“WHEN I TALKED TO AN ENGINEER, HE SAID THIS FOUNDATION COULD HAVE SUPPORTED AN EIGHT-STORY STRUCTURE ABOVE IT.”
MICHAEL GOLDIN, DESIGNER AND RESIDENT
When Deborah Oropallo and Michael
Goldin began plotting a move from Berkeley, California, to a more bucolic setting in the late aughts, they envisioned open land, a place for Deborah’s art studio and Michael’s design and fabrication shop, and an opportunity to grow and raise their own food. Veterans of two repurposed mixed-used city spaces—a machine shop and a brass foundry—the couple and their two kids were itching for country life.
In 2010, after prices proved prohibitive on
