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Neil Sullivan, an oral surgeon and national champion sailor, and his wife, Jan, a Pilates studio owner, found their slice of paradise on a peninsula in Annapolis four years ago. Architects Scarlett Breeding and John Alt of Alt Breeding Schwarz Architects LLC designed this wonderful Arts and Crafts-inspired custom house, which maximizes a one-acre lot that overlooks Aberdeen Creek.
“With the code that limited the square footage, the challenge was to create a dwelling that was visually expandable – a space that is cozy in the winter and open and connected to the outdoors in the summer,” Breeding says. “It was a tight site from a planning perspective. We wanted to stretch the house out to the waterfront.”
The house, which is 19 feet wide without the porches, gracefully extends in the back from the main house to an 18-by-42-foot screened porch to a stone terrace, past the pool, right down to the water’s edge.
“The most successful part of this house is the expandability. In the summer, this house can grow. The Sullivans have a very large family, so they can have it both ways,” Breeding says.
“I like the fact that it’s a four-season house,” Jan says. “We can enjoy the outdoor portions of the house either alone or with guests.”
Blissful Cross Breezes
One of the reasons the house can expand dramatically in warm weather is because Breeding integrated big, inviting porches throughout the design. She also ingeniously worked in a series of French doors that fold like an accordion, opening large spans of the wall. These folding walls, by NanaWall Systems Inc., flank a grand stone fireplace to connect the great room to the screened porch out back.
“We keep the NanaWalls open a lot during the summer. We keep all the windows open downstairs during the summer and only use air conditioning upstairs in our bedroom and bath. You don’t feel like you’re sealed in the house during the summer,” Neil says. “The house faces south and the prevailing winds come up the bay from the south, so the summer southerlies come up through the house.”
The Sullivans call the enclosed great room – which has a teak floor and a 10-foot-high ceiling with exposed structural beams – their winter living room. The screened porch, with its stone floor and equally high-beamed ceiling, acts as their summer living room. The woodburning stone fireplace that divides them works on both sides.
Their great room is the heart of the house, one big open space where the living room flows into the dining room, which in turn opens to the kitchen.
“Scarlett did a fabulous job capturing views from any seat at the dining table or on the porch,” Jan says.
Streamlined Storage
Katalin Farnady of Design & Style worked with Jan to design the interiors. Together they selected furniture, color, and tile, and placed the furniture. Farnady collaborated with the architects to design built-ins in several places. The most distinctive is what they call an “art box” in the great room. This is a streamlined white lacquered cabinet – 12 feet by 7 feet – that hangs on the wall a foot and a half off the floor opposite the fireplace. It seems to float on the wall and holds the flat-screen TV as well as china and linens. It’s a sleek piece with concealed hinges that solved the problem of where to put the television, because the Sullivans didn’t want it above their beautiful stone fireplace.
“The fireplace tends to be on here more often than the TV,” Jan says.
Easy Livin’
Jan loves to cook and wanted to be able to talk to people while she’s preparing meals, so it was important to her to have the kitchen open to the great room. “Neil and I can talk to each other and be in the same space,” Jan says.
She bought white maple cabinets at Lowe’s and had Berliner Construction install them. “We chose fluted glass on the top row of cabinets to show off the wonderful expanded ceiling height,” she says.
At the other end of the great room, a hall bathed in natural light with a water view leads to what is currently used as a guest room. The Sullivans, who are both athletic, could convert it into their bedroom when or if they might not be so mobile. “We can downsize and live comfortably on this level,” Neil says.
Rolling Down the River
For the time being, however, the Sullivans have a spacious and comfortable bedroom suite upstairs. It’s bordered on the east and west with large balconies that run the length of the room.
Their bath, which has heated floors, is particularly luxurious. Jan wanted to be able to see the river while soaking in her whirlpool tub, so Breeding had it raised on a platform. “A lot of people come to visit by boat, so I wanted to be able to see them coming and going,” Jan says. “The organic shape of the tub dictated the shape of the platform,” Breeding adds.
Several rooms in the house are splashed with color, including powder rooms with customized red walls, and a guest bath with Benjamin Moore Peanut Butter walls.
“Color makes me happy. I feel livelier with color,” Jan says.
There’s No Place Like Home
Neil savors the seclusion of their home and how it feels like a hideaway house. After following a long driveway, the approach to the Sullivans’ home is very inviting. “The front garden element acts as a landscape screen between the parking court and the [front] porch. The main house and the garage are connected by an open breezeway to allow each form to read as a separate structure,” Breeding says. The “oversize stepping stone” is an informal way to allow for a “friends” entrance from the parking court to the breezeway without going through the main entrance or garage, she adds.
There’s just one problem with the house: leaving it.
The Sullivans share bicycling as an interest and like to roll their bikes out and toss them on their powerboat, then go to the Eastern shore for weeklong bike rides. They ride up to 40 miles a day and sleep on the boat at night. While they cherish these trips, it’s getting harder and harder to leave home.
“The biggest problem is we look at what we have here, so we don’t want to leave as often,” Neil says.
