Making Memories
Janice Randall Rohlf
Editor
When I was a kid, summer vacation meant spending two weeks at our extremely small, rustic cabin on a lake in Lee. My dad built it with his father and brother before my three sisters and I were born — sometime in the early 1950s, I’m guessing. My city-bred mother refused to stay there until the “bathroom” was moved indoors, which was a boon for all of us.
A lot of people reminisce fondly about their summer “camps,” but it’s hard for me to romanticize ours. The kids’ bedroom was barely big enough for two built-in bunk beds, let alone a closet. If we were lucky enough to have good weather, all we needed were our bathing suits anyway. But as I remember it, every other summer brought 14 chilly, rainy days — more than enough time to get on each other’s nerves and bemoan our bad fortune.
Yet despite the spats, the uncomfortable beds and the vicious mosquitoes, I wish we still had that lakefront cabin. Sadly, it was swallowed up long ago by an ever-expanding RV park.
Times change, and today’s summer retreats — like those featured in this issue —often offer creature comforts ours never did. And yet, I sense that many still carry a simple sentimental value.
The Lake Sunapee home I wrote about on page 70 is one of them. Though new additions were made, the spirit of the original 1912 Adirondack-style lodge, meticulously restored, still prevails. The current owners — only the third in the home’s history —were fortunate to find many belongings from the original owners still there and in remarkably good condition. These included old photographs and even a home movie showing people enjoying the lake in much the same way the family does now. “We very much treasure and celebrate the history of this house,” says the homeowner.
Ensuring a seamless connection between indoors and outdoors is often top of mind when building or renovating lakefront and oceanfront properties. Expansive patios, abundant windows that capture the view, and landscape features like fire pits thoughtfully link a house to its surroundings. Describing the featured home on Lake Winnisquam, on page 58, Mike Del Sesto of Tucker Associates says, “When you walk
through the front door and see the water, it’s just a breathtaking moment.”
Upon entering a home in New Castle, featured on page 48, visitors are likewise greeted immediately by a water view — this time, of the ocean. The house also boasts roughly 3,000 square feet of exterior decking, including a covered circular porch off the primary bedroom and a screened porch off the kitchen overlooking the water. Each unique and distinct, these homes share a profound sense of place that can only come from living by a lake or the ocean.
