Kennebec is a new residential community on Lake Martin offering idyllic waterfront homesites. Buyers are also offered the opportunity to have their home designed for the site by a top regional architect following guidelines created by Birmingham-based Nequette Architecture and Design.
Located on the south side of Lake Martin adjacent to a 74-acre land reserve, buyers at Kennebec receive a style guide to help direct the design of their home. The guide is not intended to limit creativity, but inspire it. Rather than dictating a specific architectural style, it leaves the plan open to be customized to fit the property owner’s individual design tastes and needs.
Design elements that integrate into the landscape include lower pitched roofs that suggest horizontality, large expanses of glass, lakeside porches and balconies, and exposed structural details such as beams, brackets and columns.
Also called for in the style guide is the use of native and natural materials in a neutral color palette. Homes are also to be designed as a collection of structures connected with courtyards and breezeways. In addition, the guide calls for outdoor living spaces that seamlessly connect to indoor rooms.
“There won’t be any pre-designed homes or floor plans, and we have a list of approved architects to custom design the homes,” explains Vince Lombardo, a graduate architect at Nequette who was involved with the design guidelines. “We offer rough ideas for styles that have a low cottage feel to preserve the natural environment.”
Kennebec is a partnership of Alabama Power, Nequette Architecture and Design and Daniel Communities, a community development company based in Vestavia Hills.
In addition, Kennebec is the manifestation of the LakeTown concept that was the brainchild of this partnership, which also includes Derick Belden of FRED Communication by Design in Birmingham.
The aim of the LakeTown model is to create a lakeside community that centers not on the lake as simply a weekend destination, but with added permanence and an essential part of daily life. A concept inspired, notes Belden, by iconic waterside locations such as those on Lake Michigan and Nantucket Island, as well as Seaside, Florida renowned for its New Urbanist design.
Image 1- The Kennebec site map is plotted to include 41 homesites, each with a waterfront view. The design team led by Birmingham-based Nequette Architecture and Design has selected several architects from Alabama and other southern states to design the homes.
*Article Written By Jessica Armstrong and Image Courtesy of Nequette Architecture and Design