The South End in Boston is a world of intimate streets lined by brick townhouses, often with swelling bowfronts and high stoops. Most houses predate the Civil War. Among residents, the preservation ethic is strong. But preservation finds common ground with modernism in the design of this remarkable house.
Ramy Rizkalla, the owner, is an ophthalmologist with a passion for architecture that he acquired, he says, from having once lived for four years in New York, “with its strong design culture.” He loves this neighborhood. But he dislikes architecture that imitates the past. He’s a fan of early modernism. He likes an industrial look, with materials that are strong and bare: structural steel, raw concrete, unpainted wood, wide stretches of glass. He admires Brutalism. In the summer of 2011, Rizkalla and his partner, Cynthia Marturano, also a doctor, acquired a privately owned lot on tiny Taylor Street, deep in the heart of the South End. They found a sympathetic designer in Scott Slarsky, who was at that time working independently and today is a director in the firm of Shepley Bulfinch. Working with Slarsky and his associate Christopher Wortley (the team behind SAS design BUILD), the couple designed their glass and steel dream house at 10 Taylor.
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