Description: Site plan, elevations, foundation plans, floor plans, sections, details, framing plans, electrical plans. Roc's Comments: This is another Fox Family. John and Ellen Fox and their four small boys from Chicago. Great business approach and wonderful instincts for design. They were encouraging and careful clients and we enjoyed working for them. Todd Hardy was PM on the main house and Lonny Doyle PM on the very funky "garage/guest quarters/carriage house" [show more]
Description: Property plan, site plan, floor plans, elevations, schedules, framing plans, details, sections, mechanical plans Roc's Comments: I have liked most of the clients I have worked for over the years. The McLeans are in the top 5. Two older Philadelphia people who found each other later in life and joined their big families. They were happy and kind and wonderful to work with. Don had found some property that was thought to be inaccessible but once we had hiked to the site the view was magnificent looking down into all of Northeast Harbor and across to Greenings and Southwest. Harris Hyman, my partner and friend was an excellent civil engineer and he worked out a precipitous drive up the side of the mountain to their ideal site. We decided that, while the view was excellent from there we did not want to harm the view looking back toward their home so I suggested we build the home then only sparingly prune tree limbs for the view. As the land was so steep I also suggested we wrap the grade level and porches and support columns in study western red cedar lattice made to silver out and blend into the surrounding forest texture. This was the first time I tried this and have used it often since. The mottled texture of the surface diminishes the visual impact of a structure on its surround. Something, I think, the early shingle style architects tried often. I was a full time employee working for Venturi, Scott Brown in Philadelphia at the time and did this project at night and on weekends. It was good to see the McLeans in their home state and know the vacation home site as well. This project, in my mind was a total success. [show more]
Description: Plot plan, elevations, floor plans, sketches, foundation plan, roof framing plan, sections, electrical and lighting plan, plumbing fixtures Roc's Comments: Probably one of the best projects. Done for Lisa Heyward and Jock Crothers. Lisa's father was an architect and she knew exactly what she wanted and where. our job was to make it attractive and buildable. I think it worked. this house was built about 4 feet in front of a deteriorated home they first lived in. Once completed they tore the home down and built a small guest house in its place. The contractor foreman on this project was very divisive and made the construction phase difficult but we persevered and it came out well and very close to the budget. I think Lisa was disappointed in the debates we had with the contractors on the job trying to get them to keep to their original commitments. I wish I knew how to make the process less difficult for the client when this happens. Todd Stanley was an excellent help on this project and the guest house is really mostly his doing. He was a great member of our team. [show more]
Description: Floor plan, elevations Never built Roc's Comments: nice guy " At my age I don't buy green bananas." Flo liked symmetry. The contractor asked him why he did not have the Izod alligator symbol over both breast pockets of his shirt. Funny nice old guy. Eventually found a nice house on Somes Sound and sold the land to the Barretts and we went on to design and build an excellent home for them on the same site.
Description: Elevations, floor plan, sketches Roc's Comments: Geddy Mitchell was a local scalawag. I think he sold drugs in his early years and made enough money to buy a bar named Geddy's Pub on Main Street in Bar Harbor. He had something like 70 different altercations with customers when he was trying to clean up the place and never lost one. In one incident he was shot in the back by a shotgun welding neighbor and he survived. He liked me and Helen for some reason and came to the office with his profits one year and said that, while he did not have enough money to buy land on the water and build a house, he did have enough to build a house and would I design a house boat that he might build and moor off shore in various harbors around MDI. This way he might have his water view. We visited with John Letcher of Aerohydro engineers and with Jock Williams at his boatyard to engineer the hull. It was a sweet little project but Gerry being Gerry by the time we solved the problem he was off on the next adventure. [show more]
Description: Floor plans, elevations, sketches, topological plans, Roc's comment: We renovated an existing barn on Bartlett into a series of second floor apartments for visiting guests and workers. This was done for Richard Rockefeller and his second wife Nancy just before he died in a plane crash. Savas Mutlu was the project manager and he was a delightful pro to work with for the last few years of our practice. Wish I had met him sooner.
Description: Bridge sketch, sketches, plot plan, floor plans, elevations, mechanical Roc's Comments: Steven Rockefeller and his wife, Dorie, asked me to design the Gilley Museum (see 118). We had a great time working together on that building and in 1990 (when we were contemplating moving back to MDI from Philadelphia) I received a letter asking if I would design him a new home on Swans Island. Steven had remarried Barbara Bellows and they wanted a summer home built on the land that Steven had simply camped on and cleared the lower branches of the spruce trees to maintain the meadow, encourage the breezes and discourage the mosquitoes. When I asked Steven and Barbara what they were looking for in a summer house Barbara said in her charming southern accent " Roc, we like a summer house with dogs and kids and screen doors that slam." I knew exactly what she meant and prepared a series of pencil sketches that zeroed in on a really nice white clapboard farmhouse indicative of the Greek and Gothic revival structures found all over Swans and the western side of Mt Desert Island. We went thru very few iterations before arriving at the final design. The house purposely has 4 different exterior elevations. The entry or East elevation is the regional revival style facade, the South elevation has a more "craftsman/sea captains" appearance. The West elevation is meant to be the " summer house cottage" side when viewed from the water. And the North side is our current, funky Downeast side. There is a wonderful big bathtub that aligns with a big southern window looking out over the pink sand beach. This place and the clients are all a very happy memory. [show more]
Description: Floor plans Roc's Comments: The nicest couple. Introduce to them by Scott Werner, their contractor. A Blue Hill Architect did the original little one room sauna when their family was younger. When the children became adults with children the Heimbolds asked us to incorporate the original sauna space and design into a much larger building with kitchen/dining/ living two bedrooms and two bathrooms. The pleasure in this was it all looked like it had always been there. [show more]
Description: Unbuilt Elevations, floor plans Roc's favorite design he ever did. Roc's Comments: This is a sad story. Met with the McPhersons and designed this elegant and efficient home for them on a very bad piece of property on the side of the hill in Seal Harbor. They had sewer and water lines running over the property and there was a drainage swale that cut it in half. I organized all the town utility infrastructure and used the intermittent stream as a land feature and defining form in the design. I really love this little solution and think the design is one of the best I have done. Unfortunately the McLeans hired Bill Shaw a local builder who took my COA class in Architectural Design in the past. Bill told them my drawings were not what he wanted to build and they threw them out and Bill built what he wanted to. [show more]
Description: Sketches, floor plans, elevations, schedules, sections, mechanical and electrical, foundation and structural Roc's comment: Paul and Eileen Growald were given this sturdy 1940's Tudor Revival house once the home of the superintendent of the carriage road construction in Acadia by Eileen's mother and father, David and Peggy Rockefeller.
Description: Floor plans, elevations Roc's comment: Delightful old friend. Good poet. Wanted a small cottage next to here shore path shingle home for the family to live in while renting the old house.
Description: Title sheet, general notes and specifications, demolition plan, partial basement, first floor and roof plans, elevations, details, framing plans, existing conditions, topographic survey, landscaping (1999 - by A. C. Parsons)