A clearing in a forest conservation reserve. A point of land on the waterfront. The site at Harkers Point is both.
• Our project at Harkers Point in Annapolis Maryland comprises several structures on a waterfront to their west and south, organized around a welcome garden court. Their angular geometry yields to organic shapes of the forested shore with a pool forming the compound’s southern boundary. Topping out just under the 45’ height limit, the three-story house connects forest floor to treetops.
• The design grew from the development of the overall site - from 750’ of reconstructed “living shoreline” to a series of exterior spaces linked by pathways through forest conservation areas. The client’s design brief for this 8500sf second home: create sequences of interconnected space that weave together landscape and structures.
• A biopool forms the southern edge of the house precinct – an ecosystem using aquatic plants, aggregates, and constantly moving water to maintain its clarity, purity, and pH balance.
• Water links each space to the next. An 8’ diameter fountain - the “source” of water - announces the entry courtyard. Visually and via sound, it connects to the biopool and waterfall to the south. The sequence of water elements, from fountain to hot tub to biopool to the views of Whitehall Bay, fuse north to south, land to water.
• Biobased, heat-treated exterior siding extends both vertically and horizontally, an abstraction of trunks and branches. Interior hardwood flooring and tile represent wood, soil, and stone. Vertical expanses of millwork stretching the height of the main stair from first floor to third echo the dense forest of oaks, maples, American Beech, sweetgum, and Black Tupelo, constantly changing shape and color with the seasons. Walls of stained or fumed oak millwork connect the forest center at the north to the bio-pool on the south, and tile recreates the sense of stone along the property’s waterways.
• The design achieves a HERS rating 39 – 61% more efficient than the RESNET Reference Home, .....