a head-scratcher from top to bottom.
55
I can understand how much more practical the new floors are, but as others have pointed out, the house comes across as very "cold" and bland now. It's possible to have soul and interest in a monotone modern scheme, but alas they didn't yet succeed. Perhaps warm-toned lighting could make it feel less austere and institutional.
(Also, the art hung across from the sliding doors above the couch is a nice colorful focal point, but too small for the space, in my opinion.)
23
Congratulations for renovating your beautiful home!
We had done a similar project on our 1952 mid-century designed home. And yes ... with so much going on at once there were a few things we wished were done differently. However that does not diminish the pride, enjoyment & the wonderful past 27 years.
We wish you the same!
20
All the finger-wagging and tongue-lashing in these comments is quite over the top. No doubt the couple will be adding this story to their list of regrets.
While reading the article, I bought into the 'thank god for the professionals' argument put forth throughout. But in the end, and without knowing anything thing about the dynamics between the parties, I think the pros failed their clients.
A team was hired to renovate a dwelling everyone recognized as unique. But no one stood up for the house. The pros were enablers and not much more.
77
@RKP “The pros were enablers and not much more,” you say. I have contractor friends who have done jobs like this in lower Fairfield County. They relate experiences of holding their breath and their tongues from the moment they walk on the job to the minute they peel out of town. If the client (not “the customer”) doesn’t like the looks of one of their helpers, that one’s gone instantly. They are told they are being retained for their expertise, but in fact they’re being paid to do what they’re told, no matter how dumb or ultimately disastrous that might be. In short, they are treated like muscle rather than brain, and if they ever speak up against a client’s preferences, it’s taken out of their hides.
I’d surmise any of us think we’d be able to stand with integrity and act in a customer’s best interests. Sorry to burst that bubble, but entitled affluent people with visions of Sub-Zero and Wolf and gray seamless floors dancing in their heads will mow over the pros every time.
35
@ Matt, I understand your point but the clients are paying the bills and will be living in the house. Contractor's expertise should ultimately be structural, technical and to code. And you guys and gals do a great job! Aesthetics is a whole other game. If lucky, sometimes the client and builder mesh and the interplay can lead to better results. I've had many a suggestion that grated and an insistent contractor. It's a lot of stress for the homeowner too. It's hard to swallow your pride but that comes with the territory.
@Matt In English, well the pros on this job can now labor under the near-universal scorn for their work. Hope they found the job worthwhile.
Fact is, people who presumably know better- and have the wherewithal to communicate effectively- made a long series of terrible decisions. Technically, the concrete floor is a lawsuit in the making. Aesthetically, the facade of doors in the living room is a disgrace. The original doors danced along the facade. The new doors appear straight out of a big box store. It very hard, impossible, to feel much sympathy for the contractors/pros.
2
A few questions.
Is "The Money Pit" no longer available for viewing?
When should we feel sorry for the 1%?
Does the 1% understand "survived" in any global sense?
Where do the fine lines between art, architecture, sensible but attractive housing, historical significance and preservation intersect?
44
From what I saw, the old looked warmer in feel. But still modern. Not an improvement in design.
46
@Paul Z: Absolutely concur. But it's not my house.
I will never get putting aesthetics over functionality in a kitchen. Someone who has the experience that Ms. Barnes does should have known this, and it mystifies me that she couldn't think ahead in that specific regard.
28
@guyslp But they admit that they barely cook. They wanted the look of a kitchen without useful access to the things you cook with.
9
I miss the mid-century details that were stripped away — the openness of the former plan and the wall of windows. It's definitely a modern house now, not a charming mid-century home.
62
I was glad to see they could not conquer the sound of the rain falling on the roof. Nature wins that one.
146
@Ed Andrews I grew up in a very small house with a tin roof where we heard every rain storm that came. I still love that sound.
21
Oh my. Hard to know where too begin.
So, in the spirit of the holidays, I won't.
Good luck to all!
129
@jazz one Thank you for helping me to resist a very strong urge. Happy holidays to all!
7
@jazz one
Oops, meant 'to,' not 'too!'
Yikes. Embarrassing.
Mea culpa.
1
As a builder I have to say I'm impressed with the way things were shoehorned into place. The problem solving by the architect and builder deserves praise. The end result, not so much. If that monolithic concrete floor maintains that appearance after a few years I would be surprised.
77
I'm going to make a wager, that this place will eventually be found on some flavor of an Airbnb site, and will be rented out for short-term shenanigans at excessive rates. And if there are neighbors nearby, they are going to so thrilled.
This place doesn't look comfortable enough to live in, but it will suit the purpose for somebody's raucous cocktail party.
77
Sad to see such a waste of resources. The kitchen cabinets were old? Someone will purchase this house in 5 years just to put the upper cabinets back and get rid of the lifeless grey floor. We should enforce a carbon tax on this type of pointless pretentious remodeling. At some point, the environmental cost of vanity needs to be shouldered by those who squander.
192
@Carol M: I'm not quite as harsh as you are, as it comes down to any individual's home, and particularly its interior, being their personal castle that is configured to their taste.
But I couldn't believe that the old kitchen, which clearly was not old since it had lovely granite countertops, was replaced as it was.
But, I say again, it's not my house.
20
Will design ever move past all these hateful shades of grey?
I can’t think of a color that better describes the lack of soul and imagination that dominates luxury aesthetics.
111
@Catherine Despont
Thank you! Greys are for dungeons and prison cells, not kitchens. Designers, please move on, instead of greywashing everything ad nauseum.
6
House renovated; charm removed.
253
The house was near perfect before! This is a tragedy!
91
@Becky I completely agree!
3
Two words for this neurotic, entitled, annoying couple: Family. Money. Or, Trust Fund. How nice for them that they tossed obscene amounts of cash around only to wind up with a bland, cold, uninteresting shell of a potentially very interesting house with good bones. Money $$ than taste or stability, clearly.
171
As some others have commented: clueless and entitled owners who turned a warm, welcoming Modernist gem into a cold, sterile place which has all the charm of an airport lounge. Well done!
144
What a shame, why did they buy the house in the first place? They ruined the character and warmth of their home.
82
So much money spent with such sad results. I can't help feeling it looks like something out of a Rove Concept ad. The before pictures feel very avant garde for 1948 but the new ones simply
give us a dull, sterile and unimaginative image for our times.
Some one has gleaned too long and hard at what Dwell offers up.
59
I stopped reading at 7-foot ceilings. Next.
19
No kidding.
Who takes care of the cat when they are not there? Or does the cat go with them back and forth to the city? Or was the cat a model brought in for the photo shoot?
76
@david Everything about these people and this place is staged.
3
It’s sleek and nothing is out of place but where’s the soul?
56
@CC C
Yeah, the picture of the couple "relaxing in their den" really boggled me.
1
Clearly they needed to replace the floor. But why not put in their new concrete floor colored like the old one and keep everything else the same?
25
Man! A lot of catty comments.
I like the changes. The house looks great. I like clean and functional.
They are a young couple and don’t cook much. So, are they horrible people because of that? I think not.
It looks beautiful to me.
I wish you the best with it!
27
@Scottapottomus Actually everyone seemed to like the cat
4
I was so distracted by the annoying Sotheby's advertisement that wouldn't go away on the right hand side of ALL of the photos, I gave up.
11
I'm contemplating what to do with my mom's house, built around 1960, and I was hoping to see some good ideas in this article.
There's not many to be found. Every example shown was either better in the 'before' photo, or substantially equivalent. Tons of money spent, (literal) tons of waste generated and dumped, and for what? Fixing the leakage issue was necessary of course, but spending money to reduce the beautiful panoramic views because they're distracting? That's just nuts. Drastically reducing cabinet space in the kitchen and hiding outlets in drawers? I can't see how that makes the kitchen more functional.
There were too many unnecessary complications, it seems to me.
140
It’s all about making pretty photos on “ social media “. It’s a stage or movie set, NOT for actual living. Really sad, I love the bones of the place and it could be really fantastic for a lot less money.
Seriously.
35
@Phyliss Dalmatian
I'd have consulted design libraries for ideas about what was done originally, and gone with that (other than modern appliances, that is).
19
@SB yeah, I have to agree that I went, "Huh?!" when I read that the outdoor scenery was "too distracting" (in that case, why buy a house in the country?) And also that the sound of the rain was annoying. Those are the kinds of things we NEED to distract us in this screen-obsessed age. It's why I moved from one perfectly nice condo to another one that needs a lot of work--it has a little yard that is my own (with two 60-year-old fig trees in it), and which will distract me and my dog in wonderful ways, especially once spring comes again. I always feel great after I've been getting dirty working out there. And I put my bedroom at the back of the house (which was formerly used as a dining room) just so that I could wake up and see the yard through the picture window.
And I love the sound of the rain on the roof, although perhaps it can get to be a BIT much in a house like that.
27
The"reimagined" new spaces would make a lovely home...for robots.
76
the old living room had such a nice hygge quality to it. can't say I'm a fan of the transition to cool tones, concrete, and dark midcentury modern decor, but to each their own
55
Smooth concrete is great to skate on, but my bones much prefer wood or carpet to walk on. Maybe for weekends only it would almost be tolerable.
34
Basically they bought and tossed a $800K house, replacing something that charming and warm with a real chill. While the structural and mechanical issues could have been fixed, the new owners chose to renovate rather than restore, just like previous owners. All this for an additional $600K, what a bargain, I guess.
61
Most every trace of warmth and charm has been remodeled out of this (previously) beautiful house. Depressing.
111
50 years from now, the NYT will run an article about this house being "brought back to original".....and so, the architect cycle continues.
116
@RonRich
make that 10 years from now, if that.
4
Worst before/after I have ever seen. It almost reads like a spoof of Dwell mag article. All life sucked out. In many photos I got before and after confused, bc after looked so dulled and lifeless and, well, worse.
313
Boy, they really sucked the warmth and humanity out of that house. Particularly troubling are the potted broad-leaf plants - straight out of every apartment-dwelling hipster's Instagram feed - that are obscuring the view out to the much more lovely and developed natural landscape.
180
@Matt
Agree! I couldn't figure out why you would put a bunch of plants in there to "complement" the landscape, what the heck … if you appreciated the actual landscape, which was supposedly why you bought the place, why would you do that?
Actually, in practically every picture I thought, "Why would you do that."
7
Oh, to have the money to make the mistakes this couple made. They will never recover their investment on resale, which, I fear, may be very soon.
65
Love, love, love their commitment to the aesthetics of the house!!
7
@Rick Landavazo: And I weep for their lack of consideration of same.
3
I’m excited that someone is restoring a beautiful old house, but I was shocked to see how little was restoration or working with the original spirit of the place, rather than just typical repairs. I do not think this renovation is worthy of the NYT to cover. There are far more meaningful and committed projects out there in the world. As someone who does this sort of work myself with teams of people who want to do things the right way, not the convenient way, I am saddened by this coverage. Please go out of the tri state area (or within, even) and find better stories worthy of your and our attention.
117
I spent a summer as an invited artist on the centennial of Taliesin in Spring Green Wisconsin. Many would hold that Frank Lloyd Wright is a genius but that compound was a structural disaster. Windows that wouldn't close, floors that collapsed, balconies that couldn't support the weight of a small child, roofs that were more sieve that shelter, rotted wood, moldy stucco etc. A mid century pile of rot that was explained away by the acolytes who run the place with: "Oh you have to remember, this was Mr. Wright's laboratory where he tried out new ideas." Ideas which appear to have failed spectacularly on almost every occasion.
Mid century architecture is the answer to the question, "What happens when you leave a work of art out in the rain."
61
@ pigeon
I love mid-century architecture and design, but cannot avoid recognizing his failings. At its best it represents a noble idealism, but it is compromised both by the realities of nature and the laws of physics.
22
I’m rolling my eyes at the commenters who love the old look and wouldn’t change a thing. Yeah, you would. The heating/cooling system wasn’t working at all in some places, not efficiently others, the windows and doors were single-paned glass which is is terribly uncomfortable in hot or cold weather, the French doors were rotting and the wood frames on the floor were, too. Personally I have always hated granite countertops. I’m not in love with some of their choices but I doubt they would love all my choices either. Just because you have an old house doesn’t mean you have a great house. This renovation resolved the problems with the home. The looks weren’t the problem. The structure itself was.
12
@pigeon: Wright was one of the greatest architects ever to have lived from a pure design aesthetic perspective. But he was horrible in terms of ignoring stark realities of his existing built projects, and their shortcomings, as time marched on.
There are ways to retain Wright's aesthetic vision without the compromises to durability and engineering sense that he indulged. Many restoring Wright structures make very significant improvements that are never, ever seen, which is what he should have been doing, but didn't.
His hubris was legendary, too. Visiting private residences that you've designed, and throwing out furnishings that you didn't design and do not like but that belong to the owners/residents, is obscene.
9
The house renovation is very nice and it seems that the heating, air conditioning, plumbing and wiring needed an update. However, this article seems a little condescending in its description of the previous version. Why so snarky with the contractors pouring the floors and previous owners attempt at making the drainage work and windows and doors to let the outside in?
Let’s see how this incarnation holds up 50 years from now.
25
@Jane K This house, like 99% of other contemporary schlock like it will be a scrap heap in 25 years at the most.
Traditionalist buildings last and last for centuries. No drain chains required. It looks like someone just threw that monstrosity onto that beautiful landscape.
Dead city.
8
Wow. They managed to remove every ounce of mcm charm. Tragic.
100
Love the decorator cat!
41
I liked the house very much BEFORE the renovation. They remodeled all the wonderful character out of the house. So sad.
92
They took a beautiful, architecturally significant house and made it into something disfunctional and bland that will look dated in 10 years. I can't help but wonder what the 'difficult, clueless client' premium was on the project.
149
@Torioski. Here in CT that markup is set by law at between 100 and 200 percent, and you may be sure, every penny is earned. Our stalwart contractors never refuse, and keep their thoughts to themselves.
9
My husband and I are currently restoring an 1890 folk Victorian, with a balance of reasonable convenience and full respect for the aesthetic character of the house. In short, we bought this property out of love for its innate personality, because that’s what we were looking for. After seeing countless botch jobs on historic houses in the real estate listings, I honestly wonder what people like these two are thinking. If you want a gallery to live in and protect your artwork from the light, buy a warehouse instead of bastardizing a surviving mid-century.
191
I do love midcentury modern architecture, and I wish we had more of it a few towns over in Trumbull.
However, when we are calling a kitchen with granite and high end stainless appliances "dated", it makes me wonder how long we can enjoy this way of life, and the disproportionate spoils that accrue to the professional and managerial class. I'm quite happy with the old kitchen in our Colonial.
149
I realize that this wasn't a home of historical architectural significance, but don't call this a "renovation". Some really lousy, insensitive decisions were made that weren't necessary, and the cost shouldn't have been a surprise.
122
Having been a little "Mid-century Modern" girl in 1947, I read this with great interest. Our family's house was built that year, with concrete floors throughout, radiant heating, a tiny utilities room, huge glass windows overlooking a magnificent view of the Connecticut River Valley and mountains of Massachusetts. Yes, it had a flat roof! It was not a large house, but spacious and lovely, even with Eames chairs! What helped make it ours were the family antiques and a few beautiful oriental carpets in strategic places. They made it look less sterile. I loved that house as does its owner today!
37
Minimalism is about the careful refinement of detail.
It’s distressing how assiduously, carefully, and insensitively the most charismatic parts of this house were destroyed.
211
@Sam Dwyer I completely agree
3
These people even upgraded their brown fluffy cat with a sleek gray minimalist cat. And I agree the artwork in the bedroom is disturbing.
71
@Jane, what do you find disturbing about Jenny Saville’s paintings? The red paint is just her thing. Her style, or signature gesture. I think it’s funny that they hung two exhibition posters for her work...right near an original piece of her work. Sort of like a big red arrow pointing to an “important” artwork.
13
Maybe it's just me, and I adore architecture, but I found these owners to be clueless and entitled and I have little sympathy for the travails they encountered and the obscene amounts of cash they expended in remodeling their weekend getaway.
Pouring a single slab of concrete in a single 15 hour day, hoisting huge pieces up a ladder, whining that they didn't get steel doors...
Give me a break.
356
@Kiska how about not examining the kitchen island slab while it was still on the truck instead of having the workmen drag it into the house, install it, and THEN decide the finish was wrong.
I truly pity the workmen who had to execute this couple’s foolish ideas and decisions.
12
@Kiska: If you had any understanding of concrete construction, you'd know that a slab of concrete, such as here, has to laid without interruption. Concrete shrinks as it cures, so it has to be laid in one fell swoop unless you're fine with an expansion joint traipsing across your living room floor.
so ... the aesthetic of not having outlets which are tucked inside drawers ... does that mean the resulting "aesthetic" is a drawer hanging open with a wire sticking out if someone wants to use that precisely placed objet d'art of a stand mixer? bizarre! & definitely not great for resale!
269
@Aubrey
was wondering the same. also, what does one mix when there is no flour our sugar because there is no pantry?
6
@Aubrey Outlets inside of drawers? That's the dumbest thing I ever heard of.
6
"We do not keep food in the house"
The lack of storage space in the kitchen may come back to bite them when they go to sell.
114
@JBC Why remodel a kitchen with costly appliances, new countertop etc. if one does not plan to cook orkeep food in the house?
44
Having some accommodation for food storage is not an unusual expectation. And I thought she was a passionate chef?
2
@JBC ....and why you need a kitchen if you don't cook?
1
We are currently building a modernist retirement home. We so envy all the houses in Dwell that have wide, unscreened doors opening directly to the outdoors. Alas, impossible in rural VA, where we are awash in summer humidity and bugs (including the loathsome Chinese import, stinkbugs, which find their way inside by the dozens if you leave a door even slightly ajar). Please, NYT, cite vendor names for window framing and glass, and concrete floor heating systems, etc., in similar articles. Otherwise, a most interesting article!
6
@Country Life What I find truly alarming...stinkbugs...in rural Virginia!!! With global warming how soon will we be seeing them up here in Canada??!
It's too bad the original floors couldn't be saved.
Beautiful cats!
24
The colour scheme leaves me cold. We’re going to look at the all-grey trend currently overtaking interiors the same way we do ‘70s brown and orange. Sure the house was a little dated before. But now it looks tragically 2010s. And joyless to boot.
157
Must be nice to have that kind of money. I am using 85 year old kitchen cabinets and a laminate counter. Wow so granite is now dated. Spouse considers the kitchen a non priority. Our place is a dump compared to the first version of this house. Their renovations are totally out of our reach. What kind of jobs and paychecks does one need to be able to afford this???
66
@Susan
Indeed. I read "dated granite countertops" with a laugh. Yea, it's dated alright. The granite is 30 million years old.
162
@Moehoward -- I have never thought about granite that way. You have given me a whole new appreciation for our "dated" kitchen - thank you!
30
@Susan, the trend cycle of counter materials is all about having what others are striving after. Granite was all the rage until cheap Chinese granite flooded the market, the big box stores started carrying it, and it was in all the starter condo developments and mid-priced hotels. So then the affluent had to have Carrara marble. That became ubiquitous and predictable. Then the manmade surfaces came in (Caesarstone, etc.), and they were more expensive that marble or granite. There was a short period of concrete counters (they don’t hold up very well, so a lot of people have ripped them out). So that was a limited trend. Now the hot ticket seems to be humongous slabs quartz and quartzite, Caesarstone and Cambria Stone. Still a show-off high cost element but usually subtle in patterning (not always though). Other than that, what I also see these days is weird custom finishes, like leathered granite. And soapstone is a trend that waxes and wanes but never fully disappears.
More than a dozen years ago, I put in a subtle, high-quartz granite that looks like jade. I’ve been very happy with it. It’s tough as nails.
So it is downright silly to say that granite is “dated.” What dates a kitchen is the overall design. The cabinets are usually the major guilty party in dating a kitchen, but it’s also the details and layout, the colors used, the edge treatment on the counter, etc. Simple designs age best.
27
A house with character, and a lot of logistical problems, has been replaced by a bland, lifeless doctor's waiting room. Bleh.
220
@Douglas R
Agreed. There's nothing at all left that's midcentury modern except the facade. They swapped the "worst of the early 2000s" kitchen with the worst of the 2010's.
This owners should have spent more time looking at what midcentury homes actually look like, and less time watching cheap house-flipping shows on HGTV.
66
I AM a doctor. That is an insult to our nice waiting rooms.....
7
All in all, they did a very nice job. I might have gone with a lighter color for the cabinetry.
The home is redolent of the film, "The Ice Storm."
I can't help but think Christina Ricci is downstairs doing something naughty.
21
She’s downstairs with her secret boyfriend, an aspiring musician.
I love what they did (and I grew up in a MCM home)....the updates keep it working, functional and airy.....I also hugely appreciate their honesty. Tired of all the projects where the owners never admit a mistake! About to start our own and this has been useful and educational.
21
I'm glad they paid all that money, hopefully the people who got it will have better ideas on what to do with it.
50
Seven foot ceilings? Really?
14
@John
Well, that's "mid century modernism" for you. It wasn't "form follows function." It was more like form is everything and function be damned.
8
@John That's like Frank Lloyd Wright houses--in fact, the house seems like one of his "Usonian" models (we have one in town--recent owners also paid a fortune to update).
7
Wow, so much goes into a house like that. Unbelievable. Well done.
7
A classic example of more money than sense.
267
You mean more money than (good) taste; woefully overthought but under designed with all the relaxing warmth of a Midwest bus station.
13
The look they were after is the new now and common. What they had was playful and full of light. Wish they had just repaired this little gem instead of erasing it.
77
You rip out a perfectly functional kitchen and then spend $76,000 on a new kitchen for a weekend home where you don’t even keep food? This is the worst type of consumerism. Let’s live a little more simply and more sustainably.
473
@Lina 39% of greenhouse gas emissions are from the construction industry. Ripping out perfectly functional interiors on this scale should be a thing of the past.
8
@Lina That was my thought, too, when I read the article. Why bother remaking a kitchen, and one that most people would NOT like, when you aren't going to use it? They are going to have trouble selling that one. It's a shame, spending all that money and wasting so much material.
7
I read this article and immediately thought of S. J. Perelman. It's the sort of thing he would have quoted an excerpt and followed with a glorious parody (possibly ending with something like the owners burning down the house to give it that extra-warm feeling).
57
Apparently they are going for mid-21st century.
30
Love their artwork.
5
Yeah this story about a 1.6 million dollar weekend house really resonates with me. Not.
120
Are neighborhoods like this one empty during the week, when all those Manhattan and a Brooklyn weekenders go back to the city? It sure seems that way, based in all the “weekend home” stories I read in this paper. So wasteful.
25
@Passion for Peaches
Chances are this couple rents a small 1BR in Manhattan and put their ownership money into this house, which they will move into full time in ten years. I love Weston CT, but most people buying a SECOND home, choose to buy it in the Hamptons or further upstate. Not that close to NYC. In Manhattan, real estate is about 750k per bedroom. So, a 2BR will start at 1.5 mil. It's cheaper to rent in NYC and then buy a 3-4BR outside the city, and move in when you can make your own hours at work.
My guess is that most of these outside-the-city buyers are renting (and not buying) in Manhattan. They don't own two homes. They own one and rent one. The weekend home is the one they actually own. It's sort of an inversion of the buying habits of yesteryear.
13
@Anti-Marx
Is 2+ hours drive considered "close" to NYC? That's about my limit for a weekend place.
3
@Anti-Marx In some cases, yes, but I'm seeing this own/rent phenomenon more in the Catskills / upstate, and at lower price points. These folks are equity owners and probably can afford to own both places
4
oh god i hope these people have learned to live with that horrible glare on their art.
before pictures were way better, i feel sad for this house.
65
Ah, to be rich and able to waste lots of money on your second (?) home. It's true, I'm jealous. Looks very nice.
10
It looked better before.
64
@Brian Yeah, this is the first before/after architecture article that I've ever read in my life where I preferred the "before" to the "after"
34
The only desirable element of this whole thing is the cat. Everything else, oy vey, you can have it!
78
@Tony Robert Cochran. I think the cat started out as beige,
and was dyed to match.
22
BRRRRR! It looks cold. Better for Palm Springs, CA than Weston, Connecticut.
20
@jmilovich: radiant heating in the floors and double glazing on the new windows. Warm as toast, I bet.
Why would a trained chef want a beautiful kitchen with high end appliances, then get rid of the pantry because they don't cook & prefer to order in?
Everything in this house is about appearance, not livability or comfort.
If you can afford it and tolerate being constantly inconvenienced (like not being able to cook a meal), go for it.
I like beautiful design as much as the next person but my number one requirement would be a very comfortable space I could fully live in.
It feels like a lot of that was sacrificed to how things look.
However, the cat is lovely.
115
@fast/furious
Ha ha. The cat is lovely and seems to be enjoying the renovations, or at least his new couch.
Let's hope they don't leave him home alone with an automatic feeder when they go back to the City.
4
Any time you hear "built by a young architect" run. It means that they were experimenting and rediscovering all sorts mistakes that older architects know to avoid.
24
I grew up near a lot of mid-century homes built into the woods and I am familiar with the warm concrete floors that were built into those homes. It's funny how much colder the space looks by removing that element. The kitchen atrium looks beautiful.
14
Nice renovation.
Glad the homeowners learned a lot from it while they are still young. Expect that in the long-run they will recoup their investment of time, money, and energy. In the meantime, hope they enjoy the house and grow stronger from the lessons learned!
For the obvious reasons, would suggest they not emphasize the high-end kitchen while simultaneously indicating that they will seldom cook in it since it not quite functional in terms of pantry, etc.
But yes, it is a lovely house!
7
@W. H. Post Not so sure they will recoup their money unless they stay there a very long time. So much practical functionality was taken out of the house that most people will not want to deal with it. And cramming all of the HVAC, electrical work, etc. into such a small space is gonna be a major headache at some point when something fails or needs to be upgraded. If one component needs to be replaced (e.g., water heater), everything else is going to have to be moved out and possibly modified.
And any serious cook (or someone who cooks on a daily basis for a family) is gonna roll their eyes at what they did in the kitchen. Good heavens.
I think the place looks cold, uncomfortable and uninviting with all the gray and black. And those prints over the bed are scary!!!
40
I prefer the original design. It has warmth and character.
109
@Mickela My thoughts exactly. The original house had a Japanese style and openness. The use of warm honey finish works. The drab gray walls and floors plus the removal of many windows closes in the place, makes it dreary. This was not a renovation, more an accommodation for their art collection.
90
Imagine seeing a home as beautiful as this on the outside and entering it to see this cold, uninviting, and un-creative slab of concrete. They stated they "were not laughing that whole year" - this is not a home that inspires laughter. It is pretty sad, and practically an insult to the previous owners and original builder, especially for that kind of price tag.
291
And you know what, while I'm at it with the harsh criticism, this really highlights the income disparity in the United States. When people like this say they wish they went with $160,000 windows (the median price of VERY nice single-family homes in Northern New York) instead of the $80,000 ones (my yearly salary), it shows me that more work needs to be done in redistributing wealth and decreasing the amount of people with this kind of disposable income. You breathe on a cabinet in this house and it, apparently, opens. But no need for the $100k+ kitchen, they'll just get delivery! This is a glorified $1M+ art storage facility/weekend concrete shelter with a hint of mid-century design, thought up by folks who are so out of touch with reality that if they weren't that rich, I might feel sorry for them.
Build a new house next time, and don't taint historic properties with your elitism.
619
@Alyssa I absolutely agree. Not to mention the damage to the planet.
49
@Alyssa
Brilliant! Couldn't agree more.
27
Love Mid Century design. Beautiful house but took too many French doors/window view away. That's a shame. Mid Century design lures the outdoors to come in and blend with the inside.
65
I can't believe they covered all those amazing large tile stone floors with cold concrete. All the stone floors needed was a fresh commercial cleaning, buffing, new sealant and the floors would be great. Concrete floors feel like living in a suburban garage.
67
@MrDeepState It says the previous floors we're made of poured concrete, made to look like tiles. To me, the new floors are more authentic... not pretending to be something else. I love the look.
8
@Andrew I hope they're headed floors. They'll need them in Connecticut.
1
@MrDeepState They weren’t stone tile. They were poured concrete with wooden “frames.”
5
I find the "update" disjointed and cold. The original open feeling was welcoming...the choice of black as accent "color" is cold and harsh and interupts the original smooth and easy visual design. Does a black front door say please come in, relax and welcome? No, just the reverse. I understand that renovating a 60+ year-old home is no small structure, function and safey challenge and expense. These clearly ensure the sustainability of the building as a fine example of late 40's design. I am sad that the interior design choices do not embrace the openness which is the essence of the original design.
124
Shaking my head. The new owners spent over $600,000 on “improvements” yet somehow managed to make the home worse instead of better. When they bought it, the home had some flaws, but despite them it exuded warmth and character. Now it’s sterile and drab, apparently with a floor that’s destined to fail. I totally agree with the others who wonder why the homeowners didn’t just take their ~$1.42 million and build from scratch.
399
@Adrianne Rich Soulless owners who have turned what was once a very livable residence into something I would pass up.
I'd strongly prefer the original home and upgrades in keeping with the spirit of the original home.
8
It’s a beautiful movie set. Add Kids or Dogs, not so much. Very impractical for real life OR people.
50
Well, the cat seems happy.
16
@Phyliss Dalmatian Well, at least a cat is there. I wonder where they hid the litter box? Does the cat have to touch a panel to get to it?
208
@ML, that cat has to hold it until they get back to the city.
36
For a weekend getaway, which you'd think would be a respite from the city, they made the house incredibly cold and sterile. The house sits in the woods, but there was too much light and they reduced the windows to accommodate a TV? Just how expensive would it have been to restore the undulating doors compared to what they did with the wall? Reminds me of Catherine O'Hara redecorating the house in "Beetlejuice." To each their own.
114
@Gabrielle Rose
incredibly cold and sterile.
somewhat reptilian? The look of that guy?? makes you wonder..I'd also l to hear how the design choices were divvied up between them.. do they think in perfect unison??
3
It appears that these wealthy and exacting clients didn't want THIS house at all. They actually wanted Philip Johnson's Glass House, or Mies Van der Rohe's Farnsworth House. For some reason, though, they tried to shoe-horn their concept into this existing structure. Headaches ensued.
151
@James Guelcher
"headaches ensued" ;-)
“we literally got the biggest piece of Caesarstone we could get,” Mr. Barnes said.
The slab — 51 by 105 inches — was delivered on a flatbed truck and hoisted into the house with a crane. But the full-sized slab was polished, not the matte finish they had selected."
hopefully one of the contractors involved with this fun project will reply here and enlighten all to the inside stories!
“It was a big deal,” Mr. Barnes said. “We were tired of making compromises. We didn’t want a big piece of shiny countertop.”
So the slab, which had already been installed on the island, was removed, taken back to the factory, honed and reinstalled a week later.
19
@James Guelcher
Wait a minute.The Farnsworth House is like a personal architectural equivalent of the The Seagram's Building. It is excellence beyond comparison. Johnson's Glass House is imitation flattering genius.
2
I've visited both, and I'd happily take either of them. I find them both exquisite. Johnson's estate, with it's many other outbuildings and follies, shows a respect and also a playful disdain for the narrow strictures of Miesian Modernism. It's at once an homage and a response/antidote to the Farnsworth House. In short, it's the budding of Postmodernism.
4
"A kitchen has to work well, not just look pretty."
Of course it has too work, it's a kitchen.
It probably would have been cheaper, to find a nice lot and build something similar new. But money didn't seem to be a problem in this case.
53
I like some aspects of this remodel, but they were totally impractical with most of it. Their "perfect" continuous concrete floors will most certainly crack. Without expansion joints, they will crack where they want, and it won't necessarily be aesthetically pleasing.
Also, a house with no closets? A $75,000 chef's kitchen where you can't cook anything because there's nothing in the pantry? No, thanks.
This is a case of people with too much money on their hands. Thankfully, they enriched the community with an overpriced remodel.
359
Absolutely. People put expansion joints in concrete to pre-crack it, essentially. It wants to crack, it will crack, and the expansion joint anticipates that occurrence.
9
The house looks more modern than mid-century modern. The small details that really made it MCM such as Japanese inspired closets, rotating doors, beautiful wood stairs, then replaced by walls and cold materials make the house look like a new condo that could be anywhere.
417
@Charles W., yes, I was sad when I saw they got rid of the shoji doors. And I don’t understand why they replaced those cool stairs. I like things to look a little worn.
89
@Charles W. Yes, I couldn't see why they replaced the perfectly fine stairs with something less attractive.
This isn't the first house featured here where the house was made cold, sterile and all white, and got panned in the comments.
51
@Charles W.
I do hope they enjoy the 7 foot ceilings, tho..whole thing feels sterile.
18
I like the structure of this article, with all the “oops” details. Very informative, and somewhat relatable (I have never had that big a budget for a reno).
Aluminum windows and doors are always a letdown. One of the first things I changed in my current home is the windows and sliders, switching from (icky) aluminum to stain-grade wood with cladding. My preference with this house would have been to replace those wood doors with wood. I can imagine that it would look lovely with the super thin steel frames they wished for, but I like the thicker frames in the before photo. They frame the view, and provide a comfortable feeling of enclosure to the person sitting inside.
My 1970s home was also gutter-less when I bought it. We added gutters because we get huge storms here. Rain chains work only for modest rain, not a foot of rain in 24 hours.
Hiding outlets in a kitchen is too OCD and silly, I think. A kitchen is a work room. Function should always trump design phobias (visible outlets and cords...oh my). Getting rid of the upper cabinets was a great idea. Not having a pantry? Not practical.
I wonder whether the mechanicals crammed into that little closet are noisy. I stayed in a vacation condo where the HVAC system was in a closet within a larger, walk-in closet. Even with the two doors, it was really loud when the AC was on.
Overall, though, this is an exquisite, serene space. I love that sunroom.
22
The house is beautiful, and the couple must be very wealthy, but it did seem a bit decadent to spend so much money being picky when so many people have so little or are living in tent communities ... what is the line between comfort/aesthetics and wretched excess? I am not saying people shouldn't have nice houses, but my mind did begin to reel. It almost seems the more you have to spend, the more dissatisfied you end up too.
141
"The couple wanted a single sheet of concrete, but the risk was that, without seams, it might crack."
Not might crack, it WILL crack. May be not this year, or the next, but concrete cures forever and the house, though well built is surrounded by trees, and on a hill. I am always amazed at the hubris of homeowners who want to defy the rules of nature, chemistry and physics.
416
@Marie, yes, it will crack. But I have seen some creative things done with concrete cracks. And the floor can be acid stained at that point, and the owners might be ready for a different look then. Or they might be over it and sell. Houses change over time. So do people.
16
@Marie my thought would be to put luxury vinyl flooring, it's completely waterproof, practically indestructible and it has texture and warmth without being flashy or noticeable. Of course this is way too bourgeois for this couple.
28
@panny My townhouse was built on a slab, covered by cheap sheet vinyl. My back and legs used to ache after cooking large or complicated meals in the kitchen. I remodeled it a few years back and put in luxury vinyl plank (the name always makes me giggle). As a result, the floor is warmer and much more comfortable. But I'm spoiled - I don't have gobs of money and the idea that my house must be important. Just home.
29
What struck me most about this renovation is the desires and outcomes in the kitchen. Mrs. Barnes studied cooking in Florence and owned a restaurant up until two years before they bought this house.
She wanted to have very high end appliances (Wolf stove, Sub-Zero refrigerator). And then the took out essentially all of the pantry space, so really the only food storage is the refrigerator.
Then this statement: “We go out to dinner a lot, or just buy food to eat that night. We don’t have kids, so there’s no food in the house. We keep everything very simple.”
I marvel at a former restauranteur and cook who puts so much effort and money into a kitchen and appliances (in a weekend retreat home no less), and then basically doesn't use it!
626
@Joe Watters she's not saying she doesn't use it - she's saying they buy their food for the night that day. So they have no need for storage. My husband and I were like that before we had kids and when I worked part time - I would stop at the market every day and just pick up what we needed for that night. Sure, we had some spices and condiments on hand, but you don't need much storage for that.
11
@Joe Watters Yes, I'm always amused at those who MUST have a Wolf stove. Went to a dinner party some years ago where they showed off their addition/reno by fixing Stouffer's lasagnas for the guests in their Wolf stove. I honestly do not think those lasagnas knew if they were inside a Wolf or a KitchenAid.
128
@Joe Watters I don't think they are really into cooking as much as having a pretty kitchen. Heck, compare their setup to that of Julia Child's famous pegboard!!
Anyone that cooks a lot knows that you want to keep everything you use frequently close at hand and lots of easy-to -reach outlets is a necessity.
Also, you need storage space for spices, oils, flavorings, canned goods, dry goods, etc. even if you buy perishables on an as needed basis.
A better vent over the store would have been preferred too.
29
Not a fan of most of the renovation. Taking away the glass doors, removing the walls of glass. Perhaps going back to the architectural plans or more with the original look (I would have assumed that originally there was aluminum, but natural, not dark (at least it was with our mid century built in the early 50s). The dark aluminum already looks dated. Why a solid front door?
The kitchen is impractical.
79
My wife and I almost went down the same road.
Decades ago, we looked at a mid-century house in the vicinity of Weston. Those quasi-Bauhaus things can get under your skin. Charming. Sleek. Modern. No clutter. We would take our thousands of books to The Strand and be free!
We did a walk-through of the house with two friends, an architect and a project manager.
At the conclusion, they advised us that, in terms of money, the house was a bottomless pit. Were we so enamored of the house's modern aesthetic that we had to have it, the best course of action would be to bulldoze the house and build a truly modern replica.
We passed on the whole deal. No regrets.
87
@Taz
I'm glad you took the advice handed to you when your passions were high. Looking at what was required or at least desired in the home shown in this article, you must know they were right. You could send a copy of this to the team involved in your decision.
I have to wonder if the owners here feel that it was right for them. I mean, it's quite possible they got exactly what they wanted and feel proud they lived up to their commitment with grit and determination to do justice to their dream by restoring a past treasure.
It's difficult to comprehend what motivates people these days, but internal logic and consistency must play a part. I mean, how could one be wrong about everything one has ever done?
I'm wrapping up a remodel myself. I have to say it was much more work and money than I expected even though I did everything with salvage and seconds and made the best of what I have. I can't imagine the dream home bug of someone of means. It must be like riding a tiger -- dare not let go but difficult to hold onto.
19
My wife and I have spent the last three years renovating our 1915 brick house in the Bx...so we are always interested in renovations and updates. We really appreciate that the owners of this CT house explained what they were trying to achieve and how the results compared to what they had in mind - from an aesthetic and practical point of view...We wonder why they did not go with triple pane fiberglass frame windows - fiberglass frames are strong, durable - and have a high glass to frame ration (more than aluminum) - Canadian companies (Inline eg) prices are great right now...a suggestion for anyone thinking of replacing lots of windows on their house. Also, what are the owners heating/cooling their home with? We would have put in ductless mini-splits throughout the house and NOT central air-con...finally, solar panels? Perhaps this house is surrounded by woodland/trees and this is not feasible - but here in the Bx with Fed-state/city rebates solar is a wonderful investment. Finally, the cost for renovations...my goodness with they spent on the renovations (+ the original cost of the house/property) they could have purchased a better property/home. We have renovated much of our 1915 house for less than $100,000...so the amount spent on the project is a bit of sticker shock...
51
@Robert DeCandido PhD, good point about solar power. But these folks are sticklers for design and everything looking perfect. On a flat roof, solar panels would need to be set at a tilt. They would be unslightly. They also don’t have that much roof square footage to work with. And this doesn’t look like a property where you could easily mount your solar panels on the ground.
8
@Robert DeCandido PhD
I too was sorry no one suggested Canadian or European triple glazed windows and doors, yet after reading the slew of negative reactions I was hesitant to add a comment. Yet you've made several good suggestions. I, too, encourage anyone replacing windows and doors to look at energy-efficient, and surprisingly cost-effective options. Add external insulation whenever possible, and avoid thermal bridges - any material or assembly which conducts heat through the building envelope. As you also suggested, ductless heat pumps are far more efficient than central systems. If your roof or site doesn't lend itself to solar collectors, look into community programs for off-site solar. Any use of fossil fuel puts us farther off the edge in terms of the climate crisis. For advice on saving energy and building material options, seek out a Passive House consultant, many are listed on the website PHIUS.org or similar organizations.
13
My wife and I have spent the last three years renovating our 1915 brick house in the Bx...so we are always interested in renovations and updates. We really appreciate that the owners of this CT house explained what they were trying to achieve and how the results compared to what they had in mind - from an aesthetic and practical point of view...We wonder why they did not go with triple pane fiberglass frame windows - fiberglass frames are strong, durable - and have a high glass to frame ration (more than aluminum) - Canadian companies (Inline eg) prices are great right now...a suggestion for anyone thinking of replacing lots of windows on their house. Also, what are the owners heating/cooling their home with? We would have put in ductless mini-splits throughout the house and NOT central air-con...finally, solar panels? Perhaps this house is surrounded by woodland/trees and this is not feasible - but here in the Bx with Fed-state/city rebates solar is a wonderful investment. Finally, the cost for renovations...my goodness with they spent on the renovations (+ the original cost of the house/property) they could have purchased a better property/home. We have renovated much of our 1915 house for less than $100,000...so the amount spent on the project is a bit of sticker shock...
5
Creating a home kitchen without cabinets just for aesthetic appeal seems so impractical. You cook in, and entertain out of the kitchen. You don't just stand there and look at it. I agree with most of the comments on this article that the "before" pictures actually seem more warm and inviting than the "after". I commend the owners for the amount of thought they put into the project though. Everyone has different tastes.
69
With all the hoo ha about this renovation, the place has lost it's relationship with the environment. Walls cover what was once floor to ceiling windows, metal replaces wood in framings, etc. I even like the before pictures better. They have a warmth and cosiness the new iteration lacks.
485
@Albert in CA Totally agree! I do like modern design but this was off the mark. It was particularly clear in the final pictures of the living room. Sure, some parts were slightly dated but a good designer knows how to incorporate vintage details in modern design. The living room goes from cozy and inviting to doctors office lobby to me. Somewhat sad to see what happened here with it being such a beautiful piece of architecture.
134
@Willow I agree as well. the before photos in most instances are preferred. I agree that the kitchen granite needed replacement, but the cabinetry and such I would have kept. Better than the after. Master bedroom, the before closet looks like a later addition, so good that it was removed. But all in all, the house is too closed in. And the art isn't all that (I'd rather look at nature). And why a TV in the main living area, toss that into the bedroom.
47
@Albert in CA
Yup. Call me old-fashioned, but in nearly every picture and most of the details, I prefer the "before" look to the "after." The previous design fit the surroundings so much better than the update, which I sometimes call the "medical center" look.
36
The house coordinates beautifully with the awesome cat.
86
I’ll bet the cat is just one more design element in this cold art gallery. I wonder what it feels like to be in there on a cold and windy day. Makes me shiver just thinking about it. Is there a cozy blanket throw in there? Is the cat allowed to shed its color-coordinated hairs? Is all the mostly unused cooking gear and the items in the pantry all black and grey? I usually like midcentury modern renos but this one leaves me cold, cold, cold.
50
And .... where do you put a cat box in a place like that???
2
Unfortunate design choices. The house has all the warmth of an airport passenger waiting area.
579
@Carole
I agree; the house has lost all of its warmth. Dove gray may be the "in" color of the moment but having it everywhere makes for a depressing interior. White walls with a colored accent wall work well for displaying art. Choosing Ceasarstone over granite gives a dead appearance to countertops. The right granite is vibrant and alive.
34
@Carole It's the cool-tone gray. Gray is the beige of the 2010's.
2
@Carole
Conflicted on whether to comment. As it’s their house, good on them. But as a muse for NYT, it’s not my favorite choice. For me, my feet ache just looking at those hard floors and my back has some imaginary pangs too looking at the stuff furniture.
However, glad they like it and it works for them.
7
Most of the rest of us would have asked the following question: Do the updated renovations add constructive value in any resale? I see the necessity of replacing the concrete floor because of potential structural damage from water, but will the replacement system have any future failure issues and if so, was it a good idea to have a continuous concrete floor that would have to be totally replaced to fix any future issues? Was practicality a value in their decisions since the mid-modern architecture movement was based on assumptions of practicality?
31
Resale value considerations? Obviously not! There are so many individualized decisions in this reno that it likely will appeal to only these two people. Especially the kitchen—all facade and impression, not really meant for use. Too bad. It looks like it could have been great!
17
@Pamela H
I agree. A continuous concrete floor is going to crack.
1
Mylen stairs is still around in Peekskill, NY. They were so nice to me when we were building our deck and I didn’t know how to execute the architect’s rounded wall and stairs. Their engineer walked me through some options and I wasn’t even a customer. So nice to see their original work here on the before staircase _ wonderful people
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@Deirdre I was surprised that they got rid of the stairs. It seemed really wasteful, and another bit of charm removed.
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Thanks to the owners for their willingness to share this experience, and point out the decisions that worked and the ones they regret. When you're spending this kind of money, it's not that easy to admit when you made the wrong choice. Really useful article for anyone contemplating a major reno or new construction.
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yes, funny how we are all experts (restaurants also) Many of course reccomend building from scratch, this would have then been double the size. I commend them for taking a whack at it. Sure they have their own tastes, I hate brussel sprouts. Enjoy your renovation, it may not be financially practical but it is your home, even if it is for the weekends
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The previous design emanated warmth, using wood and tinted concrete, and the reconstruction emphasizes coolness, with grey the predominant color. The reconstruction looks lifeless to me, but then, when the opening sentence describes the 1,726 square foot house as a "little midcentury" they'll use for a weekend retreat, perhaps they didn't want a house with a distinct personality.
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@Prazan I completely agree. I think a little less money spent on getting rid of original finishes and outlets and cabinet space and more on those steel windows would have been better. I love the original floors. And the washer and dryer in the original location was super-functional for "real" people.
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@Prazan Agreed. In nearly all cases, the before pictures felt warmer, more at ease and homey. If this house is meant as a place to relax and unwind, why such a cold palette?
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@Prazan
My God -- even their cat is a dark gray!
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Not a house for me-I do not like modern-but they did a very nice job on the renovation.
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Beautiful house.
The kitchen it’s the best part.
It is my dream to have everything hidden in mine.
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@Jesus Deluna Mine also, but I would also have a very large hidden pantry.
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@Jesus Deluna I wonder if you like to cook. There isn't much room to store the necessary equipment for it, let alone food.
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The house is lovely! I looked through the photos before reading the article and some of choices didn’t make sense to me at first, such as the loss of the undulating doors. However the article does a nice job of explaining the trade offs the owners faced. Considering the constraints, the entire team (owners, architect, workers and contractor) did an excellent job. One thing puzzles me however — is
the artwork in the bedroom meant to depict a child who has been punched in the face?
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Saville’s work is typically morbid, extreme and features ‘grotesque exaggeration’ - and seems to fit with the other pieces of artwork displayed throughout the home. I agree with others, though the renovation was very well done, it does nothing to exude the warm peaceful calm many clamor for when escaping to the woods for a retreat. But then again, the owners, dressed head to toe in all black, probably desire a colder, cleaner, retreat.
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A beautiful house though not my style.
Keep in mind that ANY house pretty much needs a complete renovation every 75 years. The owners were buying a place that was going to need EVERYTHING done.
Modernist houses often focus on form over function which causes challenges. It's a shame the original builder didn't address the drainage issue in the back against the hill. That was a sin.
Again, it's a beautiful house. I hope the renovations were affordable in the long run. Unfortunately most modernist houses can be real challenges (and money pits).
I hope the owners enjoy long lives in their redone house.
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A remarkably thoughtful article about the joys and pitfalls of living in and renovating a modernist house. Unlike most house renovation tales, the owners seemed honest about their decisions--admitting they had made some mistakes. In the end, I hope they have a house they enjoy.
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@PBaldwin Clearly the architect and owners turned away from the mid-century style to create their own space. Not sure why they didn’t simply build a new structure.
I think the iconic signature of the original architect who created the design is lost. C’est domage.
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@Paul Caouette I agree! While I applaud the honesty of the couple, they changed most of the mid-century touches that made the house special. So sad what was done to all those striking glass doors!
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@Shell The original glass doors were definitely a huge design feature! On the other hand, the climate in Connecticut is not very conducive to wanting the house half open to the outside more than a few weeks in the year at most -- between humidity and bugs, you want to keep the outside out, most of the summer. And from Oct to May, it's generally too cold to let it in wholesale. So a better insulated system that makes the most of the indoor space was probably a good choice for them. But the steel frames would probably have been a better look.
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