At 17,000 square feet, it’s NC’s ‘largest’ Modernist home (waterfall included)
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- Holton House covers 17,000 sq ft on 100 wooded acres, touted as state’s largest
- Residence features waterfall, koi pond, pool, floor-to-ceiling glass and terrace
- Owners built home with architect; estimated value exceeds $8.5M and serves family
Nestled on 110 forested acres is a new 17,000-square-foot Modernist mansion in North Raleigh.
Known as the “Holton House” at 1756 Holton Forest Trail, it’s larger than many museums, galleries or boutique hotels. Sculpted from stucco, stone, steel and glass, it features seven bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a waterfall and koi pond, floor-to-ceiling glass walls, a pool and dining terrace.
A separate 3,000-square-foot, detached garage comes with an apartment.
“As far as we know, this is the largest, newest, Modernist house in North Carolina,” said George Smart, founder and executive director of NCModernist/USModernist.
For the last three years, its owners, Raleigh businessman Brad Holton and his wife, Ekaterina, collaborated with Chicago-born architect Joe Trojanowski to design and build the property.
It’s estimated to be worth upward of $8.5 million, not including the land. The family moved in last month.
“My wife did most of the heavy lifting. Probably 80% of the final product was her original drafting,” said Holton, 52, founder of Raleigh-based cybersecurity IT firm Proton Technologies. (He sold the company to Reynolds and Reynolds for an undisclosed sum in 2022 but continues to head it.)
The couple hadn’t intended to build such a massive home, Holton said, but plans changed.
“We started off at 13,000 square feet,” he said. “Then we kept adding space, based on how we had to dig the foundation.”
They have no regrets.
“We’ve got three kids, so we built this as a family retreat,” Holton said. “This is our staycation. We don’t have to go anywhere. It’s a place for the kids to get out, enjoy nature and get away from their tablets.”
As a favor to the architect, the owners have granted one-night-only access for NCModernist’s 18th anniversary Moon Over Modernism fundraiser on Friday, Oct. 11.
For $149 per ticket, guests will get a rare glimpse inside this private estate. Food and live music are included.
Proceeds from the fundraiser will go toward NCModernist’s mission of “documenting, preserving, and promoting” residential Modernist architecture across the state. The 20th-century design movement rejects ornamentation and historical styles in favor of clean lines, open spaces, function and simplicity, and the use of modern materials like steel, glass and concrete.
Smart is the son of the late architect George McCollum Smart. In 2007, he started as an “armchair” enthusiast, googling Modernist design.
Today, he runs NCModernist/USModernist, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving Modernist architecture with four full-time employees and one of the largest open digital archives of Modernist houses and architects. It includes a 5-million-page architecture magazine library and the long-running USModernist Radio podcast.
This story was originally published October 7, 2025 at 8:00 AM with the headline "At 17,000 square feet, it’s NC’s ‘largest’ Modernist home (waterfall included)."
