{"id":818783,"date":"2026-07-22T14:47:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T14:47:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/818783\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T14:47:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T14:47:09","slug":"a-buddhist-an-artist-a-cottage-and-an-addition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/818783\/","title":{"rendered":"A Buddhist, an artist, a cottage and an addition"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The former home of Melodie Frances Massey in Port Hope, Ont. Renovation and addition designed by Toronto-based Studio KSA.Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

At dawn each morning after putting on her robes, Melodie Frances Massey (1923-2016) would walk softly down the old, creaky wooden stairs. Like all Buddhist nuns, she would divide her days between meditation, offering service, study and, sometimes, chanting. On certain days, she would teach meditation to others. <\/p>\n

The little cottage in Port Hope, Ont., which she purchased in 1997, was a wonderful place to practice Vajray\u0101na Buddhism. On a quiet street across from a park, it also possessed a large, sunny backyard filled with birdsong.<\/p>\n

\u201cI still, to this day, think that the peacefulness that\u2019s here had something to do with the work that she did,\u201d says her son, artist John Massey. \u201cEverybody who comes here and stays here remarks on the peacefulness of the house.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before moving to Port Hope in 1970, Ms. Massey had lived in a very different type of house: the orderly, steel-and-glass, Mies van der Rohe-inspired dwelling in Ottawa\u2019s Rockcliffe Park neighbourhood designed by her husband, Hart Massey II (1918-1997). Winner of the 1964 Massey Medal for Architecture (founded by governor-general Vincent Massey, Hart\u2019s father), the house at 400 Lansdowne Rd. was designated a National Historic Site in 2018.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mom never liked the house in Ottawa,\u201d Mr. Massey adds.<\/p>\n

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The little cottage has a large, sunny backyard.Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

And while they haven\u2019t awarded a Massey Medal for Architecture since 1970, the way John Massey has treated and reinterpreted his mother\u2019s cottage \u2013 with a great deal of help from designers at Toronto-based Studio KSA \u2013 is certainly praiseworthy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd even though I didn\u2019t think of this rationally,\u201d continues Mr. Massey, \u201cit sort of brought those two things together: the spiritual questing of my mother \u2026 and then the architectural wrap around it [is] my father\u2019s presence.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

While it\u2019s unlikely Hart Massey\u2019s hand guided that of Martin Kohn, co-founder of KSA Studio in 1990 (with John Shnier) or that of his colleague, Maggie Bennedsen, both agree there\u2019s good energy here indeed, and, more importantly, that the way to preserve it was to leave most of the original cottage well enough alone.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe kernel of the house,\u201d Mr. Kohn says, \u201cwe knew we were just going to keep this simple: centre hall, two rooms \u2026 [but] making houses for people is a huge commitment; I\u2019m always very nervous. I try not to show it, but I\u2019m always terrified. And when it actually works out years later, it\u2019s really gratifying.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s gratifying for the sidewalk passerby as well. A little gable with an arched window punctuates the wooden, white fa\u00e7ade, which also sports an asymmetrical porch enclosed by a little picket fence. The only whiff of newness is the black, standing-seam cladding around the single-car garage (although an eagle-eyed Port Hope resident might note the old shutters are gone and the arched window has a bit of added length).<\/p>\n

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The original living room now opens up to the Studio KSA addition, which features a small pop-out that creates a windowed nook.Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

Open the front door, and the visitor is greeted by the old, wide-planked, slightly warped wooden floor and the worn, grooved staircase that Ms. Massey traversed each day. A neck-swivel to the right reveals an enclosed room with all mouldings intact, and a swivel to the left rewards the visitor with a lovely fireplace. That original living room, however, now opens up to the Studio KSA addition, which features a small pop-out that creates a windowed nook where Mr. Massey has placed a second couch on one side, and an efficient, modern kitchen on the other (Mr. Kohn\u2019s father installed stainless steel commercial kitchens for a living, and he says he learned a great deal about keeping them compact). <\/p>\n

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Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

The cottage sits about 25 kilometres from Newcastle, Ont., where, in 1847, Daniel Massey Jr. started the company that would eventually become the farm machinery behemoth Massey Manufacturing Co. The company moved to Toronto in 1871, and it\u2019s a good bet most of the soil between here and there \u2013 and a great many other places around the world \u2013 was turned over by Massey farm machinery.<\/p>\n

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While KSA\u2019s addition is nothing more than a rectangle grafted onto the back of the old cottage, the resulting change is tremendous.Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

While KSA\u2019s addition is nothing more than a rectangle grafted onto the back of the old cottage, the resulting change is tremendous: light carries into what Mr. Massey describes as (formerly) \u201cmingy little rooms\u201d as it enters from floor-to-ceiling windows and bounces off shiny, tall baseboards. There are visual connections to nature no matter where one sits. The transition from wood floor to polished concrete (the poor man\u2019s terrazzo, as this author likes to call it) is a friendly border between the two worlds.<\/p>\n

To go upstairs, a visitor grabs the original handrail and, like a moth to a flame, heads to the arched window over the soaker tub, marvelling at the imperfections of the lath-and-plaster walls and ceilings.<\/p>\n

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Michael van Leur\/Michael van Leur<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a bit of crudeness to it, which to us is acceptable and sometimes desirable,\u201d says Mr. Kohn. \u201cThe way we treated the existing part of the house, you know, tidying it up [but] not making everything superprecise. And that contributes to a kind of economy as well.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cPraise be to Marty,\u201d laughs Mr. Massey, who adds that growing up with a patriarchal \u201cmy way or the highway\u201d father meant he didn\u2019t think much of architects for a good portion of his life. \u201cHe got it all right; amongst many things is that the house breathes beautifully\u2026and the distribution of heat \u2013 it\u2019s super cozy.\u201d<\/p>\n

In summer, the positioning of operable skylights as heat-chimneys, windows for cross-ventilation, and massive, powered awnings to shade the backyard window-wall means there\u2019s no need for costly air conditioning, either: \u201cHalf the houses we did [do] not have air conditioning \u2026 I\u2019ve never liked it,\u201d explains Mr. Kohn. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou need a window, and some greenery, and a place to sit, and that\u2019s kind of it,\u201d Mr. Kohn finishes with a smile. <\/p>\n

Sounds like meditation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: The former home of Melodie Frances Massey in Port Hope, Ont. Renovation and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":818784,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[967,76,354,355,49,48,356,75,968],"class_list":["post-818783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-architourist","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-real-estate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818783\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/818784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}