Our clients wanted to produce the ultimate place for indoor/outdoor living and play. They imagined they could create a wonderfully interconnected setting for their children, family and friends, all within the beautiful surroundings of their home.
This project started with an addition to the second floor of the home featuring an expansive exercise facility, accessible from both the master bedroom suite as well as a substantial floating staircase leading down to a glass enclosed vestibule. This in turn opens to the lower level of the house and exits to a lighted and heated covered patio.
The patio leads to a specially built playground that enables adults to navigate under the features to attend to younger children. The playground is covered with lush, artificial turf and includes several sliding boards, swings, rope features and a large rock wall for climbing.
This very active and sports-minded family decided to build a pool house on their property that could be used year-round. To connect the project elements together, the floating staircase was extended down another level to a 100-foot heated and lighted tunnel that leads to the pool. The tunnel, which sits below the playground, connected all the features of the project, enabling the family to have year-round use of all the features.
The pool house holds a significant pool with water features, a sunken seating area at one end with a fireplace and TV, and a dining area with kitchen for entertaining. The building also contains bathrooms with a shower room and separate steam and sauna rooms. The glass outer walls, as well as the roof, are retractable for opening during the warm months.
Our greatest challenge was keeping the owner’s imagination in line with the budget. A second challenge came with a start date in early May and how to keep all the cranes, concrete pumps and concrete trucks as well as all the materials that would be needed on a day-to-day basis from getting stuck in the soft ground during that time of year.
Two feet of dirt was removed in an area of 124 feet by 75 feet. Then we laid in fabric and recycled material for support that was needed to pour 3,200 yards of concrete and more than 35 tons of rebar to complete the project. There was a 6-inch grade differential from the house to the pool that needed to be addressed in order to build 145 feet of basement and tunnel from the existing basement floor to the pool coping.
The craziest part of this whole project was the owner signed a contract with a company out of Connecticut and ordered the automatic roof system for the pool house before we had plans and an architect on board. This necessitated building around the ordered roofing system instead of them building the system to the final structure.
As the building of the tunnel and structure were under construction, the pool had to be built in the middle of all the chaos. Miles of plumbing, electric and gas lines had to be installed through and under the footing. The icing on the cake was the 3 million BTU gas meter that needed to be installed.
With a project of this magnitude, there were many challenges from day to day. Our experience, along with the enormous amount of man hours and sleepless nights, pulled this amazing project together to create the ultimate family dream home.
The homeowner had a vision to create an atmosphere at their home where they could provide lots of opportunities to play for their active family along with entertaining family and friends.
After several project changes, the final plans were completed. What the client imagined and what was created far exceeded their expectations. It was a long, arduous project that started in May 2021 and was completed in early February 2022, three months longer than expected due to material delays.
The family now has a complete exercise facility, including special pieces of equipment for their children, so they can all work out together. With all the pool toys, dining and seating arrangements included, they were able to enjoy the pool house during the winter while looking forward to opening the roof during the summer.
On many cold nights during the winter, the family can just stroll through the underground tunnel to watch movies in the sunken lounge sitting by the fireplace after a swim. A colorful, specially designed tile mural depicting “happiness” adorns the wall of the pool house. One might say a happy family is a happy life!
As spring approached, the children couldn’t wait to experience their new custom-designed playground equipment, complete with swings, sliding boards and a large climbing rock wall. The final feature added was a soccer field for these very sports-minded children. QR
Millennium Custom Homes has been inspired to create beautiful new custom homes and remodeled homes for more than 38 years. They are keenly aware that making peoples’ dreams come true is a tall order to fill. They are “dream makers” and exist to serve their clients by creating unique living spaces.