Inside Out -- This Medina Home Is A Marriage Of House And Garden

A LOT HAS CHANGED along the shores of Medina and Evergreen Point since the lazy summer days early in the century. In 1916, the newly built Montlake Cut lowered the water level of Lake Washington, unearthing ice-age rocks and increasing the shoreline significantly. In 1921, Wallace H. Foster purchased land and shortly thereafter built a summer home on Evergreen Point.

For years to come, the summer commute was a leisurely cruise on a tiny steamer named Ariel. Daughter Jean Radford recalls the weekday mornings her father would join others tuned into the Ariel steam whistle. They walked briskly along the waterfront, putting their ties on as they went. On board, the men played checkers and dominoes to while away the commuting time.

The floating bridge and highways improved access to the Eastside, and, in 1945, Ariel was the last vessel to be retired from Lake Washington service. Changes had occurred on shore, too. The summer homes gave way to year-round houses. Many were razed for architect-designed homes reflecting Medina's reputation as one of the region's most coveted residential locations.

Vinton and Mimi Sommerville have done that on the former Foster property with a residence that takes advantage of its location. Robert Small's house design and Rich Haag's landscape plan resolve in a comfortable balance.

The new house has 3,500 square feet on two floors. A central corridor runs north/south connecting the entry and stairs to the

dining and living rooms and den. Parallel to this main axis is a secondary axis, a light-filled gallery opening onto two greenhouse-like pavilions with high-pitched glass roofs and window bays for relaxed sitting and conversation. They overlook the garden and nearly 200 feet of lakefront. A third pavilion, covered but not enclosed, forms the northern edge of the house and provides a protected outdoor entertaining area, complete with cast-stone hearth, spa, shower and sauna rooms.

The effect of the design is to practically eliminate the transition from inside to outside. Small did this with interior terracing. "I took advantage of stairs and level changes to get higher ceiling spaces and extra height in the pavilions and gallery. The cascade of steps is also a metaphor for the waterway that bubbles up from a source at the south side of the house and cascades into two ponds." Artist Tom Small fashioned an iris bronze spout for the source. Charles Greening, a local sculptor best known for his sundial in Gasworks Park, fine tuned the stream bed and the stone groupings that connect the pools to Lake Washington.

The house took three years to complete - 1986 through 1988 - partly because of the unconventional approach taken by the designer and his client. It was an ongoing "design/build" scenario in the sense that instead of completing the set of plans and going forward directly from these, the architect developed plans for the shell of the house, and he, the Sommervilles, and interior designer James Halvorson, ASID, met twice a week to shape and clarify spaces and uses. Construction began before plans for interior spaces were made.

The time frame gave Tom Paulsen's Danish-trained carpentry crew a rare opportunity to use all its skills in joinery, trim molding and finishes.

Despite their satisfaction with the architecture of the spaces, the couple did have second thoughts about the interiors. Initially, Mimi Sommerville opted for a clean-lined, contemporary look. Robert Small designed a steel floating staircase supported on a billet of steel, with glass balusters. The kitchen was outfitted with black-marble counters and island. Because overhead cabinets would have blocked the view, they opted instead for under-counter drawers finished in bleached oak. Halverson's choices for the dining and living areas included a good deal of glass and metal. The owners lived with that for a bit, but found it was cold.

Eventually, the Sommervilles hired interior designer Terry Hunziker to add some warmth to the main floor. He brought in sisal carpets and comfortable rattan furniture for the garden room. Balancing the informality of the den and the garden room, he sought to define a more formal dining space with a distinctive steel and wood dining table and a metal screen divider that complements an earlier steel and copper credenza by Steven Hensel that divides the dining room from the gallery.

The Sommervilles had wish lists for landscape architect Rich Haag. Vinton wanted a putting green, spa and a crow's nest for a private hideaway, which became focal points of the outdoor pavilion. Mimi wanted pools or fountains, and had an interest in plants, lots of color and special attention to drawing birds into the landscape. To attract birds to the stream, pool and bog, Haag brought in a palette of shrubs, trees and groundcovers that included serviceberry, commercial blueberries and dogwoods, viburnums, strawberries, privet, daphne and deciduous holly. Plants range in scale from mosses to a magnificent katsura tree.

For Haag, the project was a rare opportunity for diversity. "The orientation, the site and the architecture provide a range of plant habitat, from an ever-shaded glen to soggy lake bottom to excessively well-drained heat traps on west-facing rock outcrops."

On the west side of the house, in the center of the proposed pool and rock garden, was an old birch tree that had been inappropriately topped and crippled in years past. But Haag said they should try "to find the birchness in that tree," and with some expert tree trimming, it was saved.

The other "givens" in the landscape were two erratic boulders on the site. One now is a focal point in a courtyard of the house, planted with scouring rush around it. The other shares center stage with the birch tree.

Close up to the glass walls of the house, Haag chose plants carefully for intimate interest. "The bark and sculptural form of the stewartia and the Japanese tree lilac have an almost sensual appeal to the touch; the branches of the katsura and serviceberry display special patterns; the blue-gray berries of the bayberry are persistently striking; and the double file viburnum has admirable qualities in every season."

The landscape shifts gradually from brick terrace adjoining the house to manicured lawn to stone and water garden to the low point of the lawn that inspired a bog garden capitalizing on its soggy nature most of the year. An island of Canadian serviceberry under planted with stoloniferous serviceberry, it is home to water-loving plants, submerged and floating, that include sedges, irises, lilies and such exotics as the carnivorous pitcher plant.

Haag describes his work: "The principal idea expressed over and over in the plan, the form, even the function, is fusion. Brick invades grass, grass captures brick, which in turn is infiltrated by moss, which merges with running stream and quiet pools of water. And so it goes - the yin and yang of the lifetides of the garden echoing the ebb and flow of the seasons."

Lawrence Kreisman is director of "Viewpoints" Seattle Architecture Tours and is author of six publications on regional architecture and historic preservation. Mike Siegel is a Seattle Times photographer.