Connecticut Home

A three-year restoration of a former parsonage dating to 1863 revives a cake box house, paring back its essential self while subtly introducing a modern view. The home’s original interior architecture retains its stately formality in a pared back expression: original paneling but on thickened-up walls; a wraparound, waist-high workbench envelops the formality of its kitchen’s workings.

Contributions from friends mingle with the studio’s recurring forms. Matt Merkel Hess's quixotic ceramic wall works play off the home’s original Federal-era Americana wallpaper, unearthed under layers of paint; the work of Peter Schlesinger and Purvis Young finds harmony with pieces by Landon Metz and Green River Project.

Touches of green pick up the verdant lawn unspooling out front — a wall-length silk headboard the color of moss; Nordic Knots rugs in piquant olive. As Goethe recommended, green is “for rooms to live in constantly.”