This Port Royal Home Redefines the Spec Home Concept

When John Cooney, of Stofft Cooney Architects, says he doesn’t design spec homes, he means it. While he does conceive the occasional spec home for developers—with knowledge gleaned over Cooney’s decades-long career designing functional, high-end homes in Naples for discerning individuals—the architect thinks beyond the usual requests, transforming typical ‘move-in ready’ abodes into distinctive showplaces. A supreme example is a new, 6,500-square-foot, three-story Gordon Drive estate, steps from the beach.

The home is located inside the nine-residence, beachside community of Palmer Estates, and the developer wanted a design that would mark the next iteration of the neighborhood. The enclave is rife with examples rooted in the region’s Mediterranean era. But as new owners look to tear down and build larger—and more modern—this property helps set the tone for a future aesthetic. “The developer was avant-garde to consider a contemporary home,” Cooney says. Naples designer Carrie Brigham, who handled the interiors, also appreciated the developer’s instinct to build a customized, personal space. “It was designed as if it was a private residence,” she adds.

To suit the strict codes for waterfront builds, Cooney designed the estate as a three-story manse with the first floor mainly used to house the garage and utilities—even the pool is elevated, creating an alfresco experience that’s continuous from the main living areas. “I’m very proud of the exterior architecture and aesthetics to mitigate the three-story height,” Cooney says, noting that in Naples, most taller buildings are commercial spaces, like condos. “It’s always challenging to design a three-story structure that looks like a beautifully designed single-family home. I love the cool staircase leading up to the front door.”

Cooney plays off the height with large-scale windows, including a three-story section of glass that follows the lofty entryway skyward and floods the main living areas with natural light.

Inside, the stairwell next to the front door doubles as a foyer. The glass-edged staircase with thick walnut steps is a veritable work of art that seems to ascend through the air. Enter from the ground floor garage and look straight up the 32-foot expanse. The structure is mesmerizing. “It is a phenomenal space with wonderful qualities of light and volume. But ultimately, the place is very homey,” he says.

The interior design started with the flooring. “They wanted walnut,” Brigham says, noting the material is more expensive than common oak and thus a key differentiator. From there, Brigham sought complementary tones for the black-brown flooring and trim, opting for light-colored walls and a majestic Calacatta gold marble feature wall in the great room to contrast the dark wood.

The developer was so impressed with the final look, they considered moving into the home themselves instead of selling. “We were going for a chameleon-like interior where the design could be enjoyed as is or someone could purchase and make changes to, say, the color of the walls,” Brigham says.

Brigham cultivated harmony between the home’s tony location, sophisticated architecture and chic interior design with choice furniture pieces. “We love the [Berman Rosetti] sofa because it has the most gorgeous wood details in the back corner. It’s always important to have a sofa that looks incredible from all angles,” Brigham says, indicating the sofa’s wood base, two-tone velvet and elegant reverse corner, which is exposed toward the dining room and kitchen.

The mirror-polished, stainless steel Baker end tables in the living room lend texture and weightlessness, along with a Ray Booth for Hickory Chair dining table with a marble base, walnut top and black steel support that appears to float over the base. In the kitchen, Brigham placed thin-framed Powell & Bonnell stools at the bar as a counterpoint to the kitchen’s built-in elements and the more traditional furnishings visible in other areas of the great room. “The cabinetry in the kitchen is soft and warm, so we wanted to add a modern touch to tie the lighting together and make it more architectural,” Brigham says.

Cooney and Brigham worked with Naples’ AlliKristé to design the kitchen as a minimalist counterpoint to the dramatic elements in the great room. Visual interest is subtly woven into the kitchen’s interior via the tray ceiling, a protruding range and a 90-inch brass hood that make the Ruben Sorhegui Tile mosaic tile look recessed. Two 8-by-4-foot islands covered in a satin-finish, white Cristallo Quartzite create extra counter space—one is outfitted for prep work with a sink; the other is free for chatting or overflow prep. And, the nearby breakfast bar doubles as an excellent workspace for work-from-home days. A pair of Sean Lavin Wit linear suspension chandeliers, with glass and acrylic cylinders, complete and help define the island area, and there’s an adjoining butler’s pantry with additional refrigeration and dishwashers, to keep messes out of the way.

Rather than lean into a coastal theme, the team fostered sense of place via what Brigham calls “micro-subtle elements.” “The tones in the [bathroom] vanities reference the color of the sand, the [kitchen] countertops are honed Cristallo [quartzite], which references the tones of seashells,” Brigham says.

The designer’s attention to detail is best exemplified in the great room’s 25-foot wide by 10-foot and 6-inch high marble feature wall, flanked by thick, book-matched walnut shelves. To find the perfect slab, Brigham drove to Naples’ UMI Stone 15 times. The marble frames the TV and a 102-inch-long fire feature by Grate Fireplace in Fort Myers. The water vapor fireplace creates the illusion of a burning flame, sans heat, using water mist and LED lights.

Dark walnut finishes throughout define spaces and create a more striking, elevated look than you see with most neutral-hued contemporary designs. In the dining area, kitchen and great room, tray ceilings feature a high gloss tongue-and-groove light oak inset that glows thanks to hidden ambient lighting. The great room’s 68-inch, bronze Wired Custom Lighting chandelier plays off the linear fluted pendant chandelier in the adjoining dining room.

Primary suites have become de rigueur and this home has two—one on each residential floor—so future homeowners can choose whether to perch topside or down. Both are minimalist dreamscapes overlooking the pool (though the upper level also looks out to the Gulf) and have his-and-her en suites with light oak AlliKristé vanities over Asian statuary marble flooring. The powder room is another standout, with a patterned cork wall covered with flecks of brass, John-Richard steel and glass sconces, and wall-mounted Newport brass fixtures. The floating vanity has a dark walnut finish, tying back to the flooring through the main living areas. Woven marble flooring helps complete this study in textures. “When you hear the term ‘spec home,’ you rarely think ‘personal,’” Cooney says. “And yet that is exactly what this is.”