Candlewood Cottage

Project Details

Project Description

This project was selected as an Honor winner in the 2024 Residential Architect Design Awards, Custom Home / 3,000 Square Feet or Less category.

“In all angles, it looks very nicely resolved.” –Juror Roselie Ledda Valdez

Conceived as a detached guesthouse and home gym, this 795-square-foot cottage perches above and behind the clients’ home overlooking Lake Candlewood in Sherman, Connecticut. To give each function a sense of privacy within the single volume, the architects devised a plan of two separate floors, each accessed via a different doorway and path. As the lower level contains the gym and is meant for regular use by the clients, it’s just a short path and a few steps up from the main house. Meanwhile, an arched stone path on a slightly steeper incline leads guests from the property’s driveway to the separate apartment above.

The guest-quarters floor cantilevers at an angle from the main structure to provide lake views through a full-height glazed wall comprising doors that slide open to let in fresh air. But the cantilever also echoes the design language of the previously renovated home in front. To that end, the design team created a triangular window on one side that recalls a triangular clerestory on the main house and clad the guesthouse volume in the same dark Kynar-coated metal siding that forms the main home’s roof, aiding in visually making the structure recede into the forested background.

PROJECT CREDITS:
Project: Candlewood Cottage
Location: Sherman, CT
Client/Owner: Withheld
Architect: GOA Architecture; Elizabeth Gray, FAIA (Principal and Partner); Alan Organschi (Principal and Partner); Parker Lee (Design Director); Jack Wolfe (Project Architect
Construction End Date: 2023
Interior Designer: GOA Architecture / Client
Structural Engineer: TDEG Structural Engineers
Civil Engineer: Arthur H. Howland and Associates, P.C.
General Contractor: All Phase Construction II
Size in Square Feet: 795
Cost: Withheld

MATERIALS AND SOURCES:
Bathroom Fixtures: Duravit
Cabinets: Ikea cabinet boxes with Reform drawer and door faces https://www.reformcph.com/
Ceilings: Clear coated Western Hemlock
Energy source, including back-up source: Electric
Flooring: White Oak Flooring
Lighting Control Systems: Lutron Claro outlets, Buster and Punch Switches
Metal: Corten, Avidon Design
Paints and Finishes: Benjamin Moore
Roofing: Standing seam, Kynar coated black metal
Structural System: Wood frame
Windows and Doors: Sierra Pacific, Architectural Building Resources

Photo Credit: Jasper Lazor