Lyrical Luxury

Palatialness and practicality strike an accord in the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s newest show house, part of the Turtle Lake development in Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

Built by John Shekerjian, president of John Richards Homes in Birmingham, Mich., the 248- acre development provided a "pristine setting" for the project, with a 42-acre private lake and large lots with high values. The 11,000-square-foot, French-style DSO show home was a perfect style match for the community.

"It wasn’t truly designed as a show house, it was designed as a home that is comfortable," Shekerjian says. "People could understand and relate to the home and feel like this is a home that’s going to be lived in."

Shekerjian achieved this by scaling down room size. He also used reclaimed materials, creating hand-scraped wood floors, floors made with thousands-years-old Jerusalem stone, and a back hall constructed with reclaimed terra cotta tiles from France. The material choices made a home that Shekerjian says "felt old, a home that’s been there for a very long time."

But Shekerjian says the most impressive aspect of the home is its placement: inside of a hill. While the site was expensive to create and maintain, because of the way the hill was cut, the home "just looks like it was designed into the site and it’s been there forever," he says. Shekerjian was able to make a courtyard out of the existing trees and earth, and boasts that the home has 100-foot trees that start at the roof line.

The DSO holds biannual show-home fund-raisers to benefit its outreach programs. This home opened in November and had 13,000 visitors through early December, raising at least $130,000.