Tagaris-Shergold cottage.
In constructing their own Provincetown home, George N. Tagaris and Ryan Shergold sought something larger than the two little cottages — unattached to one another — that stood on the property. One had 434 square feet of floor area, the other 280 square feet. Because the property is within the Historic District, the trick was to make one structure appear as if it were the two that once stood on the site. The solution proposed by Mr. Shergold and Mr. Tagaris, a partner in Phoenix Design and Development of Boston, was to emulate — at an enlarged scale — the massing of each of the old cottages, then join the new structures together with a short glass-walled connector under a standing-seam copper roof. Dan Webb of Webb Structural Services in Reading was the structural engineer.
In 2015, the Zoning Board of Appeals permitted this plan to go ahead, even though it exceeded the allowable scale for the site. “The dilapitdated structures toward the harbor side will be razed and replaced with a new structure of a pleasing and harmonious design,” the panel said, after a 4-to-1 vote to approve the project.¹ The building was completed in 2018, and Tagaris told me in 2019 that he and Shergold are “looking forward to making many beautiful memories in a town they love.”
An elevation drawing of the 143B Commercial Street cottage shows how the two cottages are joined by a short glass-enclosed connector. Architect-designer: Phoenix Design and Development of Boston. Structural engineer: William N. Rogers II of Provincetown.
The northwest facade of the Tagaris-Shergold cottage (at left) is considerably different than the southeast face (at right), which overlooks the beach. That’s by design, in an attempt to preserve the sense of two separate cottages. The photos were taken in 2018 by David W. Dunlap.
¶ Last updated on 31 March 2019.
143B Commercial Street on the Town Map.
Also at 143 Commercial Street:
Thumbnail image: Photo, 2017, courtesy of George N. Tagaris.
¹ Findings and Decisions of the Zoning Board of Appeals, 3 September 2015, Barnstable County Registry of Deeds, Book 29173, Page 225.