An Architect and Designer’s Rightsized Home

Milford Cushman and Terri Gregory designed their Hyde Park, Vermont, house to “tuck into the natural curves of the landform.” To take advantage of the serene setting, they added a screened porch and sunning deck.

Thanks to an intricate overlapping roof design, the front entry has a generous protective overhang; the design called for a three-bay garage: one for Cushman, one for Gregory (hers has a clay studio), and one to share.

An efficient kitchen/dining area features Cookshire Cabinetry maple cabinets from Country Home Center and a custom Baltic birch table, designed by Cushman Design Group and made by Whitaker Hartt Cabinetry.

The streamlined HearthstoneTech Tula woodstove takes the chill off the open-concept main living area.

Gregory and Cushman designed the inviting living room around a Roche Bobois sofa from their previous house.

The primary bedroom, says Gregory, gets both the summer and winter sunrise; the queen bed is the Hush bed from Blu Dot.

“At the end of the day,” says Gregory, “we retreat to the screened porch, following the sun.” The coveted space, which is framed in locally band-sawn hemlock, doubles as a peaceful spot for morning coffee.

The house faces south to capture an abundance of natural light (also a bonus for the thriving raised garden beds). With an eye toward aging in place, the couple wanted the primary living areas all easily accessible on the main floor, while ancillary spaces like Gregory’s home office, an extra bedroom, and a family room occupy the lower level.

This east side view shows the angular offset of the three-bay garage (right) from the main house (left); a coat of Benjamin Moore Amherst Gray stain ties it all together.

Call it the Goldilocks dilemma, home renovation edition. After a major remodel to their Hyde Park, Vermont, house, architectural designer Milford Cushman and his wife, interior design specialist Terri Gregory, came to a hard realization: with four buildings and 5,000 square feet of gardens to tend, the property they’d called home for thirty-three years was just too big.

Cushman, founder and president of Cushman Design Group, is no stranger to the notion of smartly scaled houses that meet—but don’t exceed—their occupants’ needs. “We are very skilled at designing ‘just big enough’ houses,” he says, which he explains as “a way to describe an in-depth and very intentional design process centered around what we need.” This ethos is a defining tenet of his firm and even has its own page showcasing past projects on the Cushman website.

When it came to being mindful of intention, there were several things that Cushman and Gregory sought in their new build, namely a house, also in Hyde Park, that would capitalize on the winter light, be fully accessible for aging in place, and would adhere to a $230-per-square-foot building cost. “Just big enough,” explains Cushman, “also means being respectful of a budget.”

To hit that goal, builder Gregory Construction used efficient cuts of wood and common materials; all the walls and ceilings of the 2,300-square-foot house are Sheetrock, the windows are cost-effective Andersen 100 Series, and the exterior is eastern white pine. The design, however, is anything but common. Take the roof, for example: Terri Gregory had admired a shed roof on another project and wanted the same for her own house. The standing-seam metal roof slopes and overlaps, and a large triangular-shaped piece connects the house with a three-bay garage while simultaneously creating an exaggerated overhang at the front entry.

Inside, the main level comprises the living and dining rooms, kitchen, and primary bedroom and bath, as well as a screened porch to take in the bucolic views. To tread as lightly as possible on the land, the screened porch and bedroom are both built on posts over ledge in the ground. This same eye to sustainability is exhibited with the furnishings, all of which (except the dining table and chairs) are from the couple’s previous home.

The resulting house—a contemporary take on midcentury modern design—is not too big, not too small. In fact, it is just right.

Project Team
Architectural, interior, and landscape design: Milford Cushman, Terri Gregory, Cushman Design Group
Builder: Tell Gregory, Gregory Construction