Pure Genius

Artist and designer Oren Sherman applies his talents and a very personal touch to the modernist home he shares with his husband on Cape Cod.

- MARNI ELYSE KATZ

“The thing about living with a genius is that I get no credit whatsoever,” Rick Miller says with a laugh. “When people walk into our home, they say, ‘You’re so lucky to live with Oren,’ as if I have no taste.”

Oren is Oren Sherman, an artist, a Rhode Island School of Design professor, and a design specialist at Elkus Manfredi Architects, a high-profile commercial architecture firm in Boston. Miller, a psychotherapist and the founder of the nonprofit organization Gay Sons and Mothers is his husband. 

The couple, who met as young men in Provincetown, Massachusetts, have been together for 30 years. As Sherman points out, Miller has been exposed to a lot of design. “The truth is, the house is very much a combination of the two of us,” Sherman says.

The couple are the second owners of this 1,600-square-foot midcentury modern house in Truro, a tiny town on Cape Cod. They are intent on respecting its modernist roots. When erected in 1957, it was about 800 square feet; the original owners eventually enclosed the screened porch (now the dining room) and added the primary bedroom. “It was built as a modest summer home; we didn’t want to turn it into a fancy house,” Sherman says. Still, there was room for improvement.

They invited their friend Thomas Henry Egan III, a principal in Evolve Residential, to have a look. Egan defined a proper entry, redesigned the galley kitchen, and enlarged the windows to enhance the indoor-outdoor connection.

Waking up surrounded by greenery and gazing into woods bathed in late afternoon light are among the greatest rewards of living here. “In four minutes, Tom told us what we needed,” Miller says. “His advice made this place what it is.”