• Design Spotlight,  Featured,  Print Edition

    Kavitha Marudadu, AIA, LEED AP

    Associate Principal DMAC Architecture & Interiors | Evanston, Illinois   For Kavitha Marudadu, AIA, LEED AP, architecture has a powerful potential to impact everyday life. It has the ability to shape experience and evoke emotion, and when the design considers a sensitivity to both context and the human element throughout the entire collaborative process and journey, it can result in…

  • Creative Endeavors,  Featured,  Print Edition

    Serene retreat

    When it came to this Arts and Crafts-inspired home set on the rolling terrain of Cantigny Golf Club’s 300-acre property in Wheaton, Illinois, the clients looked to bring Joan Kaufman, FASID, LEED AP, founder and president of Interior Planning and Design Inc. of Naperville, Illinois, on board with their existing design and build team. Recognizing its potential for their dream…

  • Featured,  Form

    SmithGroup expands Great Lakes presence

    Recently, SmithGroup, an award-winning, global, integrated design firm, expanded its geographic footprint in the Great Lakes region with the opening of a new office location in Cleveland, Ohio. The expansion is intended to build upon its legacy of work in the Great Lakes region, joining a network of operations in Ann Arbor, Chicago, Detroit, Madison, Milwaukee, and Pittsburgh, and to…

  • Featured,  Form,  Print Edition

    Bold concepts

    Conceptual design is a process, an ideation, and a framework. It is a creative solution and strategic plan that explores the potential of space, of experience, and of expression. It is a foundation in which client vision and lifestyle needs, form and function, organization and relationship, are given visual—abstract and technical—shape and express a design language distinctive to its users…

  • Featured,  Form

    Building delight

    The team at Giraffe Design Build LLC believe that a finely designed and expertly crafted home encourages inspired living and generates delight for both people and the environment. Their goal is simply to bring joy to people’s lives. The Ann Arbor, Michigan–based company affirms the principles of effective design, careful craftsmanship, open communication, and responsible stewardship of their clients’ homes,…

  • Featured

    Force of Nature

    DesRosiers Architects, an award-winning architectural firm located in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan has specialized in custom residential, institutional, and commercial design for five decades, working with clients to tailor solutions that fit their personality, lifestyle, and brand. Founded and led by third-generation architect, Louis DesRosiers, AIA, president, the firm has built upon a rich legacy in traditional and contemporary design, supported…

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    Building better lives

    “Our mission statement is to build better lives for our clients and our employees. I think the construction industry as a whole is uniquely positioned and I think our segment of the market is different in that we don’t build speculatively, we don’t go buy land and make you build with us, we are very much custom and clients choose…

  • Featured,  Form,  Print Edition

    Building Someday

    Built high into the steep, dune bluffs in Leelanau County, this contemporary lakefront home transcends traditional vernacular as it stands witness to the drama of a dynamic Lake Michigan theater. Magnetic and mercurial, the lake is one of expressive hue, shifting sands, and powerful currents set amid ancient forests, towering headlands, and islands of tilted limestone layers buried beneath glacial…

  • Creative Endeavors,  Featured,  Print Edition

    Rustic-modern retreat

    Overlooking Long Lake in Traverse City, Michigan, a home originally built in the mid-1990s was recently transformed into a rustic-modern, home-away-from-home for a couple and their growing family, a remodel designed by New Leaf Interiors of Traverse City. An interior design studio founded in 2010 by Gretchen Knoblock, owner and design director, New Leaf Interiors works toward helping clients realize…