Foster Martin one to four bedroom homes at 1484 Martin Street 334 homes by Landmark Premiere Properties
Mary Frances Hill
The Province
Foster Martin
Where: 1484 Martin Street, White Rock
What: 334 homes in three towers
Residence sizes and prices: One to four bedrooms ranging from 806 to 3,748 square feet; from the mid-$500,000s to more than $6 million
Developer and builder: Landmark Premiere Properties Ltd.
Sales centre: 105 — 1688 152nd Street
Sales phone: 604-531-7111
Hours: noon — 5 p.m. daily
While there are plenty of reasons to downsize from a long-time family home — economics, easier maintenance, children grown and gone, to name a few — buyers are not always ready to make dramatic compromises in the shift to condo life.
For Andrea Finlay, the designer who worked on the interiors at Foster Martin in White Rock, meeting these high standards involves working to transform a condominium into a comfortable haven by considering homeowners’ daily contact with tactile, sensuous materials.
“Sensitive sight lines and well-defined spaces are key,” says Findlay, principal of Studio Finlay, a Vancouver-based design company.
Joan Kallman worked with Landmark Premiere Properties on the furniture, accessories and styling, while Finlay concentrated on the suite’s space planning and detailing, the design for the bathrooms and kitchen, and plumbing and finishing specifications.
“The tactile experience of the home needs to communicate quality and thoughtfulness — the touch and movement of the door hardware, the feel of the plumbing fixtures and the honed marble and stone surfaces,” she adds.
“The option of built-in shelving on either side of the fireplace provides a functional home for life lived and create depth in the space.”
In many respects, homebuyers’ standards for living well carries directly into the principles behind the community itself. The Foster Martin community will include health and wellness practitioners, cafés, restaurants, a spa and a daycare.
Finlay says her team played with the scale of details in the display suite, creating depth and a well-defined entryway with oversized baseboards. Considering the homeowners’ views and paying attention to the details of the physical space — ceilings and millwork, for example — was crucial in the overall plan to create homes that are at once spacious and comfortable, she says.
“We were very careful with locating ceiling drops to help define spaces and create areas that would feel more intimate. We carefully designed functional millwork for the vanities and kitchen and specified fixtures and finishes that were classic and timeless.”
The bold marble look in the kitchen, including quartzite countertops, stands out among the dark wood finish to lighten and soften the space and create a sophisticated, grown-up polish. Finlay gives credit to the quality of these classic materials, and the relationship of these surfaces to the movement of natural light throughout the day.
“Using classic materials that not only have a visual, but tactile experience helps to soften the space and provide a quiet contrast to the hardwood floors,” Finlay says.
“As the suites feature amazing panoramic views from their floor-to-ceiling windows, the honed quartzite counter softens the movement of light from the glazed walls to provide a balance of warmth and texture.”
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