Sarah-Mai Miller and Heath Miller lived in 10 totally different homes and residences in 17 years. The couple owned three of these homes — an 1800s saltbox in Greenport on Lengthy Island and a contemporary cozy cabin and a glass cabin, each in a city known as Milan in upstate New York.

The couple’s ventures in actual property had been a pure extension of their jobs as artistic administrators. Collectively, they based Chalk 242, a artistic advert company they’d named after the handle of their first house in New York Metropolis, a prewar constructing on the Higher West Facet. For the Millers, the strains blurred between work, play and residential.

The 2 homes in Milan had been nicknamed Maitopia and Mailan, a nod to Ms. Miller’s title. However they bore her husband’s out-of-the-box touches, like a lap pool inside two steps of the backdoor of Maitopia, and, most curious to Ms. Miller, a bath in the course of the tiny residence. “I noticed the designs for the bathtub and was like, ‘Actually?’” she recalled.

In February 2023, Mr. Miller, 47, died in a head-on collision on a rural, darkish street on the North Fork just a few miles from their Greenport residence. Mr. Miller was driving. His pal who was within the passenger’s seat, and the 2 occupants of the opposite automobile died.

Mr. Miller’s loss of life left his spouse stricken with grief, reliving each reminiscence of what that they had constructed collectively. The night time Heath died, Sarah-Mai known as her mother and father, who drove by the night time to be with their daughter. Different family and friends members supplied their help and presence within the coming days and weeks. Ms. Miller ultimately went again “residence” to her native Ohio after the casual celebration of Heath’s life in his hometown, York, Pa., the place a few of his household nonetheless lives. She returned to the saltbox residence in Greenport weeks later to see if she may very well be there alone. She had a bit firm, Rufus, their canine. “It was so empty,” she mentioned. “On daily basis was a reminder of how quiet it was.”

She lasted 4 days. It was time to let go, she thought. She listed the house. After which she listed Mailan, the ‘cozy-modern glass home’ upstate. After which she and her husband’s enterprise associate, Max King, determined to promote Relaxation Co., a boutique lodge that her husband helped create out of a hen coop. Piece by piece, Ms. Miller has spent a yr shedding a lot of the property that they purchased and renovated so she will be able to decide up the items.

“I don’t suppose grief ends,” Sarah-Mai mentioned. “But it surely adjustments.”

Doing What They Liked

The Millers met once they labored on the Columbus, Ohio, headquarters of Categorical, the clothes retailer. Mr. Miller’s job was operating the artistic course for the model, which included working with fashions and stylists for picture shoots, whereas Ms. Miller was employed as an web coordinator, a novel title on the time that included dressing mannequins.

Mr. Miller had helped interview his future spouse for her job and wished to move on her for a extra skilled candidate. Finally, the particular person in control of Buyer Relationship Administration overruled him.

Two months later, they started courting, Ms. Miller mentioned, recalling how Mr. Miller’s nattiness was a bit intimidating. “I grew up in small-town Ohio the place there’s no such factor as vogue,” she mentioned. “Heath was fashionable. He cared about his look.”

That carried over to the décor of his house. The primary time Ms. Miller visited, he apologized for the “mess,” she recalled, laughing. “It was the cleanest and nicest house I’ve ever seen.”

Lower than a yr later, the couple moved to New York. Their first house within the metropolis was on 242 West 104th Avenue, which they renovated shortly after shopping for it, making use of a mixture of fashionable aesthetics with old-school New York grace, plus a touch of commercial.

They acquired married in Turks and Caicos in June 2008, which occurred to have been their first trip spot collectively greater than a yr earlier. Heath’s son, McKenzie, who was 12 on the time and from Heath’s earlier marriage, was additionally in attendance. They’d return to Turks and Caicos many instances after their marriage ceremony, staying on the identical lodge and going to their favourite seashores.

New York was a cultural initiation. Along with attempting out as many new eating places as they might, they cherished frequenting museums and artwork exhibitions, the place they sought inspiration for his or her jobs. This inspiration would ultimately spill into many areas of their lives — residence décor, wardrobe and the enterprise they had been planning.

By this time of their careers, having grown weary of company energy and the way in which stakeholders generally dilute creativity, the newlyweds talked so much about doing work that they each cherished versus work they thought they wanted to do. “A good suggestion goes to be polarizing,’” Sarah-Mai recalled Heath saying, a philosophy that will sooner or later issue into their attitudes round designing their residing areas.

Chalk 242 was born.

Maitopia

Whereas they had been constructing their enterprise, the Millers had been searching for a second residence, out of the town. They had been versatile on areas inside a two-hour radius and ultimately discovered a three-acre parcel of wooded land on Willow Glen Street in Milan, with an adjoining stream. Mr. Miller had no technical know-how, however he was decided to design the house himself, Ms. Miller mentioned. “It paired along with his design aesthetic and background,” Sarah-Mai mentioned. “One thing simply clicked for him. He might see it actually clearly.”

Inside a yr of buying and clearing the land, Mr. Miller had give you the designs for the house, that includes a one-bedroom lofted construction with a peaked roof and that lap pool that they might bounce in simply by opening the again door. The large pivot door that swings open to the small pool, for example, took Mr. Miller, three of their pals and a contractor to put in.

Mr. Miller appeared to be on to one thing. The peaked roof, destructive area and glass home windows, like hefty fragments of a geometrical puzzle made what is actually a one-room, tiny home really feel extra spacious.

They usually saved it naked: “Whenever you’re going from one location to the subsequent, you’re at all times bringing these things with you, and also you don’t need to be surrounded by stuff. You simply need to be in a spot that’s welcoming and clear.” That made it simple once they determined to hire it out by on-line reserving websites.

One in every of their frequent renters was Tina Roth-Eisenberg, the designer finest identified for her weblog Swiss Miss. Ms. Roth-Eisenberg began posting footage of Maitopia to her social accounts every time she rented it, shocked by the creativity and a focus to element. In an Instagram submit dated Nov. 12, 2021, she wrote, “I’ll always remember the second once we entered the driveway, in spring of 2016. There she was, this contemporary, tiny magnificence. As we acquired out of the automobile my daughter seen the Swiss cross” on the shed “and jokingly mentioned, ‘This home was ready for you, mommy!’ It felt like destiny, however she later realized that Mr. Miller had hung it there as a result of he loved the graphic enchantment of the cross, its clear strains. Ms. Miller had been a fan of Ms. Roth-Eisenberg for years and so they quickly grew to become pals.

By 2020, that they had purchased the lot throughout the street and constructed a brand new residence that they known as Mailan. They discovered an keen purchaser for Maitopia: Ms. Roth-Eisenberg. Wanting to provide a suggestion in particular person, Ms. Roth-Eisenberg met the couple within the metropolis with a houseplant and illustrations of Maitopia that her youngsters had made. “It felt like an adoption,” Ms. Roth-Eisenberg mentioned. “Like I adopted this labor of affection.”

Mailan

As a baby rising up in Ohio, Ms. Miller had seen a glass home and advised her mom she wished to stay in a single similar to it. Mr. Miller had at all times been obsessive about the glass home that the architect Philip Johnson had constructed in New Canaan, Conn., which appeared to rise out of the grass, equal components stately and understated.

Mr. Miller’s creation was smaller, but it surely was grander than Maitopia with two bedrooms, two full baths, plus an open front room space with wooden flooring and wooden slat paneling alongside the outside. She relished the view that was the wood-burning range searching onto the pool, and the woods past it. These woods contained “enjoyable little components,” Ms. Miller mentioned, “just like the treehouse that Heath and his son, McKenzie, had constructed. Heath was a artistic. He needed to at all times create or else he’d get stressed.”

The Salt Field

Greenport on the North Fork of Lengthy Island was a special vibe, neither woods nor straight seaside, neither rural or suburban. The Millers had vacationed in Mattituck, a fast drive from the home in Greenport they’d ultimately transfer to, and was beneficial to them by household pals who had vacationed there.

In contrast to Maitopia and Mailan, which they constructed from scratch, the Salt Field had been standing for the reason that 1830s on a decently busy intersection the place the Most important Street meets Rt. 48, or what’s regionally known as the North Street. The Salt Field’s age, almost 200 years previous, and its shaker-style minimalism are what first attracted the couple. The wide-plank flooring had been initially a part of the house, a few of them over a foot huge, as was the spectacular Dutch colonial fashion entrance with its stalwart trim.

When it got here to the renovation, which started in April 2021 and was accomplished later that November, the Millers wished to pay homage to the architect who constructed it, although they didn’t know who that was.

The essential factor was that it exemplified simplicity and coziness, whereas allowing the fashionable theme that the couple had grown to like. They moved the kitchen from the place the second bed room downstairs at the moment stands, to the lounge, incorporating the wooden fire, whereas making the second room downstairs a library/examine, replete with two excessive again chairs, a fuel fire and built-in cabinets that Mr. Miller constructed. “It was our canine Rufus’ favourite room. At night time, when she slept in there, we’d put the hearth on low and hold her snug every time it was chilly,” Ms. Miller mentioned.

It was one in every of her favourite rooms, too. “All of the houses we constructed had an intimate vibe to them,” Sarah-Mai mentioned. “Heath was an extrovert and I’m an introvert, and our residence was an area that felt like ours. If we did entertain, the area lent itself to smaller teams.”

But it surely was largely simply the 2 of them, plus Rufus, cooking meals, enjoying chess or cozying up by the hearth. Once they ventured out collectively, they loved driving across the island.

Mr. Miller was out along with his pal, William Worth, whom he didn’t get to see usually. Mr. Miller wished to point out off a few of his favourite spots, and Ms. Miller stayed residence to provide them area and time to catch up. Mr. Worth, who was a passenger in Mr. Miller’s Tesla, died, as did Peter Smith and Patricia O’Neill, passengers in a 2020 Ford Explorer.

Earlier than Mr. Miller died, he and his spouse talked about the place to maneuver subsequent. They thought of Charleston, after having fun with a two-month street journey down south once they had been closing on the salt field. Ms. Miller is now desirous about Paris or staying put in Ohio or settling into her house in New York Metropolis. “I’m nonetheless studying to not get connected to issues,” she mentioned, remembering how she and her husband went from challenge to challenge. (She additionally misplaced Rufus, who was eight years previous, in December.) “At the moment, we mentioned, ‘We have to hold going. We have to hold shifting. We had been gathering homes and recollections.’”

Not too long ago, she purchased a saltbox-style residence 20 minutes from her mother and father’ place in Ohio. She is about to start out renovations.