Bob and Rita Bigony had long wanted to build their dream house. In 1997, a corporate move to Illinois presented the Bigonys the opportunity to build that home. Architect Ron McCormack of McCormack + Etten / Architects was selected by the Bigonys to advise on lot selection and to design a very special home for them. It was an Owner/Architect marriage that, like all good mariages, began with good chemistry, evolved with mutual interest and a lot of fun, and matured with trust and successful results. This was one of those projects that reminds an architect just why he enjoys doing what he does.

Rita Bigony was on a mission. She had a long-standing love and appreciation for the Arts and Crafts Movement since she and Bob had lived in England. The Arts and Crafts Movement is an architectural philosophy that began in England in the mid to late nineteenth century with A.W.N. Pugin (1812-52) and John Ruskin (1819-1900), and spread to America at the turn of the twentieth century. Architects of the time began to reject familiar historical styles and to assert that a building should express its structure and natural environment. The movement criticized the de-humanizing aspects of machine work that resulted from the industrial revolution and championed the return to hand craftsmanship and a dignified living environment for all mankind. In America the movement developed into what we commonly call the Bungalow and Prairie styles. It is probably best represented by the work of architects Charles Sumner Greene (1868-1957) and Henry Mather Greene (1870-1954) in Pasadena, California, and of course, Frank Lloyd Wright in Oak Park, Illinois and Spring Green, Wisconsin.

Bob and Rita brought to the design program a houseful of Stickley furniture; wonderful, large, quarter-sawn oak furniture pieces that are faithful to their Arts and Crafts and Prairie Style origins. The home was literally designed and proportioned around many of these furniture pieces.A beautiful wooded golf course lot was selected in Wynstone, the Jack Nicklaus-developed golf course community in North Barrington, Illinois.

The best solutions in designing a home are those of a collaborative effort between owner and architect, and this home is a perfect example of that process. Both owner and architect contributed to the design, staying ever faithful to the Arts and Crafts concept and yet creating a strikingly original and livable home for the next millenium.

The general contractor selected for construction of the home was Walter Bochenek of Master Hand Contractors, Chicago, Il. Walter's crew of uniquely skilled "Old World" carpenters, masons, sculptors, wood workers, and metal workers were the perfect choice to execute this Arts and Crafts statement. A few of their special contributions to the home include setting massive two-ton granite boulders into the masonry exterior and on interior fireplaces, hand-carving and detailing 8x8" heavy timber beams, custom fabricating hammered copper and brass fireplace hoods, and embellishing trim details in the Arts and Crafts style.