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Here's a Connecticut Country Cottage, Totally Redefined

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By Amy Schellenbaum
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It all started with a run-of-the-mill property renovation; Suzanne and Brooks Kelley brought on New Haven-based firm Gray Organschi Architects to expand one of the bedrooms in the historic home—once a barn for a mansion that burned down in the '20s. But then Brooks, a retired historian and archivist at Yale, decided he needed more room for his books, and thought, with a little attention from the architects, the old cottage on the property could make a fine library. It couldn't. According to a Dwell piece from three years ago, the structure was eaten up by carpenter ants. Organschi described it as "rotten and decrepit." And so they started anew, ultimately conceiving on this lot overlooking the Long Island Sound, a cottage that was cool and contemporary, with "glazing details [that] dematerialize the building's seams," write the architects. "Eaves come apart from the walls, corners detach, the roof tears open to connect the light-filled interior to the expanse and beauty of the site."

Per the architects:

"The project brief was modest and our plan simple: a combined living and dining room with a small hidden kitchenette and a single accessible bedroom and bath with an upper story loft that doubling as additional sleeping or recreational space.

"The sedum-covered shed roof, a steeply pitched plane lifted by the pressure of the spaces beneath it, serves as one more planted surface in the garden spilling soil-filtered storm water back into the landscape."

"Long views, the branching canopies of oaks, and the ever-changing coastal sky encompass the small building." · The Cottage by Gray Organschi Architecture [Trendland via Architizer]
· Striking Angular Cottage in Connecticut [Dwell]
· Cottage by Gray Organschi [official site]

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