The two-story coastal home features a sizeable rear patio with a fire table, swimming pool and spa that overlooks a freshwater pond. The exterior design emphasized integration with the home's surroundings and reinforcing local ecology. Invasive species were replaced with low-maintenance native plantings. Limestone terraces the color of beach sand weave past shadblow, American holly, and black cherry to reach the home's entrance above-grade. Highbush blueberry, inkberry, and groundsel shrubs were interspersed with Pennsylvania sedge and little bluestem grass groundcovers, with grace notes added by specimen bayberries.

This magnificent coastal home has a swimming pool and spa on an elevated patio overlooking the pond at the rear of the property. The residence was designed with the environment in mind — to conform to the natural characteristics of the site and to reinforce the local ecology. The landscaping portion of the project involved reconstructing the dune on the ocean side and replacing exotic and invasive species with attractive native plants that would enjoy the sandy soil conditions and require little maintenance.

Square lanterns offer gentle downcast lighting to limestone terraces the color of beach sand. These steps from the above-grade entrance wind pass grasses, shrubs and small trees to ground level and the pond beyond. Except for a Japanese holly hedge by the front door, all the new plantings are natives, selected for their appropriateness to the coastal ecosystem. The use of indigenous species lends a visual authenticity to the landscape, with the practical benefit that these plants are well-adapted to the sandy soil conditions and thrive with little care.

Because of the dune that lies between the house and the ocean, the swimming pool and spa were located at the rear of the residence, overlooking the pond. Overflow edges transform both water features into mirrors, where the still water surface will mimic that of the pond below, creating another visual link between the residence and its setting.