“I remember I walked up the hill and I said, ‘Wow, I want to live here,’ ” said Mr. Besnard, 40, recalling a landscape that included lush greenery and in the distance the Marly-le-Roi aqueduct, an old conduit that brought water from the Seine River to the Chateau de Versailles.
Mr. Besnard and his wife, Julie, had been longing for some time to leave their three-bedroom loft in the Parisian suburb Levallois-Perret. “We wanted to be in the green,” said Ms. Besnard, a stay-at-home mother of two sons, ages 5 and 7.
And Mr. Besnard said it was a dream to be surrounded by nature and only 30 minutes from the Concorde metro stop near his office in Paris where he is a brand manager for Clinique, the American cosmetic company.
Their rustic residence, which sits on about an acre, was constructed in the 1870s as an outbuilding to a larger estate that had been divided up long ago. A beautiful, rough-hewn stone retaining wall framed the eastern edge of the property, adding a nice touch of Old World charm. The building is nestled between the fruit orchard and a thicket of chestnut, oak and beech trees.
Although the old stone building was immensely appealing with its wrap-around balcony and buff-colored stonework, it was a tight squeeze for a family of four. But Mr. Besnard said he was brimming with all sorts of ideas on how to renovate and expand the roughly 900- square- foot structure.
Ms. Besnard, 35, recalled that her husband came home that day in 2007 and told her excitedly that he had found the perfect place, but there was a complication: it might be unbuildable. A chat with the seller had dashed cold water on Mr. Besnard’s plans.
The property sat within a protected zone of both natural and historical significance — any alterations to the old structure and grounds would need the approval of a government board that oversees such matters. The property owner, who lives nearby, had recalled two previous deals involving enthusiastic buyers coming to an abrupt end when building plans were rejected.
“He didn’t know if it would be possible to do anything with the property,” Mr. Besnard said.
The Besnards forged ahead anyway, hoping to devise a plan that would satisfy the government and create an idyllic home for their family. “We had a really nice flat and we didn’t want to leave it for a house that was just so-so,” Ms. Besnard said. “This was a rare and fantastic place.”
Friends put them in touch with Philippe Barbier and Henry Barton, partners in an architectural firm based in Paris. Since they were obliged to keep the original structure intact, the architects looked to the old greenhouse for inspiration.
“The guideline was to make it very natural, it needed to be inspired by the area, and integrated into the existing environment,” Mr. Barton said.
It took about eight months to obtain the much-coveted building permit — a welcome relief to the Besnards, who bought the property in the fall of 2008 for 700,000 euros (about $1 million) only weeks before they received the final go-ahead to build. “It was risky,” Mr. Besnard said, “but it meant that we had to succeed.
Construction started the following spring: the new L-shaped footprint of the home expanded the existing rectangular-shaped structure, creating 2,500 square feet of living space. But the project came to a halt the day the digging crew, hard at work on the foundation, struck a natural spring; it was an expensive surprise that required the use of long, concrete pilings to stabilize the ground. All told, the restoration of the old structure and the new construction came to about 550,000 euros (about $700,000).
Today passing through the property’s ivy-covered fence has the feeling of entering a sanctuary, and the airy home seems to be embraced by the landscape rather than set apart from it. The warm, tawny-hue of larch planks — both inside and out— complement the original light-brown stonework, creating a cohesive flow between old and new.
The house is filled with glass panels, large and small, paying homage to the old greenhouse and adding a sense of nature light throughout the house. This is especially evident upstairs in the master bedroom, a bright lofty space with large windows looking out onto treetops and squirrels scampering through them. On one side of the bedroom are two wash basins and a spacious glass shower shaped like a cube.
“In Paris flats you are stuck with small bathrooms,” Mr. Besnard said. “I wanted a large shower.”
Elements of the original stone building have become striking design features on the first floor. A large entryway, soaring two stories high with a glass-paneled ceiling, uses an exterior stone wall from the gardener’s residence. The stone wall is now adorned with a white-resin, moose head lamp by a Norwegian design company. A doorway, carved from the old wall, leads to the adjoining children’s bedrooms. The entryway also opens up to a large kitchen, where a portion of stonewall is now the base of a kitchen countertop.
Off the kitchen, the living and dining area is sleek and sparsely decorated, highlighted by a futuristic black metal fireplace, by Focus, suspended from the ceiling. The floors are a soothing light-gray concrete. Once again, nature gets the spotlight. Floor-to-ceiling glass doors open onto a wrap-around wooden deck overlooking the lawn and orchard. Surveying the home and property with a mix of relief and satisfaction Mr. Besnard said: “Now we don’t need to go away for the weekend — we just want to stay here.”
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