Dream House | A Grants Pen to Junction dream

The story begins with a young girl who grew up in a dirt-floor house in a depressed section of Grants Pen, Kingston. She knew what it was like to be humiliatingly described as ugly, a dunce, and, not to mention, bear the pangs of hunger.

The once-always sickly little one realised that she was powerless in doing anything about being less attractive in the eyes of others, or her fate in being undernourished - but she could do something about her scholastic deficiencies. So, with grit and determination, she applied herself in school like never before, eventually studying law and living in England as a lawyer.

The outspoken mother of two daughters, and the last of nine siblings, on her return to the island, visited her 100-year plus family property, which somehow cast a spell, leaving her so overcome with emotional attachment to the breathtaking place that she just had to take possession of it.

Masked by countless trees, the diverse fruit-yielding property (where you can walk and walk through grasslands and never discern boundaries), is Jamaican countryside at its most untroubled and physically attractive. Its whereabouts is by Junction, southeast St Elizabeth, inconspicuously seated on an elevated area, ringed by towering mountains within a large valley.

The original accommodation on the land was a simple, old-time wattle-and-daub small structure, which the lawyer/designer decided not to tear down, but rather, subsume in the overall 3,000 square foot expansion and remodelling exercise. That started back in 2002, with construction completed two years later.

This intricately carved house rebelliously breaks with convention, being ever so cognisant that this is architecture for our time so that we and our children can indeed have a future.

The eco-friendly cottage has external walls of luxuriant greenery thriving with creeping ivy, creating an awesome vertical garden, mirroring its fertile surroundings. This softens the exterior of the building, produces oxygen, purifies the air, reduces heat, cools the interior, and absorbs noise - all the while preserving the natural environment against disastrous global warming.

This traditional indoor space (not conforming to rules) gratifies and communicates a Jamaicanised, English country cottage with its timeless feel; incorporating mostly genuine antique furnishings imported from England, for example, four-poster beds (with mosquito netting); commingling with works of art; book shelving; displays of fine, English bone China; Turkish rugs, and gilded (highlighted in gold) wall mirrors.

Wood and coloured concrete floors and walls delightfully enclose three bedrooms and two bathrooms; kitchen, dining, and living areas all in one. Colours give mood to rooms such as green, purple, and red shades. A verandah permits entertaining under the ambit of the great outdoors. An outdoor shower beckons.

It is this lawyer’s wish that her story of defying herculean odds and denigrating comments will serve to inspire other girls in similar situations to not lose hope because their dreams, too, can come true.

Barry Rattray is a dream house designer and builder. Email feedback to barry-rattray@hotmail.com and lifestyle@gleanerjm.com