This Week on Upstater: Make Way for Chalets!

  |  November 23, 2015
2057 QUEENS HIGHWAY KERHONKSON, NY 12466

2057 Queens Highway, Kerhonkson

Chalet-style homes are all over the place in the Catskills and Hudson Valley (especially prevalent near the skiing mountains). We find them to be enchanting throw-backs, many of them built in the 1970s, and we can’t see one without visualizing a swinging 70s ski pad with a roaring fire in the fireplace and a bearskin rug on the floor.

But there’s a practicality to chalet-style houses that fits right in with our infamously snowy upstate winters. See, the steep eves inherent in the design (which originate in the snowy climes of the Swiss Alps) help keep heavy, wet snow from piling up on the roof, and if you’ve ever had your roof cave in from snow, you’re probably not in any hurry to relive the experience. From an aesthetics standpoint, chalet-style houses are kissing cousins to A-Frames, thanks to those vaulted cathedral ceilings, and given our love of A-Frames, chalet-styles fit right in.

This week, we’ll be unrolling our proverbial bearskin rug in front of the fireplaces of some of our favorite chalet-style properties in Upstater Land. Stay tuned…

About Kandy Harris

Kandy is a writer and musician/music teacher living in Saugerties, NY.

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