Studio & Guest House In New York Reimagines Cabin-Style Comfort Living
Studio & Guest House sits in the woods near Accord in New York, United States, where Neil Logan, Architect reworks two modest structures into a paired retreat. The project turns an existing house and storage building into a dedicated studio and guest house, holding onto their footprints while stripping back interiors to calm, timber-lined rooms. Light, material, and measured openings guide the experience from arrival to deep in the trees.
Gravel paths cut through tall grasses toward low shingled forms, their outlines held against a dense stand of trees. Inside, wide-plank floors and pale walls open to generous windows, drawing the forest’s shifting greens straight into the rooms.
Two modest buildings become a studio and guest house just outside Accord in New York, United States, under the hand of Neil Logan, Architect. The existing footprints stay intact while everything above is reconsidered, from rooflines and cladding to the smallest cabinet pull, so the interiors read as a clear, cohesive sequence. Interior palette and furnishings carry the project, using wood, restrained color, and simple volumes to connect work, rest, and landscape.
Opening The Studio Volume
The former house near the road becomes an open studio, stripped of partitions and its second floor to form a single tall volume. Light pours in from new clerestory windows that ring the ceiling, washing over pale timber boards and dissolving corners. A panoramic window facing the forest anchors the room; from a low platform or table, the tree line sits at eye level. Only a few essential furnishings break the expanse, so the eye moves easily between work surfaces and the woods beyond.
Wood As Quiet Structure
Both buildings wear wood shingles on walls and roof, giving them a hushed presence against trunks and undergrowth. Inside, fir floors and cabinetry set a consistent grain and tone, with low built-in units organizing storage, circulation, and subtle level changes. These cabinets fold coat closet, shelving, and pantry into a continuous datum, so daily clutter tucks away behind simple doors. Custom pieces by Minjae Kim—a thick slab table, solid stools, and benches—echo that language with compact forms and tactile edges.
Rooms Framed By Landscape
In the guest house, corner glazing wraps a sitting room where a black suspended fireplace stands on a single stone hearth. Forest views run along both sides, turning the hearth, tatami mats, and low table into a quiet perch above the slope. Sliding glass doors in the adjacent volume open to a broad deck, their dark frames setting a thin line between interior boards and weathered planks outside. The woodland setting stays present from every seat yet never overpowers the calm interior tones.
Sauna, Bath, And Thresholds
A separate entry structure is reworked to collect bathroom and sauna, sharpening the threshold between arrival and retreat. The sauna is fully lined in vertical wood boards, with benches and walls catching a circle of daylight from an overhead opening. Next door, a bathroom wrapped in deep green mosaic tile turns the window into a framed view of foliage and sky. Even here, color stays restrained, letting texture, grout lines, and reflected light carry most of the experience.
As day drops, the shingled forms recede and interior light picks out window openings among the trees. Rooms remain spare but warm, grounded by wood underfoot and the steady line of built-in cabinets. The project holds onto its modest footprints while giving the interiors new clarity, so studio work and visiting life sit comfortably within the same clearing.
Photography by Mikael Olsson
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