A Note from the Sellers

We lived in Standish for many years before we bought the property in June 2017. The land had never been developed, the property was in tree growth, which was harvested or thinned every 25-30 years. Our dream was to build a modern, high efficiency, “passive house” and barn-workshop where we could live and work with our dog and two college aged children. Some of the things that made us fall in love with the property are an amazing stream with waterfalls, 1,400 feet of shorefront on Sebago Cove, the privacy, and also the proximity in under an hour to Portland. After the purchase, it was nearly 2 years before we began to clear the land and start the build. Our plan was to build the barn first and live in it until the house was built. I think my husband would have preferred to live in the barn indefinitely, but we went forward with the house build at the end of 2019.

We hired Shelter Institute, a well-respected Maine timber frame company based in Woolwich, Maine, to help us bring our vision to reality. Together we sketched what we wanted the house to look like, and the team at Shelter engineered and erected the framing, installed the roof and windows. The rest of the build, inside and out, was completed by my husband – mostly by himself, because it was 2020, the first year of the pandemic. 

The house embodies exactly what we wanted – an organic, modern house set in the trees overlooking a big steam and the lake. The house is so efficient in fact, the heat only kicks on during the very coldest part of the year. The large roof overhang and lakeshore breeze reduces the need for air conditioning. The division between the upstairs primary bedroom and the two additional downstairs bedrooms leaves plenty of room for privacy and comfort. The barn and workshop is a sanctuary that will not be easily replicated - at 2,400 square feet, the uses are endless. The space has a soul that is hard to describe until you are in it. We built the house to be our forever home, but as life would have it, we need to move to a house more suited to taking care of an aging family member.  We feel happy and confident that the next owner will become great stewards of this place that is so special to us.