October 2020 | Page 88

Rustic Retreat The schoolhouse renovations took about two years to complete but the grounds, which lured Peixinho from the start, were naturally charmed. A previous owner planted a variety of specimen trees, including a variegated pagoda dogwood, walking stick trees and a dwarf beech, and lined the edges of the property — about five minutes from the beach — with lush rhododendruns. A historic stone riverbed cuts through the rear of the rectangularshaped acre, welcoming Paradise Brook much of the year. “It’s just in the hot, hot summer that it dries up,” says Peixinho. The fairy tale landscape only required one thing: A place to sit and take it all in. “After about two summers there it became obvious it needed an outdoor living space,” Peixinho says. “That was a necessity.” Peixinho looked to a falling-down chicken coop tacked onto the barn out back. Instead of planning a demolition — or, perhaps too on the nose, adventures in animal husbandry — Peixinho envisioned a patio that afforded views of the gurgling brook. He leaned into the rusticity of the site and propped up the coop’s roof with cedar posts, leaving the bark and branch remnants intact. LEFT: The wall-mounted fish sculpture on the patio is by Captain Mike’s Woodshop in Brewster, Massachusetts; “Peixinho” translates to “little fish” in Portuguese. OPPOSITE PAGE: The barn’s coffee table is a repurposed fish trap. The house-shaped antique wood stove once belonged to Alfred Smith, a Gilded Age real estate tycoon who made his fortune selling Newport farmland to New Yorkers. 86 RHODE ISLAND MONTHLY l OCTOBER 2020