This afternoon I offer you another anticipated but unpunctual postmortem, this time for the icehouse vestibule. As with similar updates, anticipate a patchwork post gathering many previous posts, diverse elements drawn together to tell the story of a anteroom (more of an antechamber, I suppose) that concurrently serves many functional purposes. Familiars will recognize that my affinity for liminal spaces is inextricably woven into not only today’s daily dispatch but also the space itself. For the icehouse vestibule is not only an entrance, hallway, and coffee bar, it is conjunction of thresholds, a place of transition, a hub and an interstice. It is a welcome and an introduction to the unique environment we’ve created in Rosslyn’s icehouse.
But I’m pushing into preaching instead of showing and stepping back. That’s what I hope to do, starting now.
[When planning the icehouse rehabilitation,] we spent enormous time considering and brainstorming and troubleshooting the diminutive spatial environment. The volumes, relationships between volumes, visual and functional porosity within the structure as well as between the interior and exterior of the structure all are defined in large part by transitional elements like doorways and windows, stairways and railings, staircase landing, deck and landscape levels, and the vestibule… to maximize the functional and aesthetic experience and to minimize the inevitable challenges and limitation of such a small building. (Source: Limning Liminal Contours)
The following images and excerpts offer a few glimpses into the icehouse vestibule. I hope you’ll take a look around!
[In the photo above] overpainting tempers the impact of this new door, but it’s already recasting the interior in natural light. And a welcome evolution this is… everyone on the team is longing for natural light. At last the entrance vestibule is illuminated from without… (Source: East Door Installed)
Bringing sunlight into this space was a priority. While easy in the main room because of the many windows, the west elevation’s porosity, and fenestration on three sides, the vestibule was more challenging. Bringing in morning light from the east-side entrance and all day light from the small south-facing window helped overcome the fact that this room’s ceiling, defined by the loft above, damped the natural light and no north windows were possible.
In addition to streamlining the internal wall cladding to T&G nickel gap throughout (painted with a high level of light reflectivity) we emphasized the floor for character and light-play.
In the photograph above, you can see the dramatic intersection of new flooring with the bookmatched threshold (beneath the columns.) The flooring courses will be perfectly aligned in the vestibule and in the main room ensuring continuity with a dramatic interstitial transition at the ash “heart” abstraction formed from the mirrored grain (concealed with rosin paper in this photograph) of the bookmatched planks. (Source: Flooring Sneak Peek)
The vestibule is open to the main room, but the flooring contributes to the zoning of the space.
Although we incorporated a bookmatched threshold to visually delineate the vestibule from the main room, the flooring courses have been sized and aligned on both sides of the threshold, visually unifying the floor. (Source: Variable Width Flooring)
Cohesive. Integrated. But distinct.
Upon entering the icehouse from the east side deck and entrance, the door immediately to your right in the vestibule is a repurposed colonial door salvaged from Rosslyn back in 2006-7 during the early phase of our home’s historic rehabilitation.
All of the exterior windows and doors [in the icehouse] are new, custom fabricated by Marvin. I sought to balance this practical choice by emphasizing seamless integration of architectural salvage whenever possible. The columns flanking the threshold from vestibule into main room are one of my favorite examples. Another is the bathroom door. I was excited by the prospect of adapting and reusing an antique door (ie. architectural salvage) for passage from the vestibule/coffee bar area into the bathroom. (Source: Door Reconceived for Icehouse Bathroom)
The functional focus of the vestibule comes next on your right after the bathroom door.
Let’s start with an elevation of the icehouse coffee bar as originally drawn by our friend and architect, Tiho Dimitrov. This highly functional but basically microscopic addition to the vestibule occupies about 6’ between the bathroom and the column oriented to your right as you enter the icehouse from the east entrance. (Source: Icehouse Coffee Bar)
After the coffee bar (and indeed maybe even before the coffee bar) the most compelling component of the icehouse vestibule is the pair of columns.
In the snapshot above, Peter is trimming the top off one of two Greek revival columns deconstructed and salvaged back in 2006 when we rehabilitated Rosslyn’s dining room. Although our vision was to repurpose these bold design elements, to upcycle them some way, somehow, it wasn’t until undertaking the icehouse rehab (after postponing it indefinitely 14 or 15 years ago) that this capricious concept presented itself: use them in the icehouse!
Why, you might well ask, would we need two imposing columns inside the diminutive icehouse? While the question is reasonable, perhaps *need* is not the most appropriate evaluation. After all, adaptive reuse of a utility building originally constructed to fulfill a highly specific (and outdated) function obviously doesn’t *need* handsome embellishments for structural support. And yet the opportunity to re-integrate these historic Rosslyn elements into an otherwise utilitarian barn has presented a whimsical challenge that at some level echoes the unlikely marriage of work space and recreation hub we’re imagining into existence with this newest rehab project.
And soon enough, you’ll be able to witness the capricious way in which this pair of columns (and an understated entablature) not only help support the loft where I’ll be composing these daily dispatches in coming months, but also define and frame a spatial transition from the more intimate entrance and coffee bar into the loftier main room of this small building. (Source: Re-tuning Columns)
Now let’s fast forward a little to see how this capricious plan came together.
The column flanked vestibule (and the bookmatched ash threshold upon which both columns rest) is… [not only exciting because the finished space is finally coming into focus, but also because] this installation is momentous for me.
[…]
Just as fusing work and play in a single space might initially seem incompatible, designing a column flanked vestibule inside an icehouse might evoke concerns of incongruity. Fair concern. And final judgment will be for you to make once we reach completion. (Source: Column Flanked Vestibule)
I draw your attention not only to the finally repurposed columns that once supported a beam in Rosslyn’s dining room. Now let your eyes drift down to the floor, to the bookmatched ash threshold crafted by Peter from some of our homegrown stump-to-lumber hardwood…
Columns, threshold, and header are finally coalescing in a long envisioned “spatial transition from the more intimate entrance and coffee bar into the loftier main room”. Witnessing this accomplishment after so many months of planning and anticipation filled me with joy. It affirmed hopes and plans, it rewarded a risky design decision, defining and framing two functionally distinct spaces without losing the transparency and porosity. It instills a playful unlikelihood in an otherwise mostly predictable environment. It filters light dramatically, adding sensuous silhouettes to an otherwise geometric linearity. It delineates without restricting. It is a suggestion. It is poetry.(Source: Column Flanked Vestibule)
While braiding it all together was a consideration from the earliest design iterations, at least one notable final phase of carpentry and painting remained: the baseboard.
Understated trim… borders the perimeter of the room, transitioning from the handsome homegrown flooring to the shiplap walls. The first photo [above] shows the southeast corner of the vestibule prior to installation of the baseboard. Unfinished and ragged. Breathtaking floor. Beautiful wall. But these two elements exist adjacent to one another without coalescing. It’s confusing. It’s incomplete. And it’s unattractive.(Source: Baseboard & Beyond)
Baseboard trim is one of several design elements within a structure that help organize the visual experience… Now completed… [the baseboard trim] provides the missing border conjoining floor and wall. Corners and returns are especially appealing to the eye, accentuating the changes in angles while drawing attention to the poetry of planes that contributes to the character and complexity of this otherwise understated space.
Although I’m noticing the final avalanche of sand slipping through the hourglass, I’ll focus on one additional aspect of the vestibule before winding down for the day. Upon entering the vestibule from the east entrance, the wall to your left is hung with multiple framed artifacts and artworks.
At the center… is a pair of Essex Regatta promotional posters from 1955 and 1960. Harkening back to summers of yesteryear when watersports enthusiasts flocked to the Sherwood Inn waterfront for waterskiing exhibitions, sailboat and motorboat races, and… enthusiastic family festivities…
Conceived as the core of this collage, these relics’ midsummer-meets-maritime memories bridge past and present for us. Susan and I were initially smitten with Rosslyn’s waterside lifestyle possibilities… and the vintage ferry and regatta artifacts offer context and continuity.
At top left is an historic map that reaches back even further. Our waterfront did not yet have a boathouse or pier recorded, and the plan of our home did not yet include the two bays to the south of the entrance… [but] the lakeside location, the orientation of the village along the shore and around the harbors, and commercial waterfront wharfs and enterprises further affirms the heritage of historic Essex as a significant (and once thriving) inland maritime hub.
At bottom left, beneath the map, is another visual voyage back in time. This waterfront bathhouse once stood north of Rosslyn’s sandy beach, inland from the northernmost crib dock now reduced to ruins by the slosh and wash of time. A gift from Todd Goff, discussed in greater length elsewhere, this is a reference to a more contemporaneous waterfront lifestyle, tinged with the traces of a no longer extant attribute.
Let’s move to the top right, another gift, this time [a painting] from Catherine Seidenberg.
Catherine’s whimsical black and white watercolor of Rosslyn’s front facade offers a chance to reflect on the past decade Susan and I have spent reinvigorating this quirky property and an invitation to daydream about its future. (Source: Catherine Seidenberg: Artist)
And just beneath Catherine’s creative rendering is a pair of Paul Flinn illustrations… [that I referenced a couple of days ago in a post titled, “Paul Flinn’s Boathouse Illustrations“.]
[…] So many souvenirs from Rosslyn’s heritage as an actively appreciated and heralded waterfront… [So many] time capsules encouraging our water-centric adventures with inspiration from our friends and forebears. (Source: Time Capsules & Vintage Artifacts)
As always, there’s more to say. Up to this point I’ve mostly gathered elements together. It remains to convey the experience of transitioning through this space; to capture the cozy intimacy of this small environment within a larger, loftier space; and to articulate the affect of symmetry, porosity, and thresholds. I’ll resume another day perhaps…
What do you think?