A Retired Opera Performer’s Next Big Act: Designing Houses
When they first met, they had vastly different roles: One was a Nubian slave, one an Egyptian priestess and one a nobleman soldier. Now, more than three decades after that encounter on the set of “Aida" at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in 1991, the slave and the priestess (singer Rob Maher and dancer Deborah Allton-Maher) are married and the soldier (actor and architect Phil Consalvo) has just designed them a new house on Indian Lake in the Adirondacks in New York state. All three say it was their background collaborating as artists that enabled them to work through contrasting visions, producing a home that is part Japanese tea house, part homey cabin—original in its design yet in tune with properties around it.
“We had a similar understanding of the creative process," says Consalvo, 58. He says they talked through every decision based on an understanding of how each input and element would play out, the way a dancer would with choreography or a singer would with breathing. The 1,900-square-foot house, which cost about $1.2 million to build, takes the place of a 500-square-foot bungalow Maher and Allton-Maher bought in 2015 for $249,000.
They tore down the bungalow after two years because it was structurally unsound and slowly sinking into the lake. The new build is a second home for the couple, who live in Oak Hill, N.Y. The primary design hurdle was the couple’s vastly different ideas for what type of house they should build for their retirement.
Read more on livemint.com
