This morning we had a meeting with the architect, the landscape designer, the gardener, the Sherpa and Beloved. We saw the garden plan which is gorgeous - everything I wanted - lots of beautiful little garden areas, gravel courtyards, a sunken swimming pool that’s hidden, an area for the vegetable garden, a flower garden, and even a ‘white’ garden a la Vita Sackville-West, in a little parterre by the guest room.

And the house is truly breathtaking. I didn’t think it was possible to design a house that looks exactly as if it was built in the mid nineteenth century. The scale is exactly right, the proportions perfect. Aside from wondering what on earth we’re thinking, building a house in the worst financial market we have seen for many years, we’re both now sure we’re going to end up with a house that is truly magical in every way.

It’s bigger than I would have liked, but with five children and visiting relatives, it’s hard not to be. But what it isn’t, is a mcmansion. The rooms themselves are not huge, save for a large kitchen/family room that is modelled on the one in the house in which we’re currently living, but more contained.

They are reminiscent of the way houses used to be built, before people assumed they needed ten foot ceilings and giant archways, which, as far I’m concerned, do little other than turn these great big rooms into giant corridors.

The mass of our house isn’t overwhelming at all, but rather gracious and elegant, pretty rather than impressive.

We’re talking Nantucket picket fences, old reclaimed brick paths, clipped boxwood hedges and balls, lawn paths that lead you to the different areas.

A Victorian greenhouse that serves as the link between the garage and the main house, an elegant carriage house that will be the garage, and not disturbing the beautiful three weeping willows that stand majestically on the side of the garden, nor the two ancient maple trees that cast dappled shadows over what will now be the front.

But more importantly, I look at the plan of this house, and I can truly see ourselves living in it, and using every room. The ‘formal’ living room will not be formal, but instead will be furnished with squashy sofas, and a hidden television, used as a den, rather than a room in which we perch only a handful of times a year. The dining room will be walled by floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, with ’stations’ for computers, and will be used as a library and homework room, a place for the Smalls to use computers and work at the table.

We’re still ironing out a few minor details, but I can’t wait to share the plans with you…

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 14th, 2008 at 4:52 pm and is filed under House that Jane Built. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.