Houses 2015
Location: Bend, Oregon Size: 2,950 square feet (274 square meters); three bedrooms; 3½ bathrooms Working within the confines of a narrow lot, designer Nils Finne opened up as many spaces as possible to the river views. He also worked around a large outcropping, hovering a deck 6 to 8 inches over the ledge. Here you see one of the homeowners enjoying the river in his canoe.
Photo #3: The 54-inch round hobbit door, a detail straight from Tolkien's text, was custom crafted of Spanish cedar. Although a number of professionals insisted there was no way to create a hinge that would work with the door's perimeter, a Maryland blacksmith was able to forge a single-pivot model that met the challenge.
Photo #1: An 18th-century stacked stone wall on the property made this site, a short walk from the main house, a natural choice for the Hobbit House. From the beginning, Archer envisioned a structure built to look as though it had risen from the wall. "Other materials were selected for their colors and textures, timelessness and compatibility with the stone," Archer says. A stone path leads from the main house to the cottage's front entrance.
Hillside modern. For a more contemporary spin, Studio Pacific Architecture has tucked a poured concrete house into the hill above Rawhiti in New Zealand’s Bay of Islands. Topped with a sod roof, it could only be 21st century, but it’s as cozy and enveloping as Bilbo’s burrow. The rest of this getaway is cool, wooden and contemporary.
Photo #1: A well-insulated straw-bale home in Colorado. Straw bales were tightly stacked in a running bond pattern between posts and beams during this Crestone, Colorado, vacation house’s construction. The 15-inch-thick bales serve as superb insulation to keep the home warm in winter and cool in summer, essential for the high-altitude location in southern Colorado. The 2,300-square-foot house was built for a couple, their three teenage children and their friends
2. A Montana cabin surrounded by nature. This vacation retreat at Yellowstone Club in Big Sky, Montana, has serious green-building chops. Completed in 2008, it was southwest Montana’s first LEED Platinum-rated home, a designation that means it’s resource-efficient — using less water and energy, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Built as a vacation home for a family of five, the 2,200-square-foot property sits on 22 acres. A man-made pond is part of a geothermal system that heats the home in winter, using very little energy. A 2-kilowatt solar array provides the home with electricity.
One of Maloof’s most impressive works is the house he built up over the years from an existing 800-square-foot bungalow to the sprawling two-story, 22-room structure it is today. It was an ongoing project starting in the 1950s, when he and his young family moved to Rancho Cucamonga, and it was constructed mostly without a design plan with help from relatives and studio assistants.
It’s Just Big Enough: The good home should be right-sized. Not too big or too small, the good home should be sized just right. This will mean that all of its area is used and all of its rooms have a purpose. There isn’t any waste or any confinement. To do this means understanding how you really live and how you’d ideally live so that your home is truly comfortable, like that suit or dress that fits you just right.
It Sits Well on the Land: The good home should let us connect to what surrounds us. A home isn’t just a box that’s placed on a piece of land. It’s a place that is inextricably connected to the land that it’s a part of. We should be able to experience the land and all that nature has to offer when we are in and about our home. And our home should make the land better for being there.
Simple addition. Because of their horizontal layout, ranch houses are relatively easy to add on to. No need to worry about accommodating a stairwell or supporting another floor — just extend out. And if you want to add another story, the ranch's simple design makes it less challenging than, say, adding on to a Tudor or Craftsman, where you have to worry about blending with the style of the original.
Ranch Style In Texas: The colors - the pretty aqua front door contrasts sharply with the surrounding inky-blue accent, making the home’s entrance crystal clear. Dark house colors can weather more quickly than lighter colors. Reserving the darkest hue of the palette for a small recessed accent area limits the exposure to the sun’s damaging rays.
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