Anna Mangum

Most stories don’t start with finding your dream home on a Maine island one week before moving to Uganda, but Grace Becton’s does. Grace, an interior designer who splits her time between DC and Maine, was no stranger to Deer Isle’s tightknit community when she came across her dream house located there. She grew up on the island. “There were 25 people in my class, from Kindergarten to 12th,” she says. Though she left the island to attend Yale, she knew she wanted to stay connected to Maine.

As Alice stepped through the looking glass into a magical world where everything is upside down, so too does this York home transform our psyche. Designed by Whitten Architects, the house recalls the familiar shape of a traditional Maine home—a main house, a back house, and a barn—but turns this convention on its head. Indeed, Whitten Architects created microclimates in this modern home for their clients—but before we step inside, let’s start at the beginning.

Cue James Taylor’s dulcet voice singing about a country road. Picture a long driveway lined with rows of red maples, winding and fitting the music. The road and trees give way to a rustic farmhouse composed of several patinaed buildings. You can see the front door but are not yet privy to the pool, patio, or pickleball court hiding behind the main house. A wall of evergreen trees conceals the adjacent golf course without making the property feel boxed in.