Magazine Street Residence

After a devastating fire gutted this two-story townhouse in the 1980s, the shell of the circa 1835 building remained intact, but the interior was destroyed and something of a blank canvas. Architect Peter Trapolin combined his skill for historic preservation with contemporary architecture to redesign this single-family townhouse for his personal use.

Throughout the house, Trapolin emphasizes connections between and through separate rooms. The main door opens onto a corridor that runs the depth of the house, offering visitors a glimpse into the lush rear courtyard. A restrained material palette and continuous concrete floors link the front formal rooms to the more relaxed, contemporary rear living room and kitchen. Clever use of sightlines and light allow views to the exterior from every room of the ground floor. At the heart of the house a double-height light well with a grand, south-facing window that invites direct light to play across the original exposed brick wall and floods the house with ambient light. The rear wall of the house is almost entirely transparent, with a single, uninterrupted eight-foot sliding glass door leading to the garden.