Cantilevered Design Defines an Entertaining Retreat

The home’s cantilevered design with full glass walls open to nature represents the “perch,” while the lower-level living quarters, supported by a concrete retaining wall, create the “hollow”—hence the Perch & Hollow moniker.

Designer Constance Healey chose earth-toned pieces for the living and entertaining spaces, including indoor-outdoor furniture and a sisal rug from RH. “We were trying to make something that felt like the outdoors,” she says. “Even the patterns in the pillows, the striations in the vases—all of it works together.”

The kitchen, anchored by black walnut cabinetry from Leicht and a marble slab backsplash sourced from Ann Sacks, is meant for entertaining. There’s no cooktop or oven, and everything is designed to feel like life among the trees.

The lower-level sleeping quarters is meant to be a quiet, restorative space. “You can’t see or hear the cars driving by,” says Shea. “So you’re really in the earth, protected and sheltered and immersed.”

Sprawling motorized windows blur the boundary between interior and exterior, “so when the windows are open, it feels like you’re literally perched among the trees,” says architect Jennifer Shea.

“What’s special and intentional is that you go outside the building and you’re actually still inside it, and vice versa,” says Healey.

The homeowner knew: an unconventional home would require an unconventional design team. Tucked into the woods of North Haven, the 2,900-square-foot entertaining space/retreat would come to be called Perch & Hollow—a nod to its dramatic cantilevered upper level hovering above a lower level built into the side of a hill. The building is the result of a collaboration between Babbidge Construction Company and Patriquin Architects, two New Haven firms largely known for their commercial work.

But, then, the homeowner is an unconventional sort of guy. The new two-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bath structure, which connects to a primary home by a meandering path, was meant to blend seamlessly with nature and serve as a low-impact place to entertain guests or sneak away for a quiet afternoon.

“The intent was to make it look like the house was growing out of the suburbs,” says Jennifer Shea, associate principal at Patriquin. “He described what he wanted as a sort of ‘playful treehouse.’ But as a tech guy, having a modern flair was also important.”

Construction required more attention to design than usual, says Babbidge project manager Matt DiGiovanni. “Usually the approach is to level a site and then build because it’s cheaper and faster,” he says. “But in this project, the approach was to work with the natural landscape, so every single piece was meticulously selected and coordinated. It’s basically built like a skyscraper, with a curtain wall and concrete foundations that could hold up a fifty-story building—but instead, it’s holding back the hillside.”

The lower level is made of concrete foundation walls covered with porcelain tile, while the upper level is trimmed with a dark bronze-colored aluminum to conceal the steel structure. “These gestures offer a lighter—weight, not color—appearance than the heavy construction materials, giving the illusion of the floating volumes,” says Shea.

Philadelphia-based interior designer Constance Healey worked with sustainable materials and textures to create interiors that “wouldn’t break the feeling of trees,” she says. “As a designer, you spend a lot of time trying to help your clients think outside the box. This guy lives outside the box. He doesn’t even know there is a box.” When she saw the slab of honed marble from Brazil, which would eventually take center stage in the kitchen as a sort of backsplash, she knew she’d found her marquis piece. “I just said, ‘Oh, my god, that looks like a Monet painting,’ ” she says. “Like an aerial view of a river and also a view of clouds. And that, for me, was the jump off for everything else.”

Project Team
Architecture: Patriquin Architects
Interior design: Constance Healey
Builder: Babbidge Construction Company
Landscape design: Christensen Landscape Services