Long Island Dunes

Editor, Stephen Kelly

The Amagansett, New York beach house won a 2008 ASLA residential design Honor Award for Dirtworks, PC Landscape Architecture, New York, New York.

Long Island is indeed a long island, 118 miles, separated from the mainland by the East River. Its girth, not nearly as impressive, varies from 12 to 23 miles. If you picture the island as a teeter totter, Brooklyn is the west end and the eastern tip is East Hampton, home to the hamlet of Amagansett, site of the residential landscape featured here. The founding of East Hampton is credited to two Dutch brothers, the Schellingers, in 1680, and also to some descendants of English settlers.

The entry stairs, made from railroad ties, connect to the cedar pallets that surround the house. The pot to the left of the front door was made by New York sculptor Paula Hayes.

Amagansett, pop. 1,067, is on the south shore of the island, Suffolk County, and looks out on the Atlantic. In March 2008, Suffolk County, New York comptroller Joseph Sawicki proposed Long Island become the 51st state, the idea being to keep the tax dollars on the island and not dispersed about the state.

When you think of posh beach living and home prices this side of the stratosphere, Malibu comes to mind for the West Coast; for the East Coast, it’s East Hampton. In 2007, with the price of homes falling across the nation, one of the mansions in East Hampton sold for a $107 million. Nice change if you can get it, and you can get it here.

Our featured Amagansett, Long Island beach house resides among a shoreline dunescape. The landscape architect, Dirtworks, PC, strove to intrude as little as possible on this environment. The landscape architect explains the design approach.

The design challenge for landscape architect David Kamp was an outdoor living space that intruded little on the dune environment. The cedar decking, a connection of pallets supported on railroad ties wedged into the sand, were custom constructed by Brian Manix Builder, Inc. with individual adjustments to create a level surface.

Natural Settings

Comments from Dirtworks PC, Landscape Architecture (excerpted)

As spectacular existing natural sites are hard to come by, there has been a significant effort to re-create a “native” look or natural setting. The places we live are woven into these settings. The very essence of “natural” suggests nature is the dominant landscape. For the Amagansett, Long Island beach house, the most memorable feature is its natural setting, the dunescape.

The home’s winding stairs cut through a thick growth of native plants (see plant collage on p. 82 ). The landscape architects re-established a dense network of roots of native plants to prevent dune erosion and stabilize the ecology disrupted during construction.

The beach house project celebrates the dune ecology. The home is located on a quarter-acre lot at the eastern end of Long Island Sound facing the Atlantic Ocean. The home site is close to neighboring houses, part of a hilly sandbar covered in bayberry, beach plum, pine and great stretches of beach grass.

Plantings of evergreens along the entertainment deck effectively blocks view of the neighbors and the road below. The landscape architect specified Japanese black pines, Eastern red cedars, Russian olives and beach plum trees.

Dirtworks adopted the position to touch as “lightly as possible” on the site by allowing the beach house to become part of the native landscape.

The cedar strips have smooth rounded edges and are spaced only a quarter inch apart to create a comfortable surface under bare feet. Cedar weathers without splintering and needs no treatment, hence will never leach chemicals into the sand. The strip abutting the cedar is bluestone.

Important ecological considerations include the prevention of beach sands erosion by re-establishing a dense network of roots of native plants; recharging groundwater by maximizing impermeable surfaces; and stabilizing the ecology of dunes destroyed during the construction process. The result is a subtle reminder that we are part of a very special and ever-changing ecosystem.

A slender part of the terrace projects into the dune landscape. Retaining walls (left) throughout the decking are railroad ties.

The program for outdoor living areas of this project includes areas for cooking, dining, showering, and casual gathering. Screening from nearby houses is essential. Modular, weather-resistant pallets connect these outdoor living spaces. “Finger terraces” extend into the dunes, integrating architecture with the dunescape. The development of retaining walls, the layout and placement of the stairs, the massing of plant materials create a spatial intimacy contrasting with the long distant views dominated by the native landscape.

The al fresco dining area and outdoor lounging room seem to emerge forth from a sea of ‘Cape’ American Beachgrass. Privacy for the open area is further achieved by cedars, pines and bayberries.

In establishing outdoor living spaces around the beach house a series of cedar pallets were custom built for placement on sleepers (railroad ties) set directly into the sand. These pallets were arranged to hug the house on all sides and extend like fingers onto the dune facing the ocean. By planting native materials between these fingers each extension becomes an oasis—at once different from and completely integrated into this dune landscape.

Value

Everything in the design is either eco-friendly or completely renewable. Cedar weathers without splintering and needs no treatment hence will never leach chemicals into the sand. The cedar strips have smooth rounded edges and are spaced only a quarter inch apart to create a comfortable surface under bare feet. The plant material is mostly native and will thrive in this environment with minimal care.

The cedar decking is flanked by a strip of bluestone abutting the home and ‘Cape’ American beachgrass in the dunes.

Project Team:

Landscape architect: Dirtworks, PC
General contractor: Brian Manix Builder, Inc.
Planting contractor:
Matt Daly, MGD Horticultural Services
Lighting: BK Lighting
Sculptural planter: Paula Hayes
Furniture: Alissa Bucher,
Rogers Marvel Architects (dining table)
Get Real Surfaces:Henry Hall Designs
Gas grill: Viking

Sedum herbstfreude ‘Autumn Joy’ brings color to the terrace on this September morn.

Plants in the Dunes

Ammophila brevililucata—‘Cape’ American Beachgrass

Artemisia stelleriana ‘Silver Brocade’—Silver Brocade Artemisia

Cotoneaster horizontalis—Red Pearl Cotoneaster

Myrica Pennsylvania—Northern Bayberry

Nepta ‘Dropmore Hybrid’—Blue Catmint

Nipponanthemum—Montauk Daisy

Perovskia atriplicifolia—Russian Sage

Pinus thunbergia—Japanese Black Pine

Rosa rugosa—Beach Rose

Sedum herbstfreude—‘Autumn Joy’ Sedum

Vaccinium corymbosa—Highbush Blueberry