uilt before the advent of indoor heating, when a chilly night meant throwing another log on the fire, not cranking up the thermostat, the mountain retreats of the past may have been impressively big, but they weren’t always the most comfortable places. Still, they had great style, one that has never lost its appeal. Designing a home on the grounds of the historic Onteora Club in the Catskills, architect Kevin Lichten created a getaway perfectly suited to contemporary life, yet visually and spatially evocative of the past. “The programmatic challenge of reproducing these wonderful old mountain houses is that lifestyles have changed so dramatically,” he observes. “For example, the kitchen is no longer a place that only staff inhabits. Here, it had to face east, so that the family can enjoy sunshine early in the morning as they prepare and eat breakfast together.” Although the kitchen may be keyed to the Keurig age, the home sports spaces that are clearly kin to its antecedents. The great room, two and a half stories high, with a massive stone fireplace, towering windows, and multiple seating areas, generates an unmistakably lodge-like ambiance. The more intimately scaled dining room — graced with door-high wainscoting and a coffered ceiling — projects just the right measure of formality. “You have to immerse yourself in the precedents and influences consciously and then process them unconsciously,” says Lichten. “The stair hall leads you from the front door straight out to the deck and the view of the mountains. None of the precedent-setting houses had such clear planning. Nonetheless, the details and vocabulary of materials are directly stolen from the surrounding 19th-century homes.” While wood, such as the Carlisle Wide Plank Floors, is the base for the complexion of the home, color plays a defining role, too. The cabinetry in a guest bathroom is done in muted shade of yellow and the millwork in the library is stained a robust red. The B DESIGN NYC A&D Building adbuilding.com 60