The beauty is found in the details. 

At first glance, this Dennis home exudes  warm, clean, and coastal vibes—a quintessential Cape Cod home with its shingled exterior, white seashell driveway and bright and airy interior. Yet, once you spend time in the home, the details and thoughtfulness that homeowners Tricia and Mark put into their family home surface in an impressive way.

The family had spent many summers coming to the Cape for stays in Chatham, Harwich and Brewster—visiting friends and enjoying beach days. They hadn’t truly explored the town of Dennis until their son, Marcus, became fast friends with classmate Ryan Shaw after spending their freshman year together at St. John’s Preparatory School in Danvers. The two were inseparable and Ryan’s family, longstanding Dennis residents, were eager to show the family all the area had to offer. 

“We just fell in love with this area,” Trish says. “They introduced us to Crow’s Pasture, and we had never seen anything like that on the Cape. We really got to get a feel for the town.”

When they began to look for homes in 2015, it didn’t take long for the family to imagine life in a very special home they discovered in Dennis. 

Before even entering the front door, Trish had a special feeling about the home which had been built in 2007. Tucked away in a quiet northside neighborhood and only a short walk to the bayside beaches, the house instantly felt like home. 

“The shingled-style with the Gambrel rooflines, the navy doors and shutters, surrounded by hydrangeas—my heart spoke to me right away. It was our home,” Trish says.

The house has an impressive open-floor plan with a stone fireplace built with stones from Cape beaches. With high ceilings and large windows, the home was virtually turnkey—all Trish and her family had to do was repaint the walls and start decorating. It is often an over-used term, but the home was built to be timeless. “We all found the classic coastal design of the home’s interior, including the unique fireplace, to be just as inviting as the exterior.” Trish knew she wanted to embrace a classic, Cape Cod aesthetic so she settled on using white and blue tones in her decor. Now the home has a light, coastal feel; while also being warm and inviting to guests. Due to the thoughtful interior appointments Trish chose, their house feels like a home rather than a gallery where guests are fearful of spilling a drop of red wine on the white sofas. She was intentional to make her home an inviting place for friends and family to spend time together.

The dining and living spaces, which are connected, feature two white-washed wooden tables that were handmade and painted in Maine. The 10-foot-long dining room table was built without corner legs so the family could fit as many friends as possible around the table during meals. Additionally, Trish stood her ground as she decided not to mount a television over the striking stone fireplace.

“I said, ‘No television in this room,’” she smiles. “This room is about enjoying conversation, playing games at the dining room table, and having a peaceful, fun party environment.”

Watching movies and sports are reserved for either the den or the finished basement, both which are cozy retreats and have been enjoyed on many summer nights by her children and their friends.

Her daughter, Maggie, shares her mother’s belief in creating comfortable spaces for the family and their guests to socialize. Together, they redesigned the sun porch to be the perfect spot to curl up with morning coffee and a book, or to enjoy a cocktail with a friend after a long day at the beach. Maggie replaced the “old school” white wicker furniture with chic, comfortable, cream-colored, outdoor couches, new wicker armchairs in a driftwood gray, and placed a casual coffee table in the center of the room, perfect for post-beach appetizers. With a blue tile fireplace, the room feels like an inspirational blend of the Aegean Sea and Cape Cod blue hydrangeas; exhibiting the mother and daughter’s shared excellent taste in design. 

Just outside the sun porch, a newly configured backyard rivals any private resort or spa retreat. The original red brick patio was replaced with large, rectangular bluestone pavers that are impervious to the scorching mid-day sun. A new seating Adirondack chair area, placed on crushed seashells, and a spacious outdoor dining table ground the space which is landscaped with a variety of grasses and shrubs. The pièce de résistance is found in the center of the new backyard, where the elevated Soake pool, with a fieldstone foundation and an ample bluestone coping around the edge make for a perfect place to sit. Commanding center stage attention is the cascading waterfall and firepit combination along the far edge of the perfectly-sized, luxurious pool.

“The landscape architects said that it’s more typical to put the pool to the side or in the corner of the yard with the firepit separate,” she says. “We wanted it to be the focal point of the yard and the center point of conversations during parties. People can have cocktails in the Adirondack chairs and still be talking to those in the pool.” 

The 13-foot-long Soake pool has been a massive hit amongst the family and their friends. “After living several summers here we found we use the backyard at the end of the day—after being on the beach or on the boat all day, Trish shares. “It was all part of our wind down, so the concept of a ‘cocktail pool’ made so much sense. And the gas fire and waterfall add to the ‘Après-Sea’ of it all.” She goes on to say that maintenance is minimal as it is sanitized with saltwater. On any given weekend, the pool is packed with friends enjoying conversation and drinks after spending a day in the sun.

The home was created to be enjoyed, shared, and lived in. With an understated elegance, the personal touches put into the home are what ties the home together as a reflection of their family. From the intentional layout of the furniture to the hand-painted pillows made from the artist, Sitka, from Boston’s Newbury Street—the home is a display of thoughtful love. 

Yet, one element of the home remains more personal and touching than all the rest.

Scattered throughout the walls of their home are breathtaking, and award-winning, paintings of Cape Cod beaches and landscapes painted by Marcus’ best friend, Ryan Shaw, who had inspired the family to buy their home in Dennis. The boys were entering their spring semester at Northeastern when he tragically passed away from bacterial meningitis just shy of his 19th birthday in 2016. 

“The boys used to swing on a rope right into that river,” Trish points to artwork Ryan had painted of a local beach. “He was just an amazing artist…an amazing person.”

Her family still keeps their boat at the Shaw’s Dock in Wrinkle Point which they’ve started to refer to lovingly as “Ryan’s Cove.” Each year, Northeastern hosts the Ryan Shaw 5k in his honor and has raised over $1 million for charity. “He lives on in spirit,” Trish says.

The beauty of the home in many ways lies in how Tricia and Mark were able to take a classic Cape Cod home and subtly layer pieces of their lives into every tiny detail of the home. They’ve taken a house and transformed it into a comfortable, welcoming space where their friends and family can gather and enjoy each other’s company summer after summer, for generations to come. 

They understand what makes a house a home—it’s the people and memories that fill it. 

Virginia Noone was a talented addition to the Cape Cod Life summer intern program and is a senior at Wake Forest University where she studies journalism.