Salt Meadow

A 1750 house on the Barrington River, reopened for modern family life while bringing its lost history back into view.

The design intent was to blend modern living into a historic home while keeping its historic character. Sited on a quiet stretch of New Meadow Road between the road and the Barrington River, the house has long waterfront views and access to the shore. Our clients, a young family, wanted a home that could serve both aging in place and large family gatherings.

The house had been cut into many small rooms that blocked the views and limited how it worked. We opened the public spaces on the ground floor and created a new flow toward the water. The house is small, and after nearly three centuries of settling it has no right angles.

As decades of DIY work were removed, we found that the home's original historic details had been stripped or degraded. We salvaged original structural timbers from a 1600s Newport house under renovation and brought them back into Salt Meadow, recreating its lost history. The home is fully spray-foam insulated, and reclaimed original wood members are reused throughout.