Love Your Lake Life

by LUCINDA HAHN

For many custom-home clients who build on the water, the dream is not only a gorgeous house with stirring views. It’s also the desire to create a generational through-line, a place to gather, bond and grow—one that will stay in the family for decades, passed down to kids, grandkids and beyond.

With so much riding on the outcome, a good architect must know how to maximize enjoyment of the lake, the landscape— and all those days of family memory-making. “Creating that connection to the water, and also to each other, is paramount to what we do,” says Nick Liebler, partner and president of Petoskeybased White & Liebler Architects.

Lake life is embedded in the firm’s DNA: Liebler is a Petoskey native and son of a custom-home builder, while the firm’s founder, Nick White, grew up spending summers at his family’s Northern Michigan cottage. They bring more than 50 years of experience designing residential lakefront architecture, and it shows in their exquisite designs, which marry modern elements, such as ample glass, with traditional forms to create a sense of history.

Here, Liebler shares some guiding principles to help families pump up their enjoyment of life on the lake.

Buy a site that’s right for your lifestyle. “The architecture should respond to the site, not the other way around,” he explains. Want to walk out the back door and be steps from the water, without having to manage pesky stairs? Don’t buy a hilly site. Is porch-sitting while enjoying bird’s-eye views your favorite thing? Make sure a property’s elevation has room for the house to sit up high. “You don’t want to force the land into doing something it’s not.”

Maximize views in multiple ways. Advances in technology mean more glass can be used than 30 years ago—all the better to showcase those sublime lake vistas. “You are on the water for a reason, and bringing those views of the water everywhere into the house is important,” Liebler says. Good design also helps: Even rooms on a home’s back side can have sight lines to the lake. An office can have a pair of doors that open to a water view across the hallway, for instance. “We try to design so that you’re only ever one room away from the lake.”

Extend outdoor enjoyment. Your lakeside porch creates a connection to the water that should be comfortable nine months out of the year, not just three. Liebler often uses fireplaces, motorized screens and vinyl curtains, infrared heaters (tucked into a ceiling) and more, so the outdoor living spaces can be enjoyed even on chilly March or November days.

Build in waterfront-specific spaces. A delightful quirk of lake life is that guests may arrive by boat rather than car. “You want that lakeside door and entryway to be a nice, welcoming space,” Liebler says. This often includes built-ins, a bathroom with shower and tile floors suitable for wet feet and sand. A separate “beach storage room” is another essential, roomy enough to hold all those summer toys, which may include lifejackets, kayaks, even a sailboat.

Keep it simple. Lake homes are for escape and enjoyment, not angsting about upkeep. Liebler has found success with certain synthetic products “that have all the character of a 100-yearold cedar cottage, but are very low maintenance,” he says. “The goal is for owners to just enjoy their time on the water, from the time they pull into the driveway to the time they leave.”

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