Architecture studio FORMA has completed a distinctive black cedar-clad residence in Hillsdale, New York, positioned dramatically at the crest of a wooded slope. The House on a Hill, designed by FORMA founders Miroslava Brooks and Daniel Markiewicz, represents a contemporary approach to residential design that emphasizes self-sufficiency and adaptability in response to pandemic-era living needs.
The project began in 2020 when Brooks and Markiewicz, longtime friends and collaborators who were first-time homebuilders, purchased a nine-acre parcel in upstate New York. What initially started as a shared retreat from urban life transformed into an intensive five-year process of design experimentation and construction challenges. As costs escalated and labor became increasingly scarce, the architects repeatedly reworked their vision, ultimately turning these constraints into creative catalysts for their design.
FORMA's original concept called for a larger, two-story structure, but budget limitations forced the team to distill their ideas to their essential elements. The final design features a compact three-bedroom, three-bathroom dwelling organized around a 700-square-foot footprint. The home's most striking feature is its double-height living and dining space on the upper floor, which is suspended above a modest base to capture expansive views toward the Catskills and Berkshire Mountains.
This vertical organization creates a careful balance between efficiency and spatial openness. The lower level anchors the structure to the hillside, while the elevated main living area maximizes natural light from multiple orientations. Despite their distinct characteristics, each level maintains visual and spatial continuity through controlled shifts in volume and carefully framed views.
The house demonstrates a sophisticated relationship with its natural setting through deliberate positioning that takes full advantage of the existing clearing. From the western approach, the structure presents a more enclosed appearance with its dark cedar siding and vertical windows that emphasize weight and solidity. Moving around to the eastern elevation, the building appears to lift gracefully on angled supports, with its geometry becoming lighter as it opens toward a pond below.
This careful manipulation of form and orientation positions the house as both an architectural statement and a respectful response to its rural context. The shifting elevations create changing perceptions for viewers as they move through the clearing, establishing a dynamic dialogue between the building's static presence and the motion of human experience around it.
The exterior treatment reinforces the home's sculptural qualities through its dark-stained cedar cladding, which reads as a unified geometric gesture against the landscape. Inside, the architects created a deliberate contrast with lighter tones and warm finishes that provide a welcoming counterpoint to the building's dramatic exterior presence.
The double-height living space showcases FORMA's attention to integrated design through a custom millwork wall that seamlessly combines a fireplace, built-in seating, and storage solutions. This continuous architectural element serves as both a functional and aesthetic organizing principle for daily life within the compact footprint.
FORMA's design strategy throughout the project prioritized tactile contrast and visual clarity. The covered ground-level deck features untreated cedar that exposes the raw texture of the natural material, reinforcing the building's connection to its material origins and the surrounding forest environment. Every design decision, from the building's precise orientation to its interior layout and material finishes, reflects the architects' commitment to achieving maximum spatial quality within strictly limited parameters.
