Location New York, NY
Size 2300 sq ft
Date 2024
JE House
The JE House was a full gut renovation of our client’s childhood home, a stately 2-story brick Colonial built in 1940. The floor plans were reconfigured for an elder parent, providing a new primary bedroom with an en-suite bathroom on the first floor, directly off of the large bay windowed living room. The existing galley kitchen was relocated to the front of the house and opened up to the dining room, perfectly suited for their large family gatherings. Custom white oak cabinets with a calacutta quartz kitchen island provide ample storage and cookspace in a clean but modern design.
On the second floor, the bedrooms were originally arrayed around the central staircase, as a series of small rooms with limited storage, whereas the primary bedroom was extremely oversized. The floor plan was redistributed to allow for three generously sized bedrooms; the primary bedroom gained an en-suite bathroom and roof terrace. In the shared bathroom, classic white marble was paired with a rich walnut tambor paneled vanity. In a more playful and saturated palette, the primary ensuite bathroom has scalloped deep blue tile in the shower balanced with Eastern White marble wainscott and flooring. Custom floating white oak vanity keeps the space feeling bright and open.
The infrastructure was updated throughout the house— providing central air conditioning, a new efficient boiler system, updated plumbing to five bathrooms and kitchen and new electrical throughout. The building envelope was upgraded with high performance windows to improve both energy efficiency and acoustic isolation from this urban New York City home. The house previously had limited insulation; new closed cell spray insulation was provided throughout greatly improving it’s energy performance.
Like most buildings, this home embodies it’s history. It was important to us that it was our client’s childhood home. Re-envisioning the home respected the past yet celebrated their future family gatherings with the next generation. We found ourselves enjoying even the smallest of details in this project, such as inserting our client’s old stained glass panel into the dining room wall.
Photos by Hanna Grankvist