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A Riff on Retro
An interior designer and architect creates her own perfect home, a variation on the 1956 gem that once stood here BY JENNIFER BARGER
Interior designer and architect Margaret Carroll (right) with her husband, Brian, and sons Liam (left) and Mason
PHOTO CREDIT TK
we loved the neighborhood, the schools, and the feeling of a midcentury house, but we needed more room and light.” The process of knocking down one house and replacing it with another would end up taking five years, beginning in 2014 with Margaret using Revit, an architectural software program, to sketch up a design inspired by the Mad Men era. It continued through construction in 2017 and ended with the Carrolls finally moving into their new 4,500-square-foot, six-bedroom, five-bath home in 2019. Since then, they’ve outfitted the sunroom and are making plans to finish the basement. “We lived in a rental house for close to two years, and we thought we were going to be there eight to 10 months,” Margaret says. “I almost didn’t sleep for two years.” After having to fire her first contractor for, Margaret says, failing to show up when necessary, she decided to take over project management duties. Margaret hired a former colleague, Takoma Park architect Eric Saul, to help her design the exterior of the house. Together, they came up with an angled rambler with two wings off a central great room with a vaulted ceiling. The twist? One of those wings is a dramatic two-story structure that holds a primary bedroom suite on its first level plus an upstairs with two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a game room for the Carrolls’ sons, now 12 and 16.
LEFT TO RIGHT: PHOTO BY MICHAEL VENTURA; PHOTO BY ANGELA NEWTON ROY
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hen Margaret and Brian Carroll purchased a 1956 rambler near Bethesda Country Club in 2009, the midcentury modern enthusiasts hoped to make its modest size (2,396 square feet) and retro feel work for them and their two young sons. “But it was a small guy, and we ended up feeling cramped after a while,” says Margaret, an interior designer and architect. “We thought we could renovate and add on,” says Brian, a mechanical engineer. “But as we lived here over the years, things started to happen. The HVAC failed, the piping for the radiators started to leak, and then our sewer line started to leak.” That’s when the couple decided, says Margaret, “to pull the Band-Aid off and build a whole new house. We knew
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