Everything started 16 decades ago when architect and surfer Richard Bubnowski bought a small Arts and Crafts cottage in Point Pleasant, New Jersey. He turned the garage into a surf shack and tinkered with the main house for years. Then as he was getting ready to shingle it cedar, his future wife Diana threw out the notion of tearing it down and starting over.
The result, Surfer’s End, is a home with a design influenced by its neighborhood, views, sea breezes, and the plan of the original Arts and Crafts cabin and surf shack. Together with the new construction came excellent life changes: While the original cabin housed a bachelor who went off to work for someone else daily, the new location is a family home and functions as base for Bubnowski’s architecture practice. See the way he generated a relaxing delightful home full of good vibes.
in a Glance:
Who Lives Here: Architect Richard Bubnowski, his wife Diana, his 6-year-old son Thomas and his black lab Mystic.
Size: 2,100 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms, finished basement with office and playroom
Location: Point Pleasant, New Jersey, with views of the Manasquan River
Watch more shingle-style houses
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
The general design of the home is crafts and crafts meets Coastal Shingle Style meets modern times. Each facade has a special composition that reacts to the immediate context (like neighboring houses) and increased context (views of the Manasquan River), nevertheless common elements tie each of four sides together.
“Most of this structure in the neighborhood is quite traditional, so we retained front facade more conservative,” says Bubnowski. This side is a great example of the way he balances symmetry and asymmetry. While the house has a symmetrical outline, the positioning of the front door and other elements is asymmetrical.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
The renovation story actually began back here, long before Bubnowski dreamed of tearing down the original residence. Anxious to complete a construction project himself, he first renovated a small garage (click here to view the earlier picture), turning it into an outside shower and surfboard storage shed. The small project wound bringing a great deal of fantastic press, which in turn resulted in more work, for example, commission on The New Moon Cottage.
When he decided to rip down his original cabin, saving this enchanting little construction and construction around it turned into a major priority. In addition, he borrowed characteristics from this construction and applied them to the new residence.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Bubnowski paid homage to Arts and Crafts style in a modern way, and blended in coastal Shingle Style. The welcoming entranceway is a good example of this mashup. There is a traditional bungalow door, painted in Benjamin Moore’s Sea Star, framed by Arts and Crafts tapered columns and lit with a gorgeous aluminum lantern fixture by Royal Craftsman.
Cedar tiles highlighted with crisp white trim possess a coastal look, while modern pergolas overhead highlight this entrance.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
This modern pergola also relates to some similar detail about the surfboard shed. “It provides screening from sunlight, creates interesting shadows, and helps indicate the entrance,” says Bubnowski. The extended brackets are repeated throughout the outside.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Bubnowski knows how to make limitations work for him. A 40′ x 93′ great deal with strict setback requirements limited the home’s footprint and siting. “By producing little pieces and indentations within the plan, you can create curiosity, expand sight lines, benefit from natural light and make shadows,” he says. “Constraints often can provide solutions you might not think about otherwise.”
Case in point: Much more casual entrance was put into the side of the house and allows for an angled approach. This supplied a covered spot that protects you from the elements while fumbling for keys, and enabled for that vertical window, which provides a sneaky view from the kitchen all the way to the road.
“Getting the details right is so important,” says Bubnowski. This exceptional chimney is a fun detail; it was inspired by Arts and Crafts lanterns and is topped in aluminum. You can see how this sketch came to life in the first film in this tour.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
While Bubnowski revealed respectful restraint on the front facade, he managed to loosen up and proceed more modern in back. The cantilevered balcony was motivated by a house he admired in Barbados. The wraparound windows upstairs and downstairs are a contemporary movement. The altitude is asymmetrical yet balanced, and ties into the rest of the house because the elements will be the same.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
This detail shot reveals a confluence of architectural styles and frequent elements that tie everything together. These include extended brackets, exposed rafters, cedar and the crisp white trim.
These elements are repeated on all four sides of the house, occasionally in exactly the same scale and rhythm, occasionally in entirely different manners.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Studying floorplans will give you a sense for the way an architect thinks about the way to live within that setback-dictated footprint. Design, flow and benefiting from natural light, color, views and breezes all affect the lifestyle within the home. As we move inside you’ll have the ability to see how 9-foot ceilings, very good proportions, an open floor plan and easy flow give the interior a serene and comfortable feel.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Thanks to this wraparound windows, the kitchen is bathed in sunlight. This room is totally open to the dining room, therefore both spaces benefit from the natural light.
Admiring all of those gorgeous cabinets and the island? Rather than choosing typically Arts and Crafts oak or mahogany, Bubnowki chosen for cherry wood through the home. “I love cherry; it is a comparatively tough wood with amazing grains and a great deal of light and dark tones that give it a visual depth,” says Bubnowski. “It will also darken very quickly with age”
Floor: Brazilian Cherry
Counters around the rest of the room: Vibrant Dakota Mahogany
Pendant Lights: Arroyo Craftsman
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
This magnificent island, custom designed by Bubnowski, is the heart of this kitchen. Crafted from cherry wood and topped with a honed Andes Black granitecountertop, it produces a visual boundary between the kitchen and the dining spaces within an open floor plan. The tapered legs are distinctly Arts-and-Crafts motivated; the curved countertop softens the edge between the two spaces.
Along with being beautiful, the island is quite hardworking. It contains drawers, recycling and garbage bins and electrical outlets. More important, it functions as a social hub, as there’s room for four stools under the curved edge (they were removed for this film to give you a fantastic look in the island).
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Across from the kitchen is this dining area with Arts and Crafts elements but a light and modern feel. “The built in china cupboard is quite modern because of the clean, crisp horizontal layout in the doors,” says Bubnowski. It was motivated by R. M. Schindler’s King’s Road House. The white boards enclosing the china cupboard introduce a coastal component.
Tip: Mounting cabinets to the wall saves space and creates a room feel bigger. “Cantilevering the cabinets allowed the white base to carry throughout the room, providing the illusion that these cabinets are floating,” he says.
The drawings across the cabinets are both colored pencil on trace renderings by Bubnowski, media motivated by Michael Graves, among his favourite architects.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
In the living room, Bubnowski confronted a common modern-day struggle: where to place the television. “In a small house, there are many openings from windows, fireplaces, doors and an open floor plan that it leaves one very little wall area,” he clarifies.
“A fireplace is this a significant and profound statement in a room; I’d neverput a tv within the fireplace” The solution here was to style this cherry media cabinet, that is built into the wall and conceals the tv and associated components.
In another Arts and Crafts tradition, Surfer’s End motivated a furniture line that goes outside built-ins. The line comprises the Diana Chairs you see here, as well as the Skinnygirl Cabinet supporting them. While these are handcrafted investment pieces, Bubnowski hopes to explore designing furniture that can be produced less expensively.
Fireplace: Autumn Gold Slate
Oak Bench: Garage sale locate
Chairs and Cabinet: Surfer’s End Furniture Collection
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Diana Chair – $3,900
The Diana seat has an ebony-and-holly inlay inspired from the stringers found in traditional surfboard designs.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
Moving upstairs, we all see the way to make every inch at a 2,100-square-foot family home count. This library balcony is a comfy spot that overlooks space that’s often wasted. The flat railings replicate the railings used on the outside balcony.
“When my wife said we ought to paint this hallway this colour I thought’you have got to be kidding me!'” Says Bubnowski. “I wanted everything to be white. But she was right; it warms things up and it stands up a lot easier to sticky fingerprints from a 6 year old!”
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
In the master bedroom, views of the river and access to the balcony allow the couple like the outside from upstairs. “The flat steel railings possess an almost transparent look. I can lie in bed and see the river right through themthey almost disappear,” says Bubnowski.
The beadboard adds coastal cabin design, while the flat orientation is a modern twist. The room’s vaulted ceiling and pleasing proportions make it feel relaxing, airy and spacious.
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
The master bathroom continues the relaxed feel. White walls, a ceiling that vaults to from 9′ to 12′ (as you can see in the mirror reflection), natural light and translucent glass doors maintain the room feeling open.
Cherry Wood: CWP Custom Wood Products.
Vessel sinks: Kohler
Counters: Honed Durango Stone from Mexico
Floor: Travertine
Richard Bubnowski Design LLC
A pocket door between the primary part of the master bathroom and a small room featuring the commode is just another smart room saver, as will be the wall-mounted faucets and vessel sinks. In case you’re wondering, yes, there is a shower; the photographer is standing next it.
“One of the biggest compliments I have received about this house was from a mentor who advised me that it doesn’t just appeal to artists and architects, but to most people, because it’s a relaxing and cozy feel before you even start to unpeel the layers of their details,” Bubnowski says.
It is true; whether you understand the stylistic roots of a mount or only wish to stash your board and hit the outside shower, this home’s good vibes possess a universal appeal.
Photography: Alexandra Rowley, Paul S. Bartholomew Photography, Inc..
More:
Shingle Style Meets SoHo about the Jersey Shore
Shingle Style: Warm Home Design for Seaside to Suburb
Obtaining it Wright: Today’s Prairie Style
Yankee Modern: The Houses of Estes/Twombly (a recommendation of Bubnowski’s)