On a busy corner in Newburyport is a 1730 Georgian home that its owner calls “a strange, old house that sits right on the sidewalk.” It strangeness comes only from its historic nature, which made a recent renovation project to enlarge its kitchen and add a bathroom an unusual challenge.
There were the typical issues with old homes, such as floor drastically out of level, but there was also the question of how to incorporate the priorities and tastes of a modern-day homeowner while staying true to an 18th-century aesthetic.
Two factors worked in favor of the project: The existence of a relatively modern addition that could be replaced to create the new kitchen and bathroom, and the preference of the homeowner, Eve Lee, for linear design.
For the new addition, “It was really important that the massing of the exterior was compatible with the existing home, while also being subservient to it,” notes Juli MacDonald of Olson Lewis + Architects, who designed the addition. “We wanted it to be clean and simple, fitting well without distracting from or detracting from the existing home, which we love so much.”…