Like many of Brookline’s two-family houses this building, built around 1890, had been altered many times.  The replacement of an aging kitchen presented an opportunity to take advantage of the unique siting of this house - sitting at the top of a slope with an extensive and wooded rear yard.  The sequence from the street to the existing (slightly modified) materially rich introverted central hall to the ‘release’ of the framed view of the treetops from the kitchen becomes the memorable counterpoint to the cross-axial en filade of the original rooms.  As a result this larger spatial composition gives gravity to the new sequence and becomes the most striking and memorable event of the house.  The additional task of reconfiguring the somewhat haphazard and piecemeal organization of the storage and bathroom allowed the master bedroom, bath and guest bath to be greatly simplified and brought into a more spatially cohesive and efficient union with the original plan of the house. 

Please visit www.bkarch.com for more information and images.