It’s a familiar scenario: A couple buys a new home, lives there for a while and discovers some things they’d like to change. They draw up renovation plans (the fun part) and request bids, then the numbers come in higher than expected (less fun). At that point, the homeowners can increase their budget, pare back the number of updates or learn to live with the imperfections. Some decide to sell and move on.
But Deephaven residents Andy and Allison took another path by wiping the slate clean and tearing down the abode they’d lived in for 20 years. “We love our neighborhood and were ready to update the house,” she says. “The price to renovate was around 70% of how much it would cost to start from scratch and we would still have challenges to live with, so we shifted gears toward a new build and chose Kyle Hunt & Partners to help us.”
Photography by Scott Amundson
For the couple, loving their neighborhood meant ensuring their new 5,857-square-foot, three-bedroom, five-bathroom home blended in with the area’s more traditional homes but with a brighter, more connected layout that made the most of their spacious half-acre corner lot. Architect Mike Sharratt walked the line with a trio of steeply pitched gables, limestone chimneys and white, farmhouse-inspired vertical siding, then accentuated the form with flat-roofed accents at the entryway, dining room and rear of the home. The interior offers more breathing space than the original home, with a connected floor plan that keeps the home bright and makes entertaining easy via comfortably scaled rooms that flow together.
The kitchen was designed according to Allison’s specifications — every drawer and cabinet, a 48-inch range with a high-power exhaust hood at the center, and a coffee station, full-size refrigerator and full-size freezer on one side. A door off the kitchen leads to a covered outdoor cooking area and a raised garden bed, providing easy access to the grill and fresh ingredients for meal preparation.
There’s also an adjacent scullery, a space from a bygone era that’s making a big comeback. “With kitchens that open to living spaces, our clients are asking for these spaces to conceal clutter,” Kyle Hunt & Partners cofounder Laurie Hunt explains.
Allison is an enthusiastic cook and baker, so her scullery includes double ovens, which allow her to remove hot baking sheets without worrying about the safety of guests or taking up counter space that could be better used for serving appetizers. There’s also a separate walk-in pantry for storing dry goods and a mudroom with laundry facilities behind the kitchen, offering an efficient hub of cooking and housekeeping to support a tidy kitchen.
The living room is anchored around a blackened steel gas fireplace, and just off of that is a defined but open dining area, featuring a reclaimed-wood wine enclosure that establishes a sense of ease and conviviality for entertaining.
One of the property’s appealing qualities is its mature trees, including maples, which Allison and Andy tap for syrup in the spring. The screen porch is situated among them, creating an “up north” ambiance. Designed for extended use, the vaulted space has automatic screens with vinyl options, a wood-burning fireplace and infrared heaters for cooler weather. A collapsible bi-fold door system separates the porch from the dining room and, when open, brings the outdoors in and the indoors out, resulting in an uninterrupted entertaining area.
All of the main-floor spaces are modestly sized and connected, defined by cased openings to make the house feel more comfortable, whether it’s just the two of them or a gathering of friends and family. That’s an arrangement Kyle Hunt & Partners co-owner Kyle Hunt is seeing more and more often. “Many of our clients are embracing smaller-scale living spaces that are thoughtfully laid out to allow for expansion when entertaining for larger groups,” he says.
One thing you won’t find on the main level of the home is a TV. “We aren’t folks who like to build our lives around external entertainment,” Andy explains. “The kitchen, living room and dining room areas are really for people to connect, not disconnect.” The television is downstairs in a comfortable theater with a large screen, cozy sofa and a gas fireplace. There’s also a game table and bar for other amusements, making the lower level a destination with its own purpose.
But Allison says the space that gives Andy the greatest satisfaction might just be the sparkling clean mechanical room, which anyone who has lived with the vicissitudes of older plumbing and electrical systems can relate to. “He frequently sits in there marveling at the quality,” Allison says, laughing. “It brings him peace.”
Project Partners
Builder: Kyle Hunt & Partners
Architect: Sharratt Design & Company
Interior designer: Redpath Constable Interior Design
Landscaper: Yardscapes
