From the road, the house looks as it has for years. For many years, however, it was invisible behind overgrowth and out-of-control shrubbery.
Featured Homes
Natural Tranquility
A Boston couple restore a classic shingled cottage and its lush grounds to create a sophisticated summer retreat deep in the woods of southern Maine
BY
Regina Cole
PHOTOGRAPHY
Joseph St. Pierre


The front porch is large enough to serve as screened outdoor living and dining space. This is the dining end.


Mike Zamojski (left) and Mark Smith.


Sophie and Spencer, resident Corgis.


Mark Smith’s red-coated ancestor overlooks the living room. Leather Chesterfield seating, a beamed ceiling, books and traditional lighting make it comfortable and chic.


A glimpse into a guest room from the upstairs den, which also serves as a winter living room.


Newly created gardens frame a view of the guest house, which provides a lot of additional space for guests, as well as a broad deck.


The guest house living room serves as a library, as well as a gathering place. Guests sleep in an upstairs loft.


The dark colored wood paneling that remains in the upstairs hall was once dominant throughout the house.


Mark puts the finishing touches on a table set for company dinner, a common occurrence in the Smith- Zamojski household.


At the table’s other end is homeowner and proud cook Mike Zamojski.


The antique oak dining table seats ten for dinner. 

Mark Smith and Mike Zamojski have become so fond of their second home in southern Maine that they sometimes call their Boston condominium a “pied-à-terre.” They cannot imagine spending any of their free time, including weekends, vacations, and holidays, anywhere other than at the Cape Neddick house they bought in August of 2003. Built 100 years ago, the shingled cottage measures approximately 3,000 rambling square feet. Surrounded by porches and accompanied by a small guesthouse, it is located deep in the woods about 2 miles from the beach, yet the ocean can actually be heard right across the street through several wooded acres.

“This place has a soul to it,” says Mike, an independent marketing and advertising consultant. “It was built as a summer home, with fiberboard ceilings and half walls in the upstairs bedrooms, something we now see replicated in our friends’ larger, newer homes. Here, everything is real, and that authenticity permeates every nook and cranny.”

Mark, an attorney with the Boston firm Atwood & Cherney, P.C., explains his feelings this way:

“This house recalls some of the best experiences of my life, including years I spent on idyllic, far-ranging canoe trips while at a summer camp in Canada. That sense of tranquility, camaraderie, and of being close to nature is evoked for me here. After a long week of divorce litigation, I feel all that stress just slip away as I walk in the door.”

As much as they love this house now, they had very different and divergent criteria when they looked for a second home. Mark wanted a woodsy cabin that recalled his Canadian canoeing experiences. Mike, who has fond memories of sun-drenched family vacations spent on Cape Cod, favored a beach house.

“We had actually made offers on two houses on the Cape,” he says. “Fortunately, they didn’t work out.”

As they searched, Mark and Mike developed one firm rule: their second home had to be within a 11/2-hour drive from Boston. That eliminated Vermont, which Mark favored, as well as Cape Cod, where Mike wanted to buy.

“With vacation houses, it’s always one of two things,” Mark says. “Either it’s in the middle of nowhere, or it’s convenient and there’s lots of traffic.”

They love the easy-to-reach, yet private location of their Cape Neddick vacation destination, but it was the house itself they fell for. Mark had actually fallen in love with the house when it was for sale back in the late 90s, but the timing was wrong as he still owned a home in Vermont. He didn’t hesitate the next time he saw it for sale.

“I saw the kitchen, and said, ‘Done deal’,” Mike recalls. “I love to cook. And Mark, who never makes up his mind fast about anything, drove by the ‘For Sale’ sign that weekend, stopped the car, and he said, ‘I’m buying this house!’”

They weren’t alone in their regard for the house. Unknown to Mark and Mike at the time, their neighbor in Boston had also put several offers on the house and had even bought pieces for the house in anticipation of living there. “Needless to say, when we bought it he was quite surprised when we started describing the house we had bought in Cape Neddick,” says Mike. “Eventually a few of those pieces did make their way to the house.”

The couple spent their first weekend surrounded by buckets situated to catch rainwater pouring through the roof. Over the next eight months, they replaced the leaky, old roof and the sagging porches that surround the house on four sides, installed insulation, and re-shingled the exterior.

“The house itself was structurally sound,” Mike points out. “It’s built on stilts on granite ledge, so there were no issues of rot. But the land was totally overgrown. We’ve cleared around the house and brought back the gardens, and we have plans for all sorts of improvements.”

“Some friends assumed we’d gut the house,” says Mark. “But we bought it because we loved its characteristics and originality.

“You have to live in a house for a while before you make changes,” he continues. “When I first saw the pantry, I thought it was a lot of wasted space. Now I know how valuable it is.”

Mike agrees. “We couldn’t figure out why the fireplace was angled until we experienced how that enables the heat to flow into the living room, up the stairs, and down the hall. The house was never heated until the early 70s.”

Both Mark and Mike claim equal responsibility for the interior design. With a laugh, Mark says their friends call the décor “Ralph Lauren hunting lodge.”

“I like things from different places and ages,” he says. “Mike has a great eye for color and design, and I’m a weekend antiquer.”

“We’re both collectors, and the interior décor evolved,” Mike adds as he looks around. “The rugs were purchased from an oriental rug dealer who is a high school friend of Mark’s in Buffalo, N.Y.  The bronze loon by Sandy Scott is a favorite piece of ours, the kitchen and hallways are home to paintings by Paul Wood, Robert Cardinal, and Wolf Kahn, and Mark caught all the fish mounted on the walls.”

A favorite piece of Mark’s, found in Vermont years ago, is a large 18th-century portrait of a red-coated man. Overlooking the living room, the painting took on meaning when its subject turned out to be a maternal ancestor.

“He was the Colonial tax collector appointed by King George III,” Mark laughs. “His name was Townshend; my mother’s family’s name, and my middle name, is Townsend. Still, I never thought anything of it until after we moved here, when I found a copy of this very picture in a history book. That is how I learned about the family connection.”

The couple’s lifestyle dictated Mike’s first mission in the new house: find a large dining table. “I knew we’d entertain a lot. Friends come from all over the world; for our first Fourth of July in this house we had 24 people for a sit-down dinner party. We have lots of places to eat,” he continues, “on the back breakfast porch, the front porch, in the kitchen, at the long dining table—it’s a hospitable place.”

Mark and Mike, together with their Corgis, Spencer and Sophie, are the house’s fifth owners; stories about the third owner’s famous parties have circulated around southern Maine since the 1970s, when those memorable bashes occurred.

“We keep meeting people and hearing wild stories,” Mike says. “All weekend, every weekend, this house was full of people, a lot of them New York theater folk. Stephen Sondheim, Rex Reed, Bernadette Peters, Kitty Carlisle, Tony Perkins—they all partied here. Now that we’re here,” he laughs, “the house is full of people on the weekends again. Recently Rex Reed visited the house with the former owner, Larry Miller, and recalled stories of the house and its past visitors until late into
the evening.”

A less riotous, but no less stellar example of the unexpected is that Mark has taken to doing manual labor. “I re-worked a toilet tank, something I’ve never even thought of doing. As a lawyer, this plumbing work was one of the most satisfying things I’ve ever done,” he says with a smile.

“Every weekend, there are things to do,” says Mike. “All of them are gratifying. Of course, we do take time out for the beach, and Mark plays golf next door at the Cape Neddick Country Club.”

“This house isn’t owned,” he adds. “We’re just the caretakers.”

Mike’s Dinner Party Menu (click on menu item for recipe)

Grilled Filet Mignon with Asparagus & Gorgonzola Butter