Firm: Wheeler Kearns Architects
Year: 2019
Type: Single Family Residential
Size: 7,000 SF
Role: Project Architect
The Bluff House is designed for gathering, respite, and retreat for a couple entering a new phase of their lives.
Overlooking Lake Michigan, the existing site was in rough shape: unkempt and overgrown with invasive plant material, bluff sheet piling failing and a 80’ rise of beach stairs in need of replacement. But the view was worth it.
Contrasting with the general expectation of a multi-floor “lake house” with expansive views from every room to the water, the owners desired a more modest approach—radically, a single floor house---an intimate, warm, acoustically-tuned instrument that plays differently to two different audiences: the community to the west and the lake to the east.
