Trevor Kenny/Trevor Kenny
1009 Mercedes Dr., Minden Hills, Ont.
Asking price: $2.85-million
Taxes: $5,250 (2022)
Lot size: 500 feet water frontage
Listing agents: Christine Sharp, Century 21 Granite Realty Group Inc.
The backstory
In the large open living space, a wood-panelled wall is enlivened by two large circular portal windows flanking a tall rectangular window.Christine Sharp/Christine Sharp
The second time Lauren Richards went cottage shopping she was ready to be skeptical.
“We had bought on a lake we had been assured was clean and clear,” Ms. Richards said. Instead, she and her then-husband found they had “bought into a weed-pit” that was swarmed by bugs. They sold it within a year and it was about seven years later when they were visiting a friend on Drag Lake (near Ontario’s Haliburton cottage country) that they heard of another property for sale on a nearby chain of lakes.
“We came up on the May long weekend … it was cold and miserable and rainy,” Ms. Richards said. When she visited the cottage on Twelve Mile Lake, right away alarm bells went off. “I looked down at the water and saw a dock and I thought, ‘The neighbour is right there, right on top of us.’ Then I saw, of the three docks, all the paths came up to this cottage, which just shocked me.”
There’s a boating dock in deep water, an entertaining dock/deck and one next to a sandy beach in a protected alcove. “And there’s hardly any bugs, we don’t get black flies,” she said.
Ms. Richards was ready to negotiate, a key part of her advertising career. But her husband suggested a softer approach. “In those days, you didn’t have to give more than they wanted,” she said. They offered the full asking price (believing the property was undervalued given some unusual interior design choices). And just like that, the deal was done.
She and her husband enjoyed the cottage together with their two daughters for only a short time before her husband died in 2010. As the years passed, the daughters raised their own families and, for Ms. Richards, a new love (a fellow widower) helped create new traditions on the lake. Now, after weathering much of the pandemic in the family compound, she’s ready to move on.
The cottage
Home of the Week, 1009 Mercedes Dr., Twelve Mile Lake, Ont.Trevor Kenny/Trevor Kenny
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The main cottage is not overly large, with two bedrooms on the main floor with a third in the attic loft. But there was an existing two-bedroom guest suite above the garage, and Ms. Richards added a cabin-style bunkie next to the lake, “so each daughter could have their own private space,” when they visit.
The main house opens into a small foyer that leads into a central spine hallway that ends in the living space, which has a view of the lake. Directly to the right is the primary bedroom and across the hall is what you might call the spa bathroom as it features no shower but does have a deep red standalone soaker tub. There’s a sink-basin made from a large hollowed-out stone on a live-edge wood vanity tucked into a corner window.
As you continue down the hall there’s a laundry closet on the left, across from the second bedroom on this level, slightly smaller than the primary. A pocket door leads into a second bathroom, this one with a shower, that also opens to the hallway.
A spiral staircase leads to the second-floor loft bedroom is the last part of the hallway, before it opens into a large open living space that expands to embrace the lake views with floor-to-ceiling windows and two over-sized sliding doors.
This space is defined by the rich golden-coloured hemlock barnwood flooring Ms. Richards installed, and the rear wall is double the width of the front portion of the house. On the right side of the room the wood-panelled wall is enlivened by two large circular portal windows flanking a tall rectangular one in. The panelling travels across the rear wall to connect to the stone hearth and wood-burning fireplace in the opposite corner.
The kitchen was original to the cottage, and is a triangular workspace with granite counters running along the outside wall, and then wrapping around in a peninsula with bar seating next to the sink. The same circle-rectangle-circle windows repeat on this side of the house, which soars upwards and is open to the upstairs loft with its large skylight.
The garage and lake-side bunkies are panelled in the same light pine, and have their own living rooms but the garage bunkie comes with the added bonus of a three-piece bathroom with a shower stall.
As in most cottages, the great outdoors is what truly sells the space. In addition to the rear deck off the living-dining room there’s a number of amenities on the grounds. “There’s so many places to go and hang out outside,” Ms. Richards said. There’s a charming two-level play house (done in contemporary panels and angles, complete with a slide) next to a tree-mounted hammock; there’s a fire pit with Muskoka chairs; the entertainment dock is ringed with benches and shaded by trees on the shore; and there’s a barrel-shaped sauna too. “My son-in-law had that put in. … The guys like to come out of there and run and jump into the lake,” she said.
Best feature
The cottage is on a point of land that bulges into the lake, affording a great deal of privacy. But despite the peace and quiet, it’s far from remote.
“I’m not a mountain man who wants to drive for an hour into the closest town. Minden is 15 minutes away and has an emergency hospital,” Ms. Richards said. In town there’s local breweries and restaurants, and there’s even some spots you can get to by boat. “We’re on a three-chain lake, so it’s great for boaters,” she said. Ms. Richards recommends the Heather Lodge for fine dining, and the Red Umbrella Inn which sometimes has live music and is great for brunch or more casual meals: “They have great fish and chips that are locally caught, pickerel usually.”
Suffice it to say, not everyone in the extended family is happy to see the compound go. But Ms. Richards intends to stop splitting time between Toronto and Twelve Mile Lake and move closer to her daughter in Prince Edward County to help out with the grandkids more. And as she has learned, we’re not guaranteed anything in this life so the best thing to do is live to the fullest.
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