This project is a comprehensive transformation of a deteriorated former farmhouse on a large wooded property just outside Pittsburgh, designed as a home for the architect’s sister and her family. What began as a weathered, undersized structure was substantially renovated and expanded into a generous contemporary residence organized around family life and a stronger connection to the surrounding landscape.

The addition nearly doubles the presence of the original house while extending its familiar language of gabled roofs, simple volumes, and covered porches. Dark board-and-batten siding unifies old and new, while large windows and glazed gable openings bring natural light deep into the interior and frame views of the mature trees. A broad porch creates a sheltered outdoor room between the house and lawn, reinforcing the farmhouse tradition of everyday life extending into the landscape.

Rather than restoring the house to a fixed moment in its past, the project gives the farmhouse a new identity—preserving its memory and rural character while fundamentally reimagining its scale, performance, and relationship to contemporary family life.