Birmingham Architecture Firm Receives Honor for Cahaba River House

BIRMINGHAM, AL - Birmingham's Nequette Architecture & Design received national recognition recently, receiving a Palladio Award for its Cahaba River House project. The firm won in the ‘New Design & Construction, less than 5,000 square feet’ category. The Cahaba River House is a two-story cottage that sits by Cahaba River in Bibb County, Alabama on 512 acres.

The Palladio Awards, put on by Traditional Building and Period Homes magazines, honor outstanding achievements in traditional design.

Officially completed in 2016, the Cahaba River House project consists of 2,157 square feet with an additional 438 square feet of porch space. The remote location in Bibb County, Alabama strongly influenced the design and materials used for the building of the cottage.

“To have our Cahaba River House design recognized by the prestigious Palladio Awards is a true honor,” said Louis Nequette, lead principal of Nequette Architecture & Design. “The design is simply a humble vernacular cottage, so the true success of the house was placed in the capable hands of the builder and his fine craftsmen to assemble it with love and care. They hit it out of the park.”

“This river house sits over the Little Cahaba River with amazing views and privacy. By the time you get to this place, you are so unplugged that it is amazing,” said Seth Rodwell, studio manager of Nequette Architecture & Design. “We used materials that came straight from the land when possible. The stone is from a neighboring piece of property and much of the wood was milled and dried from trees on site. The tree bark siding comes from a little further out but it adds the perfect touch. We did not want the house to have to be painted or maintained. The tree bark siding allowed us to achieve this while making the house look as if it fit right into the woods. The house also includes a real cedar plank roof which is a first for us. The project is the perfect example of a client with a vision who pushed us to try things we have never done before.”

The awards were presented at a dinner ceremony during the Traditional Building Conference on July 18 in Salem, MA. The event recognized both individual leaders and design teams whose work enhances beauty and humane qualities of the built environment. (For more updates on this story and free news alerts for your neighborhood, sign up for your local Birmingham Patch morning newsletter).