Head-Turning Tile Cladding Turns a Postmodern Starter Home Into a Forever House

One evening in spring 2016, David Mostafavi was scrolling through Zillow when he came across a charming cedar-shingle house in Princeton, New Jersey. He and his wife, Rachel, were living 20 miles northeast in a rental in Edison, where they had hoped to buy their first home. The location split the difference, commute-wise, between his job at aStaten Island, New York, ophthalmology practice and hers at a Princeton charter school, where she taught French. But nothing had stood out to them, David says. "In Edison, the houses are all the same size and feel. There really wasn’t anything aesthetically pleasing about living in that type of developer house."

David says the "quirky" corner house in Princeton, however, struck him as one of a kind. Built from prefab parts in the 1950s, the dwelling had been expanded to approximately 1,500 square feet by local designer Kevin Wilkes in 1986. Scanning the online photos, David found himself drawn to its peculiarities: a mock-temple entry; what he calls a "very ’80s" color scheme inside; and a conspicuous, almost funereal scarlet chimney that seemed way too big for a house. Rachel, noting, among other things, the time that would be added to her husband’s commute by the move south, was skeptical. Plus, the house "was a little old-looking, and we wanted something new," she says. "And there were only two bedrooms—but David had a vision for it." They moved on the property that July.

"It was just the two of us and our dog, Reny, for the first couple years, and everything was cozy," David says. "Then our daughter, Violet, was born in 2017, and we realized our bedroom was the same size as her nursery." Rachel’s parents began visiting regularly after their granddaughter’s birth, sleeping on an air mattress beneath the looming chimney. With the house at capacity, and knowing they wanted to have a second child, the Mostafavis began contemplating an addition.