Design winners

The new home at the entrance to Mount Pleasant's New Village neighborhood is designed with the kinds of goals that most homeowners and home builders should aim for.

The house is situated so that the sun shines in where it is wanted and so the prevailing breeze can flow through when the windows are open. Its orientation also creates a greater sense of privacy for the closest neighbor and takes advantage of the views of established trees and a lake.

The design is simple but elegant. This isn't a home built with a big budget — about $215 per square foot — and its details stem from available materials detailed in a slightly different way.

Its construction also places an emphasis on conservation or sustainability, using recycled or reclaimed materials, dual-flush toilets to conserve water, and a radiant barrier, compact fluorescent light fixtures and appliances designed to use less electricity.

Architect Gordon Nicholson and contractor Pat Ilderton designed and built the 2,500-square-foot house to be attractive, flexible and energy efficient.

Nicholson faced the challenge of fitting this one into the established neighborhood while recognizing the uniqueness of the relatively small corner lot — a lot flanked by one of his previous house designs and a lake.

His inspiration was to reach down to Beaufort, where he previously practiced architecture and where T-shaped houses are relatively common historically.

Nicholson borrowed that T shape and then rotated it 90 degrees so the long side of the T serves as a circulation and utility area. There are few windows along this northern facade, partly to preserve the neighbor's privacy, much like the Charleston building tradition of "Northside manners," which recognizes that a single house's windows are small or nonexistent on the side that faces the neighbor's garden.

"You can walk out of your bedroom and down to the kitchen, and your neighbors wouldn't see you," Nicholson says, "but there's still a considerable amount of light."

The house's main living spaces are flanked by porches nestled into the corners of the T.

These spaces also are flexible. The first floor bedroom or dining area easily could become a home office, for example.

The size and placement of windows strike a balance between allowing in as much natural light as possible and minimizing how much the summer sun will heat up the inside. "One thing I'm proud about is you really don't need to turn a light on, and yet it's not full of glass," Nicholson says.

Another aspect of the design that helps keep the home cool is a radiant barrier, a sort of aluminum sheathing, on the walls and roofs. "It's somewhat of a new product," he says. "It really cools the roof down tremendously. We really tried to use off-the-shelf stuff to make sustainable gestures."

But the house isn't simply about flexibility and sustainability, it's also about enjoyment.

A few windows also are placed so they maximize the view of the two nearby existing trees.

"I was very conscious of the outdoor landscape," Nicholson says. "You frame something on the outside, and it becomes a direct view from your house."

Reach Robert Behre at 937-5771 or rbehre@postandcourier.com.