For an addition project in a second home in Nashville, Tenn., the owners, a Minnesota couple, decided to include a dog nook. The empty nester couple dote on their small dog, a shih-tzu named Berkeley, telling Nashville architect Ridley Wills, of The Wills Co.  that their pet likes to curl up and watch what’s going on outside through windows and glass doors. The designer included this nook in the entryway/mud room, which has abundant windows, as well as a glass door.

For the next owner, the nook could be fitted with doors or drawers to create storage, or it could remain a dog nook, with one caveat: “This wouldn’t work for a lab,” Wills says. “The next dog needs to be a small dog.”

—Kathy Price-Robinson, a remodeling writer and videographer, maintains Kathy’s Remodeling Blog.