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Head east on the winding, bucolic River Road in Deep River, Connecticut, and on your left is a hodgepodge of stone-wall-fronted residences and, behind them, the Connecticut River. To the right, hilly woodland dotted with newly built houses—most large, multi-story, and forgettable. But there’s one that quietly commands your attention.

Tucked into the trees at an elevation of 56 feet above the street is Tom Lontine Architect’s Midcentury Modern–inspired House in the Woods, Lontine’s first project since starting his own firm. Low-slung, clad almost entirely in dark cedar, and embedded in the hillside, the 4,400-square-foot home all but disappears into its surroundings—just as its owners intended. The married doctors, who moved to Connecticut from Salt Lake City, wanted a house where they could age in place, which led to a design adaptable to their changing needs. But they also wanted to minimize their impact on the site. “That’s why the house is really quiet and positioned exactly where it is, and why the materials blend in with the surrounding trees,” says Lontine.

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Embedded in a hill (1), the house engages with nature from its entry sequence (2) to its domestic spaces (3). Photos © Nicholas Venezia, click to enlarge.

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Concrete was used for the foundation and walls embedded in the hillside, while almost everything else was built with standard two-by-six stud framing. It was constructed with an eye toward maximizing engagement with the 2.65-acre site, which was once part of cosmetics magnate Elizabeth Arden’s estate. Visitors approach from the driveway up a long stair that passes under the guest bedroom, and emerge to a planted courtyard on the left and, ahead—through the front glass door and a window beyond—a picturesque view into the woods. After entering and turning to the central living space, a series of stepped rectilinear windows at the rear of the house—narrow and horizontal at higher points, larger and wider where the hill dips—mimic the shift in grade of the hillside and allow for glimpses to the trees. The north-facing wall of windows at the front of the house, meanwhile, offers an expansive vista of the property down to the river and, on the opposite shore, the densely forested Selden Neck State Park. The guest wing and laundry room, to the east, and the primary suite to the west extend out to form what Lontine describes as horse blinders to conceal the neighboring residences and frame the view. (The fourth volume of the residence is an office and home gym, behind the guest quarters, with the central living area’s pavilion-like roof covering and unifying the connections.)

Except for totally enclosed areas on the lower level—a mechanical room and an unfinished space that will eventually house a golf simulator—windows are strategically placed to allow for near constant engagement with the surroundings. One in the primary bedroom perfectly frames a majestic maple; another at the top of a dark stairwell leading up from the garage gives the owners their own version of the guest-entry experience. The spectacular view from the central living area is accessible from nearly all spots in that volume: the informal kitchen and dining area, the laid-back entertaining space with low-to-the-floor furniture, and the more intimate den. (The latter two spaces are created by a welded-in-place metal partition with a double-sided fireplace.) This contributes to the overall sense of blurring between indoors and out. Slim black columns—some structural, the others downspouts—mimic the verticality of the property’s trees, while the walls of the corridors connecting the living space with its two wings use the same wood that is found on the exterior.

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Open spaces (4 & 5) and intimate areas (5) alike are made calm and inviting by blurring the line between indoors and outside. Photos © Nicholas Venezia

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There’s a palpable tranquility in this mediation between the domestic and the natural. At the house, it’s easy to slow down and get lost in conversation—or in the landscape. Achieving this, though, was tough. Lontine had to negotiate a site that included challenges, from the preservation of as many of the large specimen trees as possible, per the clients’ wishes, to dealing with a ledge that required blasting and earthwork, which the architect had hoped to avoid. A backlog with a local concrete contractor delayed the start of construction, and pandemic-related supply chain issues held up delivery of windows and cabinetry. In the end, it took a year and a half to build House in the Woods.

“The more constraints I have, the better, because that really helps give me a starting point,” Lontine says. Still, he admits that “it got tough at the end,” not only for the architect trying to get his firm’s first project completed but for the owners eager to move into their new home. “But then, once their furniture was delivered and we were sitting at the dining table, right around peak fall, it was, OK—yeah, this is worth it.”

Click plan to enlarge