ECHOS OF BEAUTY
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ucked into the bucolic shore of Hornby Island and facing almost due west where it can soak up the last rosy rays of the setting sun, this cottage was completed just one year ago and the owners wistfully admit it has not become truly Hornbified yet. “Hornby houses have a way of becoming encrusted with Island life,” explained owner Keith Hemphill who looks forward to the metamorphosis. “Moon-snail shell collections are de-rigueur, as is the incorporation of driftwood, beach glass, Japanese floats and all kinds of other interesting things including local art and crafts. The house is still too new to have acquired that patina of Hornby, but it is inevitable. Our first bit of driftwood décor is a hat rack.” Hemphill and his wife, Carole Arnston, look forward to the day when more driftwood has crept up from the beach and the works of myriad local artists are displayed inside and out. They certainly feel it won’t be long before the landscape, including a little creek that trickles down the side of the property, reverts to wildflowers, native grasses and the house “settles back into the ground.” Both Arnston and Hemphill are architects. Married 36 years, they met on the steps of UBC School of Architecture in 1978, and while her husband is a principal in the Vancouver firm Rositch Hemphill Architects, she chose a different career trajectory 20 years ago and became a full time painter. With abstract impressionism at her core, she creates dreamy landscapes using a voluptuous palette and, needless to say, one of the bedrooms in their cottage is also a studio where she can be inspired by the forest and ocean landscapes. They designed their 1,650-square-foot seasonal home together and explain its West Coast modern style was influenced by the mid-century modern homes of Palm Springs. They admire desert modernism — with its clean lines, expanses of glass, sloped roofs, open plan and indoor-outdoor ethos — but adapted it to the less balmy weather of the Gulf Islands. The result is an elegantly informally and stylish getaway that embraces the environment while protecting itself with generous roof overhangs, including a large glassed one over a side terrace.
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5/31/16 9:01:22 AM