BALA 2003 Home of the Year: Beachside Bliss

What makes a Home of the Year? It's more than just exquisite design, dynamic space planning and knockout curb appeal. More than detailed interior finishes, an exterior that exudes character, and harmony with the home site. The Home of the Year combines form and function to absolutely meet its owners' needs and desires. This one-of-a-kind custom home in Hilton Head Island, S.C., designed by Mike Ruegamer of Group 3 Architecture and built by Rick Leach of Paragon Construction, does just that.

Ruegamer needed to understand the lifestyle, personalities and needs of his clients before putting pen to paper to create the design, even if they weren't quite sure how their needs and dreams would translate into the perfect home for them.

"They had a casual vision for the house," Ruegamer says, "but they did not know what that meant. We spent a lot of time on how they lived, how they wanted to live in this house and what they have been dreaming about." Getting it right in the end comes down to developing a good rapport from the beginning, Ruegamer says, and having the right team.

East Coast Wanders South

Surrounded by old, bent trees with lots of character, the custom home overlooks the Atlantic Ocean. An architectural transplant, it reflects the owners' East Coast heritage in its cedar shingles, calming gray-blue paint and crisp white trim.

"Everybody has a different idea for a beach house on Hilton Head," Ruegamer says. Architecturally, the shingle-style house has New England style. It features a lot of detail, playfulness and design coherence, from the cu-pola details that cap the garage and library to the pergolas at the garage and front entry to the round windows that peek out from different rooms.

To keep maintenance low long after the homeowners moved in, Ruegamer had the cedar shingle siding stained to weather naturally and specified aluminum-clad windows. He also used PVC that looks like wood for all exterior trim, right down to the deck railings and columns. "That's becoming more and more prevalent," Ruegamer says. "It holds paint better and prevents peeling and rotting.

Finding Its Center

The 5,557-square-foot house uses every square inch to maximize living space and take advantage of ocean views, which can be seen from all major rooms. The gathering room serves as the core around which all other rooms revolve. It was designed to be comfortable for the retiree owners as well as the many family and weekend guests who regularly visit the active couple.

The gathering room almost functions as the lobby of an inn -- with a large seating area, welcoming fire-place and gorgeous view -- and yet it still lives well for the couple when they are alone. Transom windows extend views upward but also help keep the ceiling in scale, as do the room's beam details.

"It is not a room that you walk past and don't see," Ruegamer explains. "You don't look into rooms, you walk through rooms. That adds a lot to the casualness of the house."

Design coherence welcomes the owners and guests as they move through the house. Heart-pine flooring and classic, built-up moldings on ceilings, columns and at baseboards unite the design -- essential as the eye moves from room to room within the open floor plan.

Still, the floor plan provides opportunities to define spaces. A shuttered pass-through rather than walls sepa-rates the kitchen from the gathering room and serves as a bar with a small sink and a wine cooler on the kitchen side.

On the opposite side of the gathering room, a fireplace flanked by bookcases creates another defining element. Open doorways on each side of the room lead to the guest wing and the library, and the room also visually flows outdoors, separated from the elements only by its wall of windows."The spaces in this house are interesting in their connection to one another without being open to one another," says BALA judge Rick Emsiek, an architect with McLarand, Vasquez, Emsiek & Partners in Irvine, Calif. "It allows the spaces to breathe by themselves. The interior volume is well-mannered and appropriately scaled. It is a large house, but it does not feel overpowering."

Judge Wendy Ney Manley of Elverson, Pa., agrees. "It is a comfortable house, not a soaring space that gets away from us," she says. "Even with 10-foot ceilings, there are elements such as beams that bring it down to human scale."

In the kitchen, the owners benefit from lots of cooking and entertaining space. A large island provides casual seating for four, while a sofa nestles into a light-filled bay window for those more inclined to watch the action from afar or settle down with the morning newspaper. Painted, stained and glass-front cabinets, tongue-and-groove paneling, and antique-style fixtures and hardware keep the feeling casual but look very pulled together. The kitchen has direct access to a covered patio on the rear of the house.

The library, which occupies its own beachside wing, generated the most comments from the judges. Ruegamer alternated windows and bookcases on three walls. Round windows challenge the room's dominating square and rectangular shapes while adding a bit of whimsy.

"With windows on three sides, the room is very elegant but livable," says judge Darren Senn, director of design for builder Senn & Youngdahl in Stillwater, Minn. "It is a place to read the paper or entertain guests."

The homeowners did not want a dark, formal library, but a room where they could really live. Pine paneling and sunlight streaming in give the space a warm look. "It is less formal because of the pine," Ruegamer says. "The boxed beam look to the ceiling adds dimension and interest."

A Room of Their Own

Despite their obvious bent toward hospitality, the owners also needed special, private living space for themselves. Being the only element on the second floor sets the master suite, a true retreat, apart from the rest of the home. This unique positioning grants the owners sweeping ocean views. Accessed by stair or elevator, the suite includes the bedroom with a fireplace and a long walk-in closet/dressing room with a window and entries at both ends. A generous terrace opens off of the spacious, light-filled master bath and also can be reached from a short hall at its other end, near the private study.

Nailing the Details

Each of the three guest suites on the main floor includes a private bath. Designed specifically for grandchildren, the fun children's room features three built-in beds with a nautical theme, including ship hardware with accents of blue, beige and red -- a motif repeated in the bathroom's tile. Ruegamer and Eloise Smith of Group 3 Interiors, Hilton Head Island, did the interior design.Nailing the Details

BALA judges continually commented on the careful attention to detail in the house, knowing that little things contribute to the big picture, such as a coffered beam ceiling where the ordinary would suffice, strategically placing a window where it is not anticipated (such as in the library), or topping the cupolas with just the right spire and weather vane. Good design and construction provide the expected. Attention to detail creates surprises and delights.

"The details add character to the house," says Leach, the home's builder. "Go into every room and you find a special feature that makes this house stand out from other homes."

"You can see the thoughtfulness," says judge Dominick Tringali of Dominick Tringali Architects in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. "Every detail was thought through."

Judge and interior designer Kay Green of Kay Green Design in Orlando, Fla., agrees. "It is not that it has never been done before, but how they put together the parts and pieces and the details."

The original site contained a small house that was torn down. "It was a wreck," Leach says.

Ruegamer sited the new house to maximize views, but the existing pool was retained. In cooperation with environmental authorities, existing trees were identified and built around. Leach appreciates correct architecture and cooperative clients. "The biggest challenge in building a home is the difference in what we have and what could be. It is important that everyone has the same vision of the end result," Leach says. "The key is communication and that everything is well-documented."

What makes a house the Home of the Year? It is not always easy to articulate. After all of the houses with flash and fireworks, the same criteria emerge, whether a home is 1,500 square feet or 10 times that size. It is how a home feels and how it works for the owners.

"The difference between a good house and a great house is planning, attention to detail and the quality of the workmanship," Ruegamer says. "It doesn't mean a ton of details, but attention to detail -- what and where. And when the client is thrilled. Those are the things that make a great house.

"It is not a success if it is not what they want."