Writer's Studio

Rarely has the firm been asked to step outside of its preferred design sensibilities, to venture in a seemingly opposite aesthetic direction. The client, a retired Wall Street executive and a lifelong poet, knowing the firm’s practice was primarily focused on traditional homes, called to challenge the firm to recalibrate the architect’s eye and design a “purpose-built, self-sufficient contemporary writer’s studio” in the woods near the client’s (traditional) home.

The discussion began with the client’s youthful impressions of Walden and the simplicity of “a small cabin in the woods”. The goal however was not to recreate Thoreau’s cabin, but rather to reinterpret it anew. Would the client’s request harmonize or conflict with the firm’s many years of classical mouldings and historical references?

The result of this Client-Architect journey is the Writer’s Studio. Hugely appealing to the client– poetry is inspired daily and prolifically, fulfilling the client’s main goal. Classical design elements present themselves, the plan is axial, symmetrical, connecting to the surroundings with a balanced use of natural light, view, and ventilation. In contrast, every edge, corner, surface, and transition are entirely exposed, no hiding behind plaster finishes, mouldings or ornament. The Studio attains a certain “essentialism”.

Intimate, welcoming, and right sized – the building’s is only 400 S.F. of conditioned space. Systems are concealed with an eye towards sustainability, electrical services buried, a well for water, an incinerating toilet eliminates the need for septic and ground source geothermal provides proper conditioning to preserve a 1700 volume collection of poetry.

The Studio is” of the place and of the person”. Portions appear as having always been there while others are new and transformative. The fieldstone walls are of the land and it’s as if the forest has grown around them, while steel and glass create an openable and transparent enclosure; a cantilevering counterpoint to the mass walls – all reflective of the poet’s passions. Classical and contemporary design are no longer directional opposites in this Architect’s aesthetic journey.The Writer’s Studio succeeds in its essentialism, as a retreat for solitude and the continuation of the time-honored art of poetry.