After overhauling a vintage  row house in DC’s Shaw neighborhood, Patrick Brian Jones immediately began designing a new carriage house on the same property. The owners wanted the 22-by-30-foot structure to contain guest quarters and a garage, and Jones’ plan smoothly integrated both, orienting the carriage house towards a shared backyard rather than the alley behind the main residence.

“The owners use this as a guest  suite, so it connects to the house via a walkway,” he explains. Like the main house, it’s clad in brick “because we wanted the two structures to communicate back and forth.”

The carriage house entry is at ground level; from the foyer, guests climb the stairs to the living quarters or open a door leading into the two-car garage. Jones carved out storage space beneath the staircase and framed it to accommodate another window system that is currently covered on the outside in rolled steel.

The architect specified insulated concrete block for the property walls, left exposed to create the same industrial edge that exposed brick imparts in the main house but at a much lower cost. “The concrete block speaks the same language as brick,” Jones observes.

The living space encompasses an open-plan dining area and kitchen, one bedroom and one bath. The sensibility throughout is modern, with mid-century furnishings. The sleek, stainless-steel-and-glass stair railing and French milled-oak floors are duplicated from the main house, and a hot-rolled-steel sliding door screens off the bedroom for privacy.

Architecture & Interior Design: Patrick Brian Jones, AIA, Patrick Brian Jones, PLLC, Washington, DC. Contractor: J. Allen Smith Design/Build, Ijamsville, Maryland. Styling: Charlotte Safavi.

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