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Modern Homes for Rural Migrators that Offer Authenticity [Issue 6; July, 2008]

By 2020, half of Americans will have moved to counties with populations of less than 50,000 in "pretty" places. Many of these rural migrators are also moving to

• Downshift, where the decision is made to disengage from others or from work to regain a slower lifestyle at frequently higher cost in reaction to crowding, overdevelopment and the hyperlife

• Tech escape, an anti-tech "time out" from the fast life in which consumers seek old world pleasures.

The following are modern home options available to rural migrators in the Northeast that also offer authenticy via old-world craftsmanship and design.

Classic Colonial Homes Classic Colonial Homes has partnered its designs with various developers to create settlements in New England. Builders are reviving historic styles in new home "settlements" in surrounding areas of New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Classic designs like colonial, farmhouse and saltbox combine traditional craftsmanship with modern-day amenities.

Brook in Waterland Hudson Valley, NY development Brook in Waterland resurrects 17th-centruy Dutch design featuring post-and-beam construction and hand-carved moldings. The settlement, "400 years in the making," also offers a homeowner-association-controlled farmland and vineyard. Set in 196 acres of farmland, this development offers a "new approach to sustainable preservation of land and heritage built upon a rarified quality of life." Brook in Waterland "writes a new chapter in the Hudson Valley tradition of the much-loved country retreat…"

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