January 2015
| Business World
125
house. Situated on a coastal compound in
Osprey, Florida, the firm set out to exceed
expectations and create a cohesive relation-
ship between the structures and the natural
landscape.
"We used that project to explore some ideas
that continue to be relevant to us," says Spark-
man. "Which is how architecture and nature
co-mingle or merge. Here, particularly, we
really tried to prove you can blend indoors
and outdoors. You can have this stark dif-
ference but in fact, sometimes they overlap
and it's not quite clear whether you're inside
or outside. And that's part of the lovely pos-
sibilities of designing a building in Florida,
you have to shade someone from the sun
but not necessarily close them in on all four
sides."
By utilizing the natural environment, The
Main House has a relaxed atmosphere with
views from Gulf to Bay, in addition to a cen-
tral garden. At the request of The Owner,
the Bay House was designed to be a house
in the trees with an emphasis on privacy, and
Sweet Sparkman Architects set out to "evoke
an organic architecture that is influenced by,
