It Doesn’t Look Like an Average Garage—and It Helps Power Their Home

Setting down roots in the rural northwestern Illinois village of Shannon (population: 841) has enabled Daniel Payette and his wife, Jessica Merchant, not only to be closer to their families, but also to engage in a vibrant, varied lifestyle that’s rooted in sustainability and art.

A striking new garage by Chicago’s Converge Architecture, topped with enough solar panels to power the couple’s entire home, is just the latest in a series of building projects the couple have embraced at their .43-acre property and beyond.

After returning to his hometown to work as a regional planner following graduate school, Dan purchased a Shannon farmhouse in 2014 with an unusual setting: The 1956 structure occupies the site of a former church, and it’s surrounded by a cemetery on two sides. "The common joke is we hope we don’t hear from our neighbors, otherwise there’s an issue," Dan says with a laugh.

When he married Jessica and she moved in, they expanded the 900-square-foot home by 200 square feet. They removed a wall between the kitchen and living room, exposed and expanded a pattern of glass blocks in the kitchen, and added locally milled ash wood floors. But that was just the start.