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still get married, it'll be a miracle," says Tina with
a laugh.
The couple managed the feat by dividing responsibilities:
He took care of overseeing the five-month building project, while she handled
the marriage arrangements.
Though the building plans predated the marriage
proposal by a couple years, finding a site for their post and beam proved
more difficult than arranging a place to get married.
David and Tina thought they had a spot picked out
three years ago, but it turned out the site was not suitable for a post-andbeam
home. They really wanted to find a site in Noank, near where they
do their boating, but little land was available.
Then, little over a year ago, they heard about
land coming to market off Fishtown Road. Calling Market Realty agents
Judy and Celeste Caracusa, they secured the property by being first to
inquire and paying the asking price - beating out seven others who called
before the land was even listed.
David and Tina, who had become interested in post-and-beam
construction while watching an episode of "This Old House" on television,
eventually decided on Stonington Post & Beam owner Don Barber as their
builder. But not before going on what they dubbed a "post-and-beam
tour" around New England to check out five different companies, including
Oak Post & Beam, Yankee Barn Homes, Davis Frame and Classic Post &
Beam.
"One of them let you use their model home to spend
the night to see if you liked it," Tina recalls. "So we planned our
trip to end up there and spent the night there Saturday.
"We looked at different details. Some were
very traditional, with mortise and tenon joints, and some were fake post
and beams, with no structural value. We eventually decided on Stonington
Post & Beam because it combined the best of both worlds."
The couple's Noank home features all the rugged
charm of post-and-beam construction along with the practicality of stick-built
sections (such as the stacked upstairs and downstairs bathrooms), which
allow electrical and plumbing conduits to be
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hidden. (One of the down sides
of postand-beam building, says the couple, is that wiring and pipes
are not easily hidden.)
The crowning achievement of the open design, which
incorporates elements of a story-and-a-half Cape with those of a traditional
Saltbox, is the 16- by 16-foot great room, a light-filled space that features
an intriguing engineered hammer-beam truss system. David spied the
design, made of the same white pine that graces the rest of the house,
while looking at pictures of a rod-and-gun club built by Stonington Post
& Beam.
A brick fireplace that runs all the way up to the
ceiling adds another natural element to the great room. But mason
Louis Caswell of North Stonington suggested that shelves be incorporated
into the design because he thought a solid wall would be too boring.
With nothing yet to grace the shelves, Tina and David now refer jokingly
to it as their rock-climbing wall.
Adjacent to the great room is the home's largest
space, a massive 16- by 26-foot kitchen with an island that runs the width
of the house and serves as the entertainment hub. The attractive design,
with a dark granite countertop to counteract the light wood throughout
the house, was put together by United Builders Supply. The front
entrance opens up directly to the kitchen; in the back is a 37-foot-wide
deck for outdoor get-togethers; and to one side is the entrance off the
garage.
Near the garage entrance sits the mudroom, dubbed
Gavin's bathroom, in honor of an excitable 2-year-old golden retriever.
"We have a dog that likes to swim and get muddy,
Tina says. "A lot of things in this house were built with him in
mind."
The only closed-off room in the downstairs, beside
the bathroom, is a bedroom set aside for guests, which doubles as a quiet
room to relax.
Upstairs, another quiet spot overlooks the great
room, with just enough space for a couch, a rocker and a comfy chair Tina's
favorite place in the house.
Above this contemplation nook, not yet completed,
will be a loft that wasn't part of the original design. But when
the builder
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| saw that this section overlooking the great
room was going to be just a blank wall, he suggested a loft with a railing
to add visual interest to the room. A library-style ladder will allow
access to the loft.
Hard work along the way
Such relaxing touches - and the easy, informal
flow of the house itself - belies the hard work that went into it.
As part of the contract, Barber of Stonington Post & Beam allows owners
to cut costs by putting in their own sweat equity. In Tina and David's
case, they not only did much of the interior painting, they also sanded
and oiled the home's beams outside, in the middle of the winter, to help
save costs. They could handle most of the beams themselves, but a
couple of them took four people to lift.
"We belt-sanded all four sides with a 4inch
belt sander," David recalls. "It was very, very hard work."
Sometimes, neighbors would take pity on them.
Tina and David remember one of them twice bringing hot food, as well as
two bottles of champagne.
"The neighbors around here have been fantastic," David
says.
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Other praise is heaped upon Jessie Mackin
of JJ's Excavation in Voluntown, who had a great vision for what turned
out to be a very difficult site with plenty of rock. David said Mackin's
wasn't the cheapest bid he received for sitework the seven bids sought
had a range of about $40,000 - but he had the best vision for the property
and gave a definite bid that didn't call for higher costs if more work
was required.
"The dirt guys are key because if they don't do
a good job you pay for it the rest of your life," David says.
The greatest praise, however, is reserved for the
builder, who estimated it would take four months to build the house.
It has actually taken Stonington Post & Beam five months, but the project
lost two weeks because the Drywall wouldn't dry during one particularly
humid period of this summer and another two weeks because of changes Tina
and David wanted incorporated into the house.
"To me, that's on time," David says. "He
said he would get us in before the wedding. He didn't say how long
before the wedding." |
ONG
BEFORE THE BLASTING BEGAN, the foundation work got under way and the first
post and beam came together, there was a man, a woman and a rock.
Top, the great room shows off post-and-beam construction.
