The Simple Life: A Montauk Beach House for a Creative Couple

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When Elisa Restrepo, cofounder of the shoe line Dieppa Restrepo, and her husband, Dylan Dodd, who owns NYC restaurants Karasu, Walter’s, Walter Foods, and Barrio Chino, went looking for a place to escape the city, they chose a three-story split-level house in the “sleepy surfing town” of Montauk and hired Brooklyn architects Space Exploration to overhaul it.

They’d worked together before: Space Exploration had renovated the couple’s Brooklyn apartment (whose kitchen, incidentally, won Remodelista’s 2014 Best Professional Kitchen Design award). The firm also designed two of Dodd’s restaurants—Walter’s and Karasu, both in Brooklyn.

Although the house was standing, it required a full gut remodel that included replacing windows, moving skylights, modifying the deck and driveway, and extensive landscaping, in a neighborhood “that still feels untamed by development.” The remodel took a year’s work, from first meeting to the last item on the punch list. Firm principal Kevin Greenberg walked us through the changes.

Photography by Kevin Greenberg, courtesy of Space Exploration.

the dining table in the back is made of a repurposed marble slab fro 17 — Above: The dining table in the back is made of a repurposed marble slab from the owners’ Brooklyn home, with legs found on Etsy.

To meet their clients’ desire for a house with a “light, unpretentious, and casual feel,” Space Exploration used light neutrals and pale woods to frame Dodd and Restrepo’s eclectic furniture collection from travels in Morocco, Europe, and Central America.

the kitchen and main living space are on the top floor—&#8\2\2\1;the 18 — Above: The kitchen and main living space are on the top floor—”the flexible social center for the house,” said Greenberg—from which the family can enjoy views of nearby Fort Pond Bay over the tree canopy. They anchored the living space here because the top floor “enjoys the best views, an abundance of natural light, and accommodates an open-plan layout perfect for hosting and socializing,” said Greenberg.

Colombian-born Restrepo was closely involved in the process. She and Greenberg had long conversations about the tiniest details, including “the finish of the plumbing trims and the placement of the kitchen cabinet hardware. She has a keen eye for materials, color, texture, and proportion,” he says.