Belle Meade Residence
A 7,500-square-foot family home in Belle Meade, Nashville, Tennessee, stretched around courtyards to hold both quiet seclusion and lively gathering.
- Location
- Belle Meade, Nashville, Tennessee
- Type
- Residential, new construction
- Size
- 7,500 square feet, primary home with a family office
- Materials
- Clay tile, limestone, oak, copper, stone
- Completion
- Ongoing
The family bought this property in Belle Meade hoping to craft a good family home. In our first conversations they shared memories of a secret stair and a great room filled with family and friends. They wanted a house for both quiet moments of seclusion and boisterous gatherings.
Belle Meade is a distinct Nashville neighborhood, bordered in part by a river you can ford in your car as you come and go. Its homes are brimming with personality, each one like a different person. Our site was shouldered by such homes and dropped steeply at the rear toward a small creek.
Hemmed in at the sides and in close conversation with its neighbors, the house found relief only in the front and rear yards. We needed a way to bring quiet into a very extroverted streetscape, and began studying courtyard homes, the porte cochère, and the old arrangement of outbuildings.
So we stretched the house. A family office comes forward to the street, and a porte cochère, a private courtyard, a small entry court, and a series of terraces breathe space between the structures, cascading down to a pool, spa, and pool house. The outdoor rooms are drawn into the plan, and the house folds in on itself, making quiet, intimate places alongside great rooms for entertaining. The result is a home with real personality, holding gathering and seclusion in beautiful tension.
More work
Green Hills Residence
We first worked with the clients on a retail store downtown, and they later asked if we would help with their own home. They are warm and inviting people who have built a strong community in their Nashville neighborhood, so when a homesite went up for sale on their street, they couldn't resist making a home in the place they already call home. In our first meetings they told us about spaces that had felt like home, her grandmother's dressing room, where the ladies could be themselves, and a cabin in the wilderness by the water. He would spend all of his time on a porch if he could, and she would spend hers in the kitchen, but entertaining was what they shared, a way to bring people in and share life with others.
Carrol Residence
The clients were looking for a home for a new season of life. They wanted to spend more time in Chattanooga, where they already had family, and to share more of their life with them. They found an urban lot in the North Shore neighborhood and asked for a home that could support an active life, with room for large family gatherings and intimate nights by the fire. The kitchen was the heart of it, a place for people to gather, eat, and share stories.
Shackleford Ridge Residence
Our client, a contractor himself, had built or renovated many of the homes his family lived in over the years, yet none quite suited the way they lived. They were still chasing a house they could call home, one that held meaning and memory. They remembered coming home from school to find their mother on the stairs, and a big open room by the fire for play and stories. They wanted a home for deep living and connection with the natural world, where the doors stay open and friends are always welcome.