There’s a Better View in Every Direction at This "Lake House" in Indiana

After moving to Chicago from Lithuania in the 1990s, Danas and Odeta Lapkus quickly discovered the small beach town of Beverly Shores on Lake Michigan in Indiana. Just an hour drive from the city, the community is a tranquil getaway situated among rolling beach dunes and towering trees within a state park. "We would visit Beverly Shores’ beaches and dune trails with friends for years," reflects Danas. Eventually, the couple sought out Chicago firm dSPACE Studio to design a family retreat here.

"Beverly Shores has a very interesting history of modern and progressive architecture," says Robert McFadden, principal at dSPACE. The community was a satellite site for the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair, hosting several homes designed specifically for its "Century of Progress" theme, five of which are still extant. Building on this history, McFadden and Kevin Toukoumidis, another of the firm’s principals, set out to design a home that was both innovative and artful. "The intention was to create art," declares Danas.

The result is a 2,200-square-foot home set atop the site’s highest point, nicknamed Tree House by the designers because of its upright, three-level plan. In part, its shape was out of necessity. "The property is quite steep, and there were some restrictions from the local municipality about where we could and could not build," explains McFadden. "That meant we had to focus on a limited footprint." Because the volume had to move up instead of out, the designers decided to invert the standard multilevel floor plan by locating the primary living spaces on the top level.