Our brief was to create a calm, modern country kitchen that avoided cliches - and to intrinsically link to the garden. A weekend escape for a busy family who come down to escape the city, to enjoy their art collection, garden and cook together. The design springs from my neuroscience research and is based on appealing to our hard wired needs, our fundamental instincts - sociability, easy movement, art, comfort, hearth, smells, readiness for visitors, view of outdoors and a place to eat. The key design innovation was the use of soft geometry, not so much in the planning but in the three dimensionality of the furniture which grows out of the floor in an organic way. The soft geometry is in the profile of the pieces, not in their footprint. The users can stroke the furniture, lie against it and feel its softness, all of which helps the visitors to kitchen linger and chat. The fireplace is located in the middle between the cooking zone and the garden. There is plenty of room to draw up a chair and just sit around. The fold-out doors let the landscape into the space in a generous way, especially on summer days when the weather makes the indoors and outdoors come together. The sight lines from the main cooking and preparation island offer views of the garden throughout the seasons, as well as people coming into the room and those seating at the table - so it becomes a command position or what we call the sweet spot. This often results in there being a family competition to do the cooking. The woods are Canadian Maple, Australian rosewood and Eucalyptus. All appliances are Gaggenau and Fisher and Paykel.

uptown flat

Gardner Architects LLC

Photography by Ken Wyner 2101 Connecticut Avenue (c.1928), an 8-story brick and limestone Beaux Arts style building with spacious apartments, is said to have been “the finest apartment house to appear in Washington between the two World Wars.” (James M. Goode, Best Addresses, 1988.) As advertised for rent in 1928, the apartments were designed “to incorporate many details that would aid the residents in establishing a home atmosphere, one possessing charm and dignity usually found only in a private house… the character and tenancy (being) assured through careful selection of guests.” Home to Senators, Ambassadors, a Vice President and a Supreme Court Justice as well as numerous Washington socialites, the building still stands as one of the undisputed “best addresses” in Washington, DC.) So well laid-out was this gracious 3,000 sf apartment that the basic floor plan remains unchanged from the original architect’s 1927 design. The organizing feature was, and continues to be, the grand “gallery” space in the center of the unit. Every room in the apartment can be accessed via the gallery, thus preserving it as the centerpiece of the “charm and dignity” which the original design intended. Programmatic modifications consisted of the addition of a small powder room off of the foyer, and the conversion of a corner “sun room” into a room for meditation and study. The apartment received a thorough updating of all systems, services and finishes, including a new kitchen and new bathrooms, several new built-in cabinetry units, and the consolidation of numerous small closets and passageways into more accessible and efficient storage spaces.

East Meets West

MN Builders

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Media Room and Office

Jane Ellison

Media Room Large comfortable sectional fronted by oversize coffee table is perfect for both table games and movie viewing – and when company is staying, the sectional doubles as two twin size beds. Drapes hide a full length closet for clothing and bedding – no doors required, so sound is absorbed and the area is free of the harshness of ordinary media rooms. Zebra wood desk in foreground allows this room to triple as an office!