Top Custom Case Studies
Modern Farmhouse by Barnes Vanze Architects
For this new house in rural Virginia, architect Stephen J. Vanze looked to nearby agrarian structures and the bucolic hillside site for...
Living in Nature
Architect John Carney designed his 950-square-foot home as a guest house on a wooded Wilson, Wyo., property, and he and his wife are living...
Kyle House, Brewster, Mass.
A Cape Cod house is divided into four linked pieces.
Historic log cabin renovation in the Virginia countryside.
A trio of historic structures comes together in the Virginia countryside.
Barrio Historico House, Tucson, Ariz.
The 2012 Custom Home of the Year is a brilliant reinterpretation of the traditional urban courtyard house.
At first glance, the five most-popular custom house case studies from the past year seem to have nothing in common. The houses serve a variety of purposes for their owners, including a compact, energy-efficient guest house, a large live/work compound for new vineyard owners, and a sleek urban remodel in an historic district. The houses’ geographic locations—ranging from the shores of Cape Cod to rural Wyoming—are just as widely scattered. Take a second or third look, however, and the similarities become more noticeable.
The architects and builders for each of these exquisite projects all delicately balanced history of place with modern lifestyle preferences. The nuances of each site were carefully woven into the composition of each floor plan. Every project also favors quality over quantity by using spatial economies appropriate to its program, but they feel luxurious thanks to an abundance of well-crafted details that keep readers coming back. A simple palette consisting of authentic regional materials rounds-off the roster of bonds the houses share.
Examine these five custom homes for yourself and see what you think makes them the darlings of 2012.
