Board by board; each nail, tile, stair tread, and riser; from the hand-poured foundation to the pine rafters; Zach Kalatsky’s cedar framed, round house outside Saugerties was raised by the hands of community. A manifestation of the proverb, “to go fast, go alone; but to go far, go together,” the 27-foot-high circular house (technically an icosidodecagon with 32 sides set at five degree angles) is much more than the sum of its carefully crafted parts. Part yurt, part castle; the 1,800-square foot interior looks through walls of windows onto the property’s surrounding 52.8 wooded acres and Overlook Mountain in the distance.
When Kalatsky bought the raw plot of land in 2018 he had a vision of creating a nest. “I wanted the house to support everyone around me and be a community space, while also be a home that was uniquely me,” he explains. But there was one catch: “I’d never actually built anything before.” Kalatsky admits he likes to go big. “I tend be ambitious when I take on something new. Then know I can do everything below that level. It was a fun game of learning for me.”
To make his vision a reality he relied on the help of old friends and new, as well as family. “Between 60 to 80 people helped me throughout the process,” says Kalatsky of the five-year project. With each new construction step to be mastered, someone more experienced came along with expertise to share, enthusiasm to teach, and a free day to help out. “I didn’t know how to wire for electricity and then a friend told me they loved electrical work. Another friend taught me how to use a router. Someone else asked ‘Can I help you paint?’ and I was like, ‘yes please’. I had friends’ children here helping to screw things in. Often times the help actually slowed me down, but I was never alone. It was always about building community.”
Burning To Be Understood
A Queens native, Kalatsky grew up in an Orthodox Jewish community where he always struggled to fit in. “Our family was the black sheep in the community, and I’m the youngest,” he says. “No matter what I did, I didn’t really belong.” He describes himself as a shy child who often hid in the closet and had a hard time speaking in public. “I was a nerdy kid who was into computers and didn’t know how to talk to women,” he says. “I didn’t even like to take photos.” He attributes his meekness to learned family behavior. “There was a huge emphasis on safety and security in the community,” he explains. “Travel was dangerous, not being seen and hiding—these are all safety tactics.”
At 18 he went to a yeshiva in Israel for six months. “I wanted to give Orthodox Judaism one last shot,” he says. While he found beauty in both the country and the religion, he ultimately realized the traditional Orthodox life wasn’t his path. He returned to New York and began studying graphic design at Queens College, where he discovered the New York City Burning Man community. “The community really helped me open up and express myself,” he says. “I realized I could dress however I wanted, do whatever I wanted, and really be accepted for my own weird self.” He attended the Burning Man festival with a group of Orthodox Jewish friends, and then, back in New York, began helping to organize large-scale events for the extended community. “I can’t say Burning Man was my long-term home,” he says. “However the community taught me how to be seen.” This revelation inspired him to create spaces where others could be seen for their true selves.
Zach‘s Side of the Mountain
Kalatsky was first drawn to the Hudson Valley’s natural abundance a decade ago. He had transitioned from graphic design into sales and ran a successful online business that gave him work-from-wherever flexibility. “I was living in Brooklyn,” he says. “Every weekend my friends went drinking and I came up to go hiking and camping.” After a stint traveling cross-country with his former partner, he made the permanent move to the region, and together the two began looking for a home.
After placing several unsuccessful bids on homes, Kalatsky regrouped a little. While relaxing at the Emerson Resort and Spa in Mt. Tremper during a day off, his partner asked him what he was hoping to manifest. “I described a place with a long driveway, open floor plan, big bathroom, and aerial silks on the ceiling—secluded but close to everything,” he recalls. “Then it was like voila! I knew exactly what I wanted to build.”
When he found his 50-plus raw acres between Woodstock and Saugerties, he moved very quickly. “I knew I could make it whatever I wanted with the help of the internet and time,” he says. He moved into a tent at the property’s edge at the end of 2018, while he waited to close with the bank and get a construction loan approved. Then he spent the next three months camping, using a sled to trek in supplies, getting a feel for the land and dreaming of what he could build. In the spring of 2019, the land was his and he upgraded to a trailer.
Kalatsky cut his construction teeth by building a small house retrofitted from a shed sourced from Bob’s Barns in Shandaken. Finishing that project, he turned his attention to creating a larger, more unconventional home that reflected his initial vision. “I talked to multiple architects but wasn’t excited by anything they proposed,” he says. Then he came across a small, round teaching studio in Lake Hill. “I immediately got on my computer and began designing,” he says. “I knew I wanted something unusual like that and also much bigger.”
Nesting 101
He designed the home himself on Illustrator and then sent his initial renderings to an architect to turn into a 3D plan. After working with an engineer to make sure the plans were practical, he sent the home’s final design to a pre-fab company in Washington which turned the design into a kit and then shipped him the walls and the roof. With the help of friends, he laid the 1,200-square-foot round foundation at the very center of the property. He added a high-efficiency heat pump and radiant coils throughout the first floor and then covered them with an expanse of hardwood flooring and tiles.
Facing north, the home’s open-concept living room has an angled, open kitchen at one end. Kalatsky added an expanse of composite quartz counters for meal preparation and his neighbor showed him how to plane live edge elm and oak shelving for the walls above. A green tiled backsplash adds color. Kalatsky realized he could add a pot filler behind the stove himself after reading the instructions online. “It’s one of those things that would cost thousands if someone else installed it, but was cheap to do myself,” he says. “It’s kind of silly, but it was fun.”
At the opposite end of the living room a wood burning stove was one of the only features he professionally outsourced. However, he and a friend laid the dark herringbone tile hearth, which reaches to the home’s cathedral ceiling. At the back of the house Kalatsky added two bedrooms with sliders onto a deck. In the guest bathroom, a mix of slate and dark tiles line a cave-inspired shower. He painted the primary bedroom emerald green to match the view, and then, in the primary bathroom, tiled the Jacuzzi-style triangular bathtub with a mix of emerald and white tiles. A large Italianate vanity completes the space, which he’s named “The Italian Mermaid Grotto Bathroom.” Above the bedrooms, a loft adds a den/meditation space and 600 square feet to the home.
Now with the project completed and his former partner having amicably flown the nest for a career in Berlin, he hopes to open the space to the community that helped build it. “We’ve already hosted many gatherings,” he explains. The gatherings have ranged from informal potlucks and ecstatic dances to more organized sound baths and workshops. “I created something from a place of wounding to really be seen myself,” Kalatsky explains. “I hope this becomes a space where others feel they belong because I didn’t feel like I belonged. I love holding that space for people.”
This article appears in October 2023.
