Connecticut Home

A three-year restoration of a former parsonage dating to 1863 revives a cake box house, paring back its essential self while subtly introducing a modern view. The home’s original interior architecture retains its stately formality in a pared back expression: original paneling but on thickened-up walls; a wraparound, waist-high workbench envelops the formality of its kitchen’s workings.

Contributions from friends mingle with the studio’s recurring forms. Matt Merkel Hess s quixotic ceramic wall works play off the home’s original Federal-era Americana wallpaper, unearthed under layers of paint; the work of Peter Schlesinger and Purvis Young finds harmony with pieces by Landon Metz and Green River Project.

Touches of green pick up the verdant lawn unspooling out front — a wall-length silk headboard the color of moss; Nordic Knots rugs in piquant olive. As Goethe recommended, green is “for rooms to live in constantly.”