Allovette - Estes Twombly + Titrington Architects

INFO

The owners had been looking for farm land near the ocean when they found this site. 18th century deeds described it as a “homestead” and the land has been occupied and farmed for the past 300 years. It was a bigger parcel than they had in mind, and when they asked a friend from Texas what he thought, he drawled “Y’all should just buy all-of-it”, hence Allovette Farm. The new barn sits in the same place as the original barn, which burned down 50 years ago. The barn/guest house will serve as temporary quarters until the new main house is built.The client wanted a real working building, not just a garage with an apartment above. The program includes 4 drive-out bays for tractors and other equipment, a 2-car garage, a full woodshop (the owner is a cabinet maker), a 2 bedroom apartment, and a root cellar. The over-riding aesthetic was to keep the barn simple and straightforward, to respond to the land, and to have the apartment capture views of the surrounding fields. When asked if they wanted to create wall space for paintings they said views of the land could take the place of paintings.The result is a 24’ x 70’ shingled rectangle with 3 major window groupings complimented by a series of small “punched” openings. These simple groupings allowed us to keep the barn form while bringing the full expanse of the landscape inside.