Luxury Homes
The oceanfront house is high on a bluff overlooking the Elizabeth Islands.
Biophilic design, according to the LandVest real estate professionals who are listing this property, “fosters positive and sustained interaction and relationships among people and the natural environment.”
The name of the property is Minawetu, which is derived from the Wampanoag names for Island (Munahee) and home (Weetyoo). Located on a three and one-half acre lot on Lambert’s Cove, West Tisbury, on the north shore of Martha’s Vineyard, the oceanfront house is high on a bluff overlooking the Elizabeth Islands. It embodies the principles of design first popularized in the 1980s, when Harvard biologist, theorist, naturalist, and author Edward O. Wilson promoted biophilia as “Love of life or living systems.” At Minawetu, this is expressed in the building materials, the landscaping, and in the way the contemporary structure interacts with its surroundings.
“Major corporations have been incorporating biophilic design into their new buildings,” said Tom Tate, of the Vineyard’s Tate Builders, who completed the main part of the house in 2021 and the lower level and the attendant building earlier this year. “Now it is beginning to be used by residential architects and designers as well.
“The idea is to create an environment where we connect with nature,” Tate said. “Biophilic design emphasizes human adaptations to the natural world that, over evolutionary time, have proven instrumental in advancing people’s health, fitness, and wellbeing. Each element of biophilic design stimulates a physical response from the body.”
At Minawetu, this begins at the entrance, where a stone path leads across enormous granite stepping stones that bridge a water feature that introduces sound as well as sight: it includes two waterfalls cascading from the reflecting pools to a lower-level pond.
Inside the 8,200-square-foot home, there are 10-foot-high ceilings and expanses of glass looking out at Vineyard Sound. The main house has five en-suite bedrooms, while the lower level features a sophisticated wine cellar, entertainment room, media room, gym, and sauna. A dramatic glass circular staircase leads to a rooftop pool, which the realtors describe as “arguably the best place one could choose to watch the sunset each evening.”
A detached accessory building has two additional bedrooms and two full baths, bringing the property’s number of bedrooms to seven, with seven full and two half bathrooms. The accessory building could serve as a home office or as a guest house. While the outbuilding is a short walk from the main house, it offers privacy, as well as its own views of meadows blooming with wildflowers.
From the lawn at the rear of the main house, a stone staircase leads down the bank to nearly 250 feet of sandy beach.
The house is self-sustaining with solar panels.
Principles of biophilic design are expressed in materials including Chelmsford granite, African mahogany, glass, Ipe, red eucalyptus, and coral from the Dominical Republic. High-quality materials are combined with carefully curated plantings that favor native trees, shrubs, vines, perennials, and grasses.
“As spectacular as this house is,” Tate said, “it is, at best, a platform for a botanical garden.”
Minawetu is offered for sale by Gerret Conover and Thomas LeClair of LandVest Martha’s Vineyard, a subsidiary of Christie’s.
“Everything about this property is unique and special,” the listing materials say. “It is by the ocean, for the nature lover, on an island.”
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