About Tenwood Lodge

Tenwood Lodge is the dream home of Russ and Kim Nitchman (empty nesters of five children and grandparents beginning in 2022!). It was constructed using ten different varieties of local woods, including locally milled black locust. The building is almost entirely solar-powered (and grid-tied), and it incorporates as many green features as we could pack into it, including a huge recycled kitchen. In addition, the structure was designed to optimize views of our unique valley.

We purchased the land Tenwood Lodge is located on in 2000. We were seeking a remote retreat that wasn't "too removed from civilization" for our kids to experience nature and for Russ to pursue his hunting passions. While we didn't know it at the time, the land turned out to be the ideal location for the present-day Tenwood Lodge.

In 2011, we decided to sell our home in Queens, and build a larger home in Danby that could house our immediate and extended family. After an initial design, we decided to hire professional architects.
We thought we knew what we were doing.

Our daughter, Sarah, was not impressed. She had just received her degree in Landscape Architecture from Rutgers. Sarah asked, "Dad, when you and Mom are gone, you want us to keep the property and the house, right?" When he answered yes, she said, "Well, then, we need to change the plans significantly because, the way it is now, all I'd want to do is bulldoze it". Somehow she said it in such a way that Russ was willing to work with her design professor and his partner in their summer months off.

We think Brian Osborn and Carmen Trudell did an amazing job of helping us connect a beautiful home with our wonderful valley, optimizing the views and creating a superb retreat for individuals and families.  So do our guests and we hope you do too!