The Coval property on Mercer Island has a new name – Summerwell, a forthcoming development of 16 new homes located at the former property of Myer and Barbara Coval on the north end of Mercer Island.
A few features of Coval will remain – the Koi pond, a hedge of Rhododendrons, two mature Douglas fir trees, a Madrona tree, as well as a number of ornamental flowering trees and granite boulders – but will be shared by a small neighborhood rather than a single residence.
The development is currently mid-construction with first completion dates in Fall of 2016. A community of five acres, each lot is generous, ranging between 10,000 to 16,000 square feet. With prices ranging from $2.5 to $3.4 million, the homes will be two and three levels with 4 to 5 bedrooms. The smallest house is 3,300 square feet, and others are upwards of 4000 and 5000 square feet.
The property website calls each home “a unique creation,” and I had the opportunity to talk earlier this week with Philip McCullough, the principal architect of Summerwell. He said his team took a custom approach to each home rather than a spec-home approach and discussed how they determined individual designs for each property.
“The vision and design for these homes came from the unique qualities of the site – the topography, vegetation, and the access to daylight,” he said. “Not one house looks like the next. They are all individual homes crafted specifically for their site.”
He also shared his inspiration for the style of the homes, which came from some of the mid-century period homes in the surrounding neighborhoods.
“I’d call the style of these homes ‘organic modern,’” he said. “We thought about how people live in and interact inside their homes. The homes were also designed to have an indoor-outdoor relationship.”
Four homes are currently available for pre-sale, and future owners will have the opportunity to customize interior color schemes and other features in consultation with Summerwell lead interior designer, Dawn Wilkinson, and owner of Six Walls, a local interior design company.
Thomas Rengstorf, Principal at Thomas Rengstorf & Associates, designed the development’s landscape, preserving features of the original property to honor the legacy of the “original owners [who] cared deeply for the site,” according to Summerwell’s website.
New features include rain gardens surrounded by native plants, large privacy hedges, Katsura trees to line the street, and a sidewalk through the neighborhood.
Islander Wes Giesbrecht is one of the main principals of the development partnership, which purchased the property from the Covals in 2014. The mansion was demolished in 2015 though the roof of the pool house was salvaged for reuse for the grand lobby of the future Mercer Island Center for the Arts.
Learn more about Summerwell Homes at: www.summerwellhomes.com
Images courtesy Summerwell Homes.
