Pine Haus

Apr 4

Turn left at the Oakley Diner and head east toward Weber Canyon. The Sandhill cranes I have seen along this stretch of road have migrated south and today I have instructions to find Melissa on a snowmobile at an orange gate. We will make our way to Pine Haus.

This is the story of Pine Haus

I see a wall of windows through the trees and remember. I think of building Lego houses. Mostly that is what I built. The only kit I ever asked for was “extra windows and doors, please”. I loved the tiny windows and shutters and that the doors and shutters open and close.

I remember Italian opera moving toward me from down the street; standing on the corner until it arrived; the surprise that the music poured out from a truck strapped with huge panes of glass; and the lesson: why should I be surprised by this? I had read Tintin’s “The Calculus Affair” by then and knew Bianca Castafiore could shatter glass with her voice. I wondered if the glass panes would shatter when the soprano started singing.

In the last throes of winter I spent a lazy afternoon at Melissa and Adam’s arched cabin, Pine Haus, constructed from a kit over several years during the late ’70’s. Being in the space put me in the mood for reflection. “Did you know that we met the original builder?” Melissa asked. “Yes!” She had shared a little about him on social media. “Bob Rudy,” she said. “It was serendipitous because the gate is always locked and you can’t even get to this place. On our move-in day, we were inside unpacking boxes and heard a man call out: ‘Can I talk to you people?’” Old Mr. Rudy was standing in front of the cabin. He said: “I built this cabin.”

They made his acquaintance and invited him in to see his long-ago craftsmanship. Melissa continued, “It was all built by hand with the help of his family and friends every free minute they had. He even told us what nails he used.” When Melissa and Adam sketched new plans for the cabin, they hoped to open it up and reveal the original arched beams. They were nervous to share the changes, but Bob Rudy admired what they had done. In his time, to accommodate his big family, he had covered the wood and built four enclosed rooms in the roof space plus a kid’s loft in the peak. Pine Haus now has the entire tongue-and-groove wooden ceiling exposed in a single open expanse. “I would have loved to have done it this way,” Bob Rudy said.

Melissa and Adam replaced the old windows and added some new ones to invite light into the space. The magic happens looking out through a wall of glass at the trees and across the canyon. Melissa shared that when the expensive new panes finally arrived after a four-month wait, such was her fear that one of the panes would crack, that she could not watch the installation. I did not tell her about the danger of Bianca Castafiore!

As when Bob Rudy built the cabin, Melissa and Adam have spent their free time working on Pine Haus; doing all of the finishing work and interior design themselves. I know they have ideas and plans that will take shape over time, but I loved the cabin as I experienced it. They grinned when I thanked them: “We love having guests!” I see a cabin visit in my future.

Melissa expertly delivered me to the cabin on the back of her ski-doo. Dogs and groceries arrive this way also. The only other way in during the long winter is with snowshoe-clad feet or skis.

The shingled roof and new windows of the gothic arched cabin, tucked in amongst pine and quaking aspen.

As a photographer, I cannot see without noticing shapes. I worked at a school and it was fun to watch the first graders on their annual shape-finding hunt. Can you spot the triangular shapes?

The sconce, chopped wood, and the steel corral.

Everyone is welcome! Sasquatch and alien friends share the forest with happy woodland creatures where I hang my coat at Pine Haus. The spiral filament in the Schoolhouse sconce is the perfect nod to a moment of sci-fi/fantasy.

Pine Haus is furnished mostly with previously-loved-by-others’ pieces. “It is fun to source and to scour vintage shops,” Melissa says. “Everything is selected purposefully.” As a celebrated local realtor, Melissa has an eye for interior design and is an experienced stylist.

I wanted to stay longer in this space; to look out the window; to lie on my back on the vintage Turkish rug exactly under the peak and count the ceiling boards, using the knots in the wood to keep track. Adam’s grandfather welded the steel frames for the butterfly chairs. The original covers were long gone when Melissa found the chairs in the family attic and declared she would love to have them. Now fully restored with handmade leather covers from Etsy, the chairs are at home in the loft bedroom.

A small bathroom made pretty with a few precious objects. We were playing music on the record player and had I recognised Stevie Nicks at the time, I would have put in a request for Fleetwood Mac.