Six Overlapping Pavilions Create a Flower-Shaped Home in Massachusetts
No Architecture designs a weekend house with an octagonal courtyard and interconnected spaces that bring a family together during the pandemic.
No Architecture designs a weekend house with an octagonal courtyard and interconnected spaces that bring a family together during the pandemic.
It’s late October in Western Massachusetts and the countryside bears all the hallmarks of the season: browning leaves, flapping Halloween decorations, and yard signs asserting either political allegiances or opposition to a proposed marijuana farm. A thick blanket of rain has smudged out the Berkshire Hills, and what remains of the landscape is a gray smear in the windshield wipers.
Doug and Lara Holtz tapped New York architect Andrew Heid to design a weekend home on a scenic family plot in the Berkshires. "We wanted something that was sympathetic to the views and nature," says Lara.
Photo by Iwan Baan
Stepping into the Holtz family residence—a low-slung house a few miles from Great Barrington—just might make you forget what’s going on outside. Here, after casting aside your umbrella and passing along a hallway, the gloom gives way to lofty timber beams, a crackling wood stove, and misty views in every direction. In the open-plan dining area, a breakfast of soft-boiled eggs and toast is being cleared away.
The result of the project is an artfully arranged house that looks out on open fields (protected by a land trust) and the rolling landscape beyond. "The only downside is that the area is farmed, so we get manure smells," Doug jokes.
Photo: Iwan Baan
"You don’t really get a sense of what it’s like inside from the outside," says Lara Holtz, who, along with her husband, Doug, built this place as a weekend retreat on a shared family property. "It’s a bit like a Tardis," she adds.
Heid kept the interiors largely raw, which left Lara, Doug, and their interior designer friend, Elaine O’Dwyer, to fill in the blanks with a mix of modern furnishings and family treasures. The table, pendant, and bar stools are from Pinch, while the dining chairs are from Naughtone and the Cubitos rug is by Minna.
Photo: Iwan Baan
See the full story on Dwell.com: Six Overlapping Pavilions Create a Flower-Shaped Home in Massachusetts
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