Key takeaways
- A Colorado couple spent six years restoring a Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired home.
- Loveland property is on the market for $2.75 million.
- Owners said they blended historic design with contemporary updates.
Nicolette Alderson wasn't house hunting when she found a one-of-a-kind home in Loveland, Colorado.
The former hairstylist of 23 years overheard a real estate agent talking about the solar hemicycle home known as the "Morning Drive Residence" — designed by Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice David Eric Calvin — while working on a client in her salon and knew she had to see it.
“My ears kind of perked, and I started listening a little bit more to what she was saying … She took us on a tour of it, and it never hit the market,” Alderson said.
Alderson, 44, an interior designer, and her husband, Tyler, 41, a tradesman, purchased 2109 Morning Drive in 2020. The house is 4,136 square feet with three bedrooms and five bathrooms.
Tyler Alderson said the previous owners had died, and their children were ready to move on from the property.
"The home was owned by ... Jack Orman, a printmaking professor and artist at Colorado State University and his wife, a musician," Nicolette Alderson wrote in a description.
She said the home was vacant for three years before they bought it.
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The home reflects the creativity of Frank Lloyd Wright
Nicolette Alderson said the home was designed by Calvin, who was trained at the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation under the well-known architect himself.
Morning Drive Residence is a replica of Wright's "Jacobs II" house in Wisconsin, Nicolette Alderson wrote.
She added that the home is made of natural materials and features curved architecture.
“Wright coined the concept as a ‘solar hemicycle’ style, creating a flowing feel absent of most right angles and welcoming odd angles,” she wrote. “It is also built into a berm in the hillside just as the Jacobs II house was.”
The couple, who also own a plumbing company, said the home was in rough shape and needed a lot of work when they bought it.
To ensure they did the home justice, Nicolette Alderson said she decided to fulfill her dream of becoming an interior designer. She closed her salon and worked to get her degree from the New York Institute of Art & Design.
She said she learned that effective interior design begins with understanding how people live in a home. In the case of this house, she learned how to blend different styles and eras.
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Couple preserved the old with the new
The couple said they didn't want to take away from the original design elements when they were restoring the home. They added that many of the handmade elements incorporated during the renovation are virtually indistinguishable from the home's original features, including hand-painted terra-cotta tiles on the stair risers, the wood ceiling and the hammered-iron details such as the Spanish revival chandelier in the dining room.
Nicolette Alderson said they also added radius elements to match the design of the home.
“[We’re] mimicking the radius of the home in things like the glass and the cabinetry and the curves of the concrete outback,” she said.
Tyler Alderson added that there is a custom radius floating shelf above the kitchen sink to complement the rounded wall.
The couple redid the electrical and heating, ventilation and air-conditioning systems and added a tankless water heater.
Tyler Alderson said he did the plumbing, which was a challenge. He added a bathroom on the main level of the home and had to cut through the existing concrete floor of a former garage. After making the cuts, he said, they discovered there was no soil beneath it — only bedrock. They had to jackhammer trenches in the rock to install the new plumbing lines.
The renovation was just completed
The couple said the home took about six years to renovate and was completed a few weeks ago. During the process, they lived in a fifth-wheel trailer with their three dogs. They eventually moved into about 1,000 square feet of space.
Nicolette Alderson said that, whether they were living on the grounds or in just a portion of the house, it has always been home.
“It always felt like it was meant to be ours,” she said.
Tyler Alderson agrees. “Living in something that feels alive makes a house really feel like a home,” he said. “For me, it's just a different relationship between your traditional production build, or even the semi-custom homes in the area [that] all really look the same.”
The couple said that although they love the home, they moved to Alabama to pursue other business ventures and felt it deserved to be loved and appreciated by someone else.
For the couple, an ideal buyer would be someone who appreciates the details and artistic elements they created.
The upkeep of the home, such as fire control and other elements, might not be for everyone, the couple said.
Listing agent Jessica Tate of Milehimodern said some buyers have expressed a desire for more bedrooms since the home went on the market July 17.
The couple said they hope the home’s history is preserved as the next owners make it their own.
“I think if you live in that house, you're more hands-on to your home than you've ever been, and you like it,” Tyler Alderson said. “You enjoy that aspect of it, because it's your relationship with it.”