A year and a half ago, my husband and I bought a property in Lake Oswego on the Willamette River. We decided to sit on it for a while but are now working with an architect on custom home plans. Being a lover of interior design and architecture, this has been a super fun process thus far. I’ve decided to document some of the process here after searching high and low for blogs documenting a custom home build (not flips!) and coming up mostly empty handed.

Let’s start with the property. Nearly a half-acre riverfront lot in Lake Oswego in a very special neighborhood. The property is mostly flat with a drop off towards the river and a sandy beach below. The property gets lots of morning sun and beautiful light in the evening. It’s surrounded with some mature trees and hedges that I’m hoping to save. We are VERY familiar with this neighborhood as we already live in it…just a stone’s throw from our future new house. Maybe a blessing and curse since we don’t have to move far, but we have to listen to our own construction noise for a year plus!

Right after purchasing the property, I started researching architects. While there are lots of modern/contemporary homes on the river, I knew that I wanted a more traditional home. I’m calling the style Modern European…repeating gables, minimal eaves, a modern floorplan (not great room style though) and classic finishes. I want someone to look at the house and not be entirely sure what year it was built in. I was also inspired by some of the original cottages on Oswego Lake. I reached out to three architects, interviewed two and was so excited to hire James Dixon Architect. Jim and his team are warm and not only seemed to understand my vision but share it as well. His firm has offices in both New York and Portland and are adept in designing homes that take in a view. He’s been the perfect fit for our project and us!

After hiring Jim, I promptly sent him my 13-page project inspiration presentation which he kindly agreed to review (and not fire me for being over the top!). I’ll leave you with the title page of that deck 🙂

xo,

LC