In the Press Archives - Morehouse MacDonald and Associates

MMA named to Ocean Home magazine’s Top 50 Coastal Architects

November 6, 2020/
in Uncategorized, In the Press /by mma

Ocean Home magazine, one of the world’s premier publications for oceanfront residential design, lifestyle, and real estate, has selected MMA to its Top 50 Coastal Architects List. This is the fourth year in a row the firm has earned this honor.

This year, Ocean Home magazine’s annual Top 50 Coastal Architects listing changed its layout and structure to provide detailed highlights about each of the top 50 architecture firms selected for this prestigious honor across the United States.

Organized by state, MMA is listed again alongside the biggest names in the New England region’s top residential architecture firms. “We are quite pleased to have received this honor four years running,” says Anthony M. Frausto, AIA, LEED AP, associate principal at Morehouse MacDonald and Associates. “And the magazine’s editors gave us quite an appropriate nickname in their write-up calling us ‘The Adaptors’ because of our firm’s ability and history to respond to diverse regions and client interests.”

Of the top residential architects listed in Massachusettes, only Morehouse MacDonald and Associates has a national and international portfolio, reflecting our client’s confidence in our expertise and competences in diverse and demanding coastal environments.

This year, MMA is busy with several projects from existing clients as we adapt and expand existing properties better to suit clients’ needs in a post-pandemic world. The firm has recently finalized a contemporary oceanfront home on Cape Cod. It has other seaside projects in New Jersey, South Carolina’s Kiawah Island, and the West Indies and new projects in the mountains of Vermont and Metro Boston.

Classic Cape Ann — Northshore Home Magazine features MMA Shingle-Style house

July 6, 2020/
in In the Press /by mma

Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc., was featured in the Spring 2020 issue of Northshore Home Magazine, for its project on Cape Ann. The firm collaborated with interior decorator Abby Welling Forstall on this brand new Northshore home with commanding views of the Atlantic ocean and a nearby cove.

The new residence serves as a weekend and holiday retreat for a couple and their daughter who lead busy professional lives in Metro Boston. They came to our firm asking for a new home that while modest in size captured the spirit and history of the grand Shingle-Style homes of the Gilded Age. To accomplish this MMA and Abby Welling Forstall developed a sophisticated take on aspects of a relaxed seaside cottage combined with the weight and proportions of the grand Shingle-Style tradition.

“They wanted this house to be more sophisticated than a typical beach house,” says Welling Forstall, in this six-page feature article by Victoria Abbott Riccardi. All photography for the Northshore Magazine feature was done by Jared Kuzia.

Abby Welling Forstall worked closely with principals John S. MacDonald and Anthony M. Frausto, dovetailing her two-decade history with the client with MMA’s expertise in coastal architecture. The union enabled the design and build teams to deliver a highly tailored house and experience working with an architect—a first for this couple.

The article ends by noting that this client loves to host extended family and guests in their new home. MMA has recently begun phase 2 additions to the home which were previously designed into the concept for the original house. Phase 2 will expand guest accommodations and provide a two-car garage, bike storage, and a covered second-floor deck with views of the ocean.

To read the complete article visit this issue of Northshore Home Magazine here. To view this project in our Work portfolio, visit this link.

Resources

Architecture: Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc.

Interiors: Abby Welling Forstall

Landscape Architecture: Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc.

General Contractor: Hull Enterprises, Inc.

MMA Selected for Ocean Home magazine’s Top 50 Coastal Architects

November 5, 2019/
in In the Press /by mma

Ocean Home magazine, one of the world’s leading magazines for oceanfront lifestyle and real estate, has again selected MMA for the third year in a row for its prestigious Top 50 Coastal Architects List.

Our Boston firm has recently completed a stunning new home in the West Indies for an international client and is currently working on an estate that will raise the bar for residential properties at the Four Seasons Resort Estates on the island of Nevis.

“We are again thrilled to be selected to Ocean Home magazine’s Top 50 Coastal Architects List,” says John S. MacDonald, AIA, and principal of Morehouse MacDonald and Associates. “We recently finished what I have referred to as a once-in-a-lifetime project on a volcanic mountainside lot in the eastern Caribbean and we are thrilled with the final results.”

MMA’s stunning eastern Caribbean home is visible to the right of the inside contents page of the 2019 Ocean Home magazine Top 50 Coastal Architects issue. You can see much more of this stunning home here and here.

MMA earns Top 50 Coastal Architects List honor third year in a row by Ocean Home magazine.

Design Visa: Why MMA’s Clients Take Us Abroad

MMA makes Ocean Home’s 2018 Top 50 Coastal Architects List

November 2, 2018/
in In the Press /by mma

Morehouse MacDonald and Associates has again earned a spot on Ocean Home magazine’s highly coveted Top 50 Coastal Architects list, for their 2018 compilation.

“Being recognized and honored by Ocean Home again for our work in seaside architecture is another boost of confidence in our adaptive and innovative design work and client-centered services,” says John S. MacDonald, AIA, principal of Morehouse MacDonald and Associates.

Over the past several years MMA has been graced with the opportunity to design bespoke custom homes for US and international clients, particularly in the West Indies but also close to home like on the famous Cap Cod seashore. “Working across large geographies has been an incredible education as we learn to both apply our overall knowledge to each new coastal project while simultaneously learning in situ on the project in hand,” says Anthony Frausto, AIA, LEED AP, associate principal.

The inside cover of the 2018 Ocean Home Top 50 Coastal Architects issue.

When MMA works abroad and in states far from our Boston base of operations, we strive to leverage our connections across the eastern US, from general contractors and material suppliers to a host of engineering consultants. In each case, we formulate a top team that we feel will provide us the know-how we need to excel in any particular new environment.

MMA again earns the honor of being listed in Ocean Home magazine’s 2018 Top 50 Coastal Architects.

To see some of our coastal portfolio of projects, click here and select, Island and Coastal. You can also visit our page devoted to Island and Coastal Living.

Design Visa: Why MMA’s Clients Take Us Abroad

MMA makes Ocean Home’s 2017 Top 50 Coastal Architects List

November 1, 2017/
in In the Press /by mma

MMA has made Ocean Home magazine’s 2017 Top 50 Coastal Architects list, a significant industry honor given to many of the nation’s most important architecture firms.

“Our annual collection of the Top 50 Coastal Architects includes some of the most innovative, influential, and prolific architects in the world,” writes the magazine. “So, if you’re dreaming to build a one-of-a-kind home in a one-of-a-kind coastal location, chances are any one of the Top 50 architects listed here can help turn your design dreams into a reality.”

No doubt, MMA shares company with many of the nation’s most prestigious and award-winning architecture firms, and we are honored to have been selected for the Massachusetts region, alongside many of our local and regional competitive peers. Unlike, many of our local Massachusetts competitors, however, MMA has decades of experience designing coastal residential architecture across the entire eastern seaboard and in the West Indies.

MMA earns honors as Ocean Home magazine 2017 Top 50 Coastal Architects.

Our diverse experience across geography and country adds layers to our competencies in tackling any new coastal project. And it’s a reason why many of our Boston regional clients take us abroad because our more global track record has provided us with deeper knowledge and insight across a range of project sites, environmental conditions, cultural contexts, and localized building methods. In a nutshell, it’s our depth of experience across a diversity of situations from Maine in the northeast to Nevis in the West Indies that underwrites our expertise.

Design Visa: Why MMA’s Clients Take Us Abroad

New Kid On The Block

December 17, 2014/
in In the Press /by Anthony Frausto

Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc., was prominently featured in the May-June, 2014 issue of New England Home Magazine for its project ‘Wellesley Country House.‘ The firm collaborated with noted Los Angeles-based interior designer James Radin, whose residential interiors work has also garnered the attention of Hollywood with set design for blockbuster films Something’s Gotta Give, The Holiday, and It’s Complicated.

The new home, located in Wellesley, Massachusetts, took a novel approach in its inspired Arts and Craft aesthetic. “It’s more about the materials than the ornament, more of an artisan house,” states John MacDonald, in the eight-page feature article by Kristine Kennedy. All photography for the New England Home Magazine feature was done by Sam Gray Photography.

(courtesy New England Home Magazine, All rights reserved. Photography copyright Sam Gray Photography)

James Radin worked closely with John MacDonald, principal-in-charge. As noted in the article, the young family was very enthusiastic about the Arts and Crafts concept for their new home but “wanted a twenty-first-century interpretation in the interiors.”

MacDonald and Radin set the stage for an inventive perspective, with Radin counterintuitively turning to the Art Nouveau period and the work of master architect Charles Rennie MacKintosh for inspiration. The marriage between the work of both architecture and interior design firms led to an artfully synthesized and uniquely original home for a mutual client.

Visit New England Home Magazine to read the full article. To view this project within our Work portfolio visit this link.

Resources

Architecture: Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc.

Interiors: James Radin Interior Design

Landscape Architecture: Gregory Lombardi Design, Inc.

General Contractor: The Lagasse Group, LLC

Boston Perspective: Architectural Flare for Collectors

March 5, 2000/
in In the Press /by Anthony Frausto

Morehouse MacDonald and Associates, Inc., was featured in the March 2000 issue of the highly coveted industry periodical Architectural Digest, for its work on the ‘Boston Tower Penthouse‘ project. Working in tandem with the Boston interior design firm Bierly-Drake Associates, the apartment design was conceived to showcase the owner’s collection of contemporary painting and sculpture.

Located in the Ritz-Carlton House Tower, the penthouse features commanding views to the adjacent Boston Public Garden and the city and Charles River beyond. “Our original idea was to treat the apartment as an art gallery,” states John MacDonald, in the six page feature. “We wanted the vocabulary to be strong enough to display the art but neutral enough to not overwhelm it.”

(The Hall space serves as art gallery in the apartment, with wall detailing that reads like architectural coining and modernized barrel vaulting to dramatize the importance of the space. Title image: courtesy of Architectural Digest, All rights reserved.)

Such an ambition is not necessarily an easy task. While it is a common approach to utilize a crisp modern architectural aesthetic for projects that display art, MMA, in this case, sought to infuse the project with a degree of historical pedigree as well, employing a barrel vault and horizontal reveals on the walls of the entry hall, thus giving the important gallery space a sense of gravitas. “Barrel vaulting is a nice way of letting the architecture define the procession,” says MacDonald in the Architectural Digest feature.

To view this project within our Work portfolio, visit this link.