1543 Monk Road 4 (HOMESITE), Gladwyne, Pennsylvania 19035

All renderings are conceptual and may be fully customized to accommodate the buyer. The suggested stone-built Dower House is sited on a high point on the main Linden Hill estate and has sweeping views over and within its parkland setting. With its steep roof and carefully articulated elevations, its design is conceived in the tradition of Dower Houses found on French and English manorial estates; these were houses designed and built for the widow of the lord of the manor. The French name – ‘petit manoir de douairi re’ – points to their compact but impressive style of architecture. Such houses were also often used for an oldest child setting up a household within the same estate and their architectural composition made them second in rank to the principal house of the estate. With its two tall storeys, the Dower House at Linden Hill is designed by ADAM architecture in the spirit of a minor French chateau or simple seventeenth or early eighteenth-century manor house. Indeed, it has the air of a house built around an older core, to which an elegant classical dress has been added, the whole being carefully framed by formal gardens with parterres and terracing, pool and tennis court. The plan of the house is compact but generous, with a central axial plan in the Beaux Arts spirit, featuring a double height central hall with the main staircase tucked to one side, in the Palladian tradition. The overall effect is deliberately made informal on the park elevation, where a projecting wing containing family kitchen and master bedroom suite, has the air of having been formed out of an older, adjoining farmhouse. The generously-scaled principal dining room and drawing room are open to each other, and the large and light-filled family kitchen completes the park elevation. This house has five bedrooms suites, each with their own bathroom and dressing room, arranged around the central top-lit hall.