In Sarasota’s Lido Shores, the architecture reads like a syllabus of post-war modernism. Take, for example, the Gallery House, which is on the market for $4,185,000.

“Everywhere you go in this home, you see the art," says Matthias Schubnell, who owns the home with his wife Erika Ivanyi. "At night, it reflects in the pool water.”

After Ivanyi spied the for-sale sign at 1354 Westway Drive on a jog and fell in love with the home, she and Schubnell purchased it in October 2020 for $1.84 million, drawn not just to its midcentury footprint but also to its quiet potential. “I saw a Sarasota Magazine article [about the home] years ago,” Ivanyi says, “and that’s how we knew to find Guy Peterson.”

They reached out to the architect, who was nearing retirement, not long after closing. What followed was a series of carefully plotted interventions that honored the home’s minimalist composition while upping its livability. “Guy came and drew everything in pen and paper,” Ivanyi says. Then architect Damien Blumetti took over the project and "ran it with such a great eye,” she adds. 

The house was originally built in 1962 by Arthur Weiser, a local builder, for his brother, a playwright from New York who had contracted polio as a child. “That’s why the pool is so deep,” Ivanyi says. “It’s 9 feet deep, 16 feet wide and 36 feet long—probably the biggest in the neighborhood. It was built for exercise.” It’s a detail that anchors the home in personal history—a gesture of care that shaped the architecture long before Ivanyi and Schubnell arrived.

The home wasn’t an original Sarasota School classic, but over time, it’s been remade in that spirit. Ivanyi and Schubnell's remodel, completed in 2022, expanded the home’s footprint while preserving its inherent sense of restraint. The living room was extended to accommodate a 12-foot-long bobinga wood dining table with a custom aluminum base—“it was too big for the house, so we had to make space for it,” Schubnell, who built the one-of-a-kind table, says—and a new dining room now creates two seating “vignettes” for morning coffee or entertaining.

Elsewhere, the couple added a proper laundry room, reconfigured the pantry and air handler, and gave the kitchen a quiet makeover with blonde maple cabinetry and white quartz countertops. “The laundry used to be in the kitchen,” Ivanyi says. “A lot of these homes built in the '60s don’t have storage, so we added a huge new pantry.”

The couple transformed the landscaping, too. The front now holds a walled Japanese-inspired garden. “We designed it with a water feature in a concrete trough,” Schubnell says.

In the back, the pool deck was smoothed out and updated with large white pavers. “It used to have small tiles and a fountain that split the hot tub and pool—it blocked the house,” Ivanyi says. “We wanted it clean and uniform.”

Blumetti’s subtle refinements are seen in the columns that now punctuate the interior and exterior, creating a sense of privacy and casting geometric shadows. “He didn’t want it to be just a big wall," Ivanyi says. "He said the columns should create anticipation, like seeing something through.”

The house has three bedrooms, though one has been opened up and serves as an office. “People fall in love with the idea of mid-century homes,” Ivanyi says. “But they’re not for having three teens.” Instead, the home favors solitude and intimacy. “Our greatest pleasure in it has been the private space and the art.”

The art is no afterthought. Schubnell, a retired English professor who specialized in the author Willa Cather and Native American literature, is a serious collector. “We both collect contemporary art, especially from the Southwest. T.C. Cannon, Pepper Brown and Vincent Valdez," he says. "And I’ve got this obsession with German expressionist woodblock prints from the ’20s to the ’40s.” 

The library, which doubles as a family room, is a study in layered interests. “The books are coming with us,” Schubnell says.

With backgrounds rooted in Germany, Hungary and France, Schubnell and Ivanyi are downsizing to a condo on Palm Avenue, with an eye on a more nomadic lifestyle. “We want to be able to leave for three months at a time,” Schubnell says. “This home deserves someone who really lives in it.” 

Potential buyers who have flooding and hurricane safety on the mind will be happy to know that even after last season's devastating storms, this one came out strong. Its elevation is 9 feet, "one of the highest points in Lido Shores," Schubnell says. "Nothing happened. We just helped the neighbors."

Still, it’s not a good-bye without a little regret. “This is the first real neighborhood where we actually talk to our neighbors,” Ivanyi says. “We walk the dogs, we have potlucks and concerts.”

There are plenty of listings on the market right now—Sarasota’s inventory has grown and continues to do so—but homes like this, with a story in its bones, are ever more rare. In Lido Shores—where the Gulf sparkles just beyond the palms and the architecture still speaks in glass, wood and light—that kind of resonance isn’t easily replicated.

Interested? Call Joel Schemmel of Premier Sotheby's at (941) 587-4894.