Opelika, Alabama Architecture & Site Design 2018 - 2022
Porch House
Situated in the heart of Opelika’s historic cotton warehouses, the Porch House reclaims an empty brick ruin for residential use. A modest streetside entrance opens into a secret garden shaded with a canopy of redbud and black gum. The yard is both intimate and flexible, lushly textured and open to the sky. Swaths of wooly planting offer occupiable nooks and crannies within the garden, while the courtyard walls soften the urban clamor of Opelika’s downtown. The native planting design emphasizes a complex tapestry of colors, textures, and heights, ensuring year-round visual and sensory delight.
PATINAS & PATCHES: The residence—nearly equal parts interior and porch—is nestled within this verdant enclave. The design borrows the weathered textures, graffiti, and historic signage left over from the site’s past as a car shop. This incorporation of remnant elements contrasts with the simple materials, textures, and colors of the new construction, highlighting a dialogue between old and new.
INSIDE/OUTSIDE: Each view from the house fosters an immersive connection with the garden outside. The generous covered porch is the most prominent space within the house and gardens, drawing the outdoors in and the indoors out.
