On the Drawing Board

Rob and Anna at Photo Shoot Photographing a home is a team effort. Rob, our photographer, Anna, our stylist, and Mary, her assistant, began their day early. Rob drove down from Maine with all his equipment, while Anna and Mary shopped at a wholesale flower market for the best natural props available. They will work non-stop until dark to get those great indoor shots and stunning dusk exterior photos we have loved over the years. Mary and Anna Moving Furniture [...]

Sheep Sandwich The baby lambs we had this winter have grown up quickly. Our little farm was quite loud when we had to wean them from their mothers. I'm not sure who bleated louder, the ewes or the lambs. Since the weather went from very chilly to brutally hot in a matter of days, we quickly asked our favorite sheep shearer, Donald Kading, to visit and give the sheep a respite from the heat. Molly Before Being Sheared Donald Shearing [...]

Three-Season Porch There are some design ideas that, for a while, are the latest trend, but come and go quickly. Many of our renovation projects include undoing the latest trend of 10, 20, 30, or more years ago and replacing it with designs that are meant to last. Below are a few ideas that we feel are timeless. Porches That Feel Like Outdoor Rooms With Seasonal Flexibility The best porches are not treated as leftover exterior space. We [...]

  Craftsman Style Home                                  HABS/HAER/HALS Collection, Library of Congress     By the late nineteenth century, American architecture had grown elaborate. Victorian homes were loaded with ornament, machine-produced and applied by the yard. A quiet reaction was building. Out of that reaction came one of the most enduring domestic styles America has ever produced. The Craftsman home is not a grand gesture. It [...]

Stanfordville Kitchen Every custom home involves a long series of decisions, and almost every one of them has a cost attached to it. The challenge isn't that clients want too much. It's that the cumulative weight of many reasonable choices can quietly push a project beyond what anyone intended to spend. The good news is that not all choices carry the same weight. Some decisions return their investment many times over, in daily use, in lasting beauty, in the character [...]

Entry/Mudroom Every year in the Hudson Valley, winter doesn’t end — it dissolves. The snow recedes in uneven patches. We have a few days of mud and then another week of frozen moonscapes, then it repeats. From the adults to the children, we track in the mud. Then the dogs with mud-clogged toes come trotting in, completely bypassing the towels we have prepared for them. In one word, it is a mess. Mud Control Starts Outside the House [...]

  Clearing a Path to the Barn One more round of snow made it pretty difficult for the shepherds and the dogs to make their way up the hill to the barn. Being from down South, I had never owned or operated a snow blower until this year. I didn’t realize I needed one until 20 inches of snow fell in January. Who knew it could be so much fun to forge a path up the hill and [...]

Cost Comparison Between 2018 and 2026 "How much is this going to cost?" is one of the questions we hear the most, for good reason. At the beginning of a project, no one can answer that question accurately. We can review the pricing of the most recent similar project, or we can apply a cost-per-square-foot range we have seen or heard from contractors. In fact, there is often a significant difference between the low and high bidders’ prices [...]