by Tim Gilmore, 12/12/2012
Like mushrooms in the forest, octagon houses sprout up across the beaches, here and there, 1970s through early 2000s, at South Ponte Vedra and Crescent and Vilano Beaches. A magazine feature might lead with a pun about being strange instead of straight.
from Water’s Edge magazine, 2003, original photograph by Ed Hall
From these eight sides, you see in a full circle. In some beach houses, you look out from one or two directions toward the ocean, but Lee Johns’s double octagon-shaped house in South Ponte Vedra Beach offers you a panorama, welcoming the beach right into the living room.
“The shape of the house uses the space so well it really takes advantage of the view,” Johns says.
from Water’s Edge magazine, 2003, original photograph by Ed Hall
The view is the first thing most octagon dwellers will tell you about. Frank Oliver’s octagon house in Crescent Beach allows him to watch the ocean on one side and the marsh on the other from the comfort of his living room. That’s because the living room has a 40- to 50- foot diameter and opens up through windows in every direction.
from Water’s Edge magazine, 2003, original photograph by Ed Hall
“You can see from the St. Augustine Pier to Matanzas Inlet,” Oliver says. “And that’s about 12 to 14 miles. You’re comfortable in it, but you don’t own it all. You’re just comfortably part of the sweep of the marshes to the sea.”
cont’d as Octagon Beach Suite, Part 2: View from Sand and Skull
