At the Intersection of Art, Architecture & Design

Exterior Design, Indoor/Outdoor Living, Outdoor Rooms, Entry Gardens

This article is about how garden design effects the “feel” of your home. An entry garden can make a home feel more or less formal. It can make an imposing home feel less or more imposing and it can make a modest home feel more or less modest.

I’m sitting in another home just a few blocks away. It was built in 1917 and I’ve been here just about a year. And I’m frustrated beyond belief that I don’t yet have the money to build the addition in the back that will connect me to the out of doors! My response is to spend most of my spare time working on the landscape

This is the 5th article about taking an isolated kitchen in an older home and making it the center of today’s activities. While not strictly a galley kitchen, the kitchen in this 1930′s home is isolated from the rest of the house. My clients asked how they could make the kitchen the center of the home

Think how much more ordinary this home would appear without the deep taupe color in the foyer. When you arrive you enter a compressed area — an area of calm and containment that marks a landmark in your travel from the street up the walk to the home.

I’ve moved to a neighborhood built at the turn of the 20th Century where many of these homes, including mine, have windows that look into a neighbor’s house. The quickest and cheapest solution is often drapery and curtains which help ensure privacy but also often block light and a sense of space. Below are some strategies I’ve used to block a view. I would love to hear about ways you’ve successfully blocked a view while retaining daylight and airiness.

All of the perennials shown in this garden were started from seed! It’s a relatively straightforward process and saved the homeowner thousands of dollars. Plus it’s green! Most of what was shipped was lightweight materials and seeds not 2-year old plants.

This 1930′s home off Sligo Creek in Silver Spring, MD didn’t have an easy way to take advantage of it’s sylvan setting. The nicest views were from the front but zoning set-back requirements prohibited adding on in that direction.

Whether you call it a Garden Room or Indoor/Outdoor living, opening your Home to your garden is probably the single most expansive change you can make in the feeling of your house.

This remodeled Tudor revival home in Silver Spring MD features
an open floor plan that helps a very modest house “live large”.
The original floor plan was busy — with small rooms running
into each other

The most striking feature of this sun room is one that couldn’t be planned — the exposed hickory rafters. And, in fact, one of the best parts of remodeling old homes is taking advantage of
unexpected surprises.