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From the road, this Nantucket house presents itself as a small, shingle-clad guest cottage. Beneath that restrained silhouette, however, is roughly 10,000 square feet of basketball, fitness, wellness, entertainment, and vehicle space. Workshop/APD used the underground volume to fit an unusually ambitious program on a constrained coastal lot without making the house above ground dominate its surroundings.
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Architectural Digest’s March 19, 2025 home tour describes a residence designed by Workshop/APD on a Nantucket coastal dune. The visible building is intentionally scaled and detailed like a guest house. That decision conceals the project’s most surprising feature: a large subterranean level organized as a private playground and service area.
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Andrew Kline, an architect on the project, summarized the street-facing strategy this way: “From the street, all you see is a guest house—what looks like a humble cottage. But beneath it is the entrance to the car showroom.” The entrance is not treated as a conspicuous automotive pavilion. Instead, the cottage-like volume keeps the public view quiet while leading to a showroom that also functions as a garage.
The underground program totals 10,000 square feet, according to Architectural Digest. That figure is a project-specific measurement reported in the 2025 feature, not a typical size for underground residences. It accommodates uses that would otherwise require a much larger visible building: an indoor basketball court, gym, spa, media room, vehicle display and parking, and circulation between private and guest areas.
| Element | What the 2025 feature reports |
|---|---|
| Underground area | Approximately 10,000 square feet |
| Recreation | Indoor basketball court and gym |
| Wellness and leisure | Spa and media room |
| Vehicle space | Car showroom that also serves as a garage |
| Deepest construction | Below the water table, with a six-foot-thick concrete slab and waterproofing system |
| Architectural team | Workshop/APD for architecture and interiors; Miroslava Ahern Landscape Design Studio for landscape design |
Why put so much of the house underground?
The site combines several constraints that make outward expansion difficult. It is a coastal dune, sits in a flood zone, and is subject to local building rules that limit how much visible structure can be added. Michael Luft Weissberg, an architect on the project, described the challenge as follows: “It’s on a coastal dune, with a flood zone creeping in. So we had to figure out how to maximize every inch of the lot.”
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Building upward or spreading the house across the lot could have made the residence look out of scale with its setting and consumed more of the open landscape. Excavating allowed the owners’ wish list to fit within a comparatively modest above-ground form. The approach also separates functions vertically: the cottage-like structure carries the most visible rooms, while much of the recreation and vehicle program disappears below grade.
This is not presented as a universal solution for coastal construction. The feature reports the design team’s response to this particular parcel, its flood exposure, and its regulatory context. A different lot could have entirely different soil, groundwater, structural, environmental, and permitting conditions.
How daylight keeps the lower level from feeling like a basement
Putting 10,000 square feet below grade creates an obvious design risk: dark, enclosed rooms that feel disconnected from the landscape. Workshop/APD addressed that risk with strategic changes in elevation rather than relying on a single conventional basement window.
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Deep site cuts
The architects cut into the site to expose portions of the lower level. Those cuts create open edges where rooms can relate to gardens and allow light to reach spaces that would otherwise be surrounded by soil. The result is a lower floor that is not uniformly buried; some areas are carved into the terrain while others open toward planted exterior space.
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Large light wells placed near the pool bring daylight down to the gym, spa, and media room. These voids act as vertical courtyards, delivering sky views and helping the rooms maintain a visual relationship with the outdoors. They also support the architects’ stated goal of avoiding a sealed-off, basement-like atmosphere.
Weissberg put that intent plainly: “We didn’t want it to feel like a basement or a dungeon.” In practical terms, the project uses light wells, exposed cuts, and views toward gardens to give different underground rooms distinct lighting conditions rather than treating the entire lower level as one enclosed bunker.
The below-water-table basketball court and gym
The deepest part of the excavation contains the basketball court and gym. According to Weissberg, this portion is below the water table and was engineered as a highly contained structure: “The deepest portion—where the basketball court and gym are located—is actually well below the water table and built like a bathtub.”
Architectural Digest describes four project-specific measures used for that portion of the work:
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- Sheet pilings supported the excavation. The shoring held back surrounding ground while the team created the below-grade construction zone.
- The excavation was pumped dry. Water was removed so construction could proceed in a controlled, dry area.
- A six-foot-thick concrete slab was poured. The feature reports this unusually substantial slab as part of the strategy for resisting buoyancy.
- The structure was wrapped in a waterproof system. The enclosure was detailed to keep groundwater from entering the occupied spaces.
These details describe this residence, as reported by the project’s architects and the Architectural Digest feature. They should not be read as construction instructions or as evidence that a six-foot slab, sheet piling, or the same waterproofing assembly would be appropriate elsewhere. Below-water-table work requires site-specific geotechnical, structural, waterproofing, flood-resilience, and code analysis by qualified professionals.
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What is inside the hidden playground?
Indoor basketball court and gym
The court and gym form the most dramatic part of the subterranean program. Their location at the deepest point explains why this area drove much of the engineering effort. Rather than treating exercise as a small room attached to the house, the project gives athletic activity a full-scale indoor setting below the landscape.
Spa and wellness rooms
The lower level also includes a spa. Light wells near the pool help daylight reach this wellness zone, allowing it to share the underground level’s connection to the gardens instead of reading as an entirely internal facility.
Media room and games room
A media room adds a quieter form of entertainment, while the house also includes a games room. Together with the court and gym, these spaces make the lower level a sequence of active and relaxed destinations rather than a single-purpose basement.
Car showroom and garage
The car showroom occupies another major portion of the hidden program and doubles as a garage. Its concealed entry is one of the project’s clearest examples of architecture doing two jobs at once: the guest-house form protects the street view, while the lower-level volume provides secure vehicle storage and a display environment.
How the rest of the home is organized
The house is not simply a large basement under a cottage. The plan separates private owner spaces from guest quarters and entertaining areas, giving each group a distinct relationship to the site and to the circulation system.
The owners’ private volume
The primary suite, library, offices, and seasonal closet are grouped together and connected by a spiral stair. Kline described the arrangement this way: “The client’s private spaces—including their bedroom, library, and offices—are in one volume.” Keeping these rooms together creates a private domain within the larger property rather than scattering personal spaces among guest and recreation areas.
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Guest and entertaining spaces
Elsewhere, the project includes guest rooms, a pool, a cabana, a screened porch, and landscape designed by Miroslava Ahern Landscape Design Studio. These rooms and outdoor areas support visitors and group activities without requiring every gathering to pass through the owners’ private suite.
The resulting organization is layered: the street sees a compact cottage; the owners have a connected private suite; guests and gatherings use their own rooms and outdoor amenities; and the most specialized recreation and vehicle spaces occupy the concealed lower level.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Landscape and the illusion of a smaller house
The landscape is essential to making the underground strategy convincing. Site cuts and light wells are not merely technical openings; they shape how the lower rooms meet gardens and how the property is experienced from outside. Planting and outdoor rooms soften the transition between the shingle-clad building and the excavated areas.
Because the visible structure remains guest-house-like, the landscape can carry much of the project’s apparent scale. A visitor sees a cottage, porch, pool, and garden rather than a large above-ground recreation complex. The hidden volume supplies the area, while the landscape preserves the visual impression of restraint.
Materials, interiors, and credited collaborators
Workshop/APD led both architecture and interiors. Nicole Ficano led the interiors, and Read McKendree / JBSA photographed the completed project. The project-team announcement also credits CRAFT Engineering Studio, Consulting Engineering Services (CES), and Clear Device, alongside Workshop/APD and Miroslava Ahern Landscape Design Studio.
Architectural Digest identifies a mix of specified and custom furnishings and lighting. Named examples include StudioTwentySeven counter stools upholstered in Garrett Leather, a Ross Gardam chandelier, and a Lindsey Adelman Studio pendant. The feature also mentions pieces from Avenue Road, Holly Hunt, Allied Maker, Jean De Merry, Usona Home, Bone Simple Design, Cuff Studio, Kettal, and other suppliers.
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Those credits identify items shown in the project; they do not establish that every piece remains available, that a current product listing is identical to the photographed item, or that the furnishings are standard specifications for similar homes. Several elements are custom.
What this project demonstrates—and what it does not
This Nantucket residence demonstrates how a designer can trade visible building mass for carefully engineered underground area. Its strategy addresses five linked questions:
- Daylight: Can cuts and light wells give buried rooms useful natural light and garden views?
- Water: What structural and waterproofing measures are required when occupied space extends below the water table?
- Footprint: Can essential recreation and storage move underground to preserve a modest above-ground profile?
- Zoning and flood exposure: How do local rules and coastal conditions shape where floor area can go?
- Privacy: Can private, guest, entertainment, and vehicle functions be separated without making the circulation confusing?
The feature supplies a detailed account of this one project but no comparative study of underground homes, no generalized cost data, and no performance statistics. The 10,000-square-foot area and six-foot slab are measurements reported for this residence, not benchmarks for other properties.
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The house’s impact comes from the contrast between what is visible and what is concealed. A conventional large house would announce its size through multiple wings, a broad facade, or a prominent garage. Here, the public-facing architecture remains deliberately quiet while the program expands downward.
That concealment is not a gimmick detached from the site. It answers the dune setting, flood-zone pressures, and desire to maximize the lot without overwhelming the landscape. The engineering is substantial, but the architectural expression remains domestic: shingles, a cottage-like form, garden connections, and outdoor rooms.
For readers interested in the project as an architectural lesson, the key idea is not simply “build a basement.” It is the coordinated use of massing, excavation, daylight, waterproofing, circulation, and landscape to make an unusually large program feel compatible with a small coastal house.
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