Builders and developers often talk about the crucial need to have a there there in order to pique buyer interest in a new project. Although The Kootenai is situated on 42 acres of virgin forest in Montana’s Flathead Valley, this secluded outpost has the place-making angle covered. Named for one of the three tribes of the Flathead Nation, its history is as rich as its trees are tall.
During its heyday a century ago, the property served as a retreat for copper magnates Lewis Orvis Evans and Cornelius Kelley of the Anaconda Copper Company, and played host to luminaries such as John D. Rockefeller, Will Rogers, Jane Wyatt, and Charles Lindbergh.
Today, ten of the site’s original cabins are being restored, and its 14,000 square foot lodge – a masterpiece of lodgepole pine construction that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places -- has been converted into a killer community center, complete with a card room, multimedia room, lounge, bar, full catering kitchen, and a walk-up ice cream window. Other community amenities include an interpretive center/museum featuring antiques and artifacts once owned by the “copper kings,” a fitness center, pool, croquet court, and a nature center offering mammal tracking and bird-watching tours.
With the addition of 32 new homes in the same rustic vernacular, developers Paul and Robert Milhous are creating a resort community unlike any other, and banking on the notion that there is still a second home market out there, and that buyers will emerge, provided the offerings are enticing enough. This project seems to have the goods. Interior designer Warren Sheets describes each home as a “living novel” with a personality all its own. Check out the property in pictures: