Dream House | Healing Haven: Aiin Duncombe’s architectural Montego Bay sanctuary

Oh my God! This dream haven, by any known measure of evaluation, is beyond the extraordinary! A house of healing, where the presence of the Holy Spirit, therapeutic architecture, and the unwavering, divine faith of its owner and what she brings to it, synthesises to engender a transformational experience for those under its roof.

The story has been publicly told about the titleholder Aiin Duncombe and her 88 year-old journey of life. So, the spotlight today is more on the architectural constitution of her home, and the consequential, starring role it has played in her accomplishments.

For context, she left the island in 1957, bound for the United Kingdom, eventually becoming a registered psychiatric nurse for those with mental health disorders. In retirement, Duncombe, never married, with no children, opened a home for the mentally challenged. During this time, the devoted Christian lady became seriously afflicted, facing difficulties with diabetes. She would seek urgent attention in America at a lifestyle (alternate medicine) health centre, reversing, she said, her acute illness. Back in England, because of the bitter cold, she retreated to Florida for some years, but her sister’s sickness compelled her to relocate to Jamaica to be near her. She needed to buy a house here.

In 2007, the lady was swept off her feet by this one with its individualised architecture on a one-acre plot, in the sought-after neighbourhood of Ironshore, Montego Bay. It was expanded and refurbished with the same exterior style.

The solar-powered residence now boasts nine bedrooms and 13 bathrooms; main and auxiliary granite counter kitchen; dining and an upstairs living room; wrap around garden-view balconies, and a downstairs patio to pool and blooming garden.

The exterior design, in white, is instantly recognisable with all those proud columns and beams extending from the upper section of its structure, transmitting strength and attraction to onlookers. The roof projection, with clerestory windows, floods the interior with much natural light, giving domination and distinction to the façade.

This is the intriguing part of her spiritual home: Duncombe’s life-altering programme and experience has been replicated right here, thanks to the Almighty, with her engaging in a wellness solution of prevention, treatment, management and reversal, for chronic lifestyle diseases. Guests arrive, some left for dead, others in dire need not being able to contribute monetarily, but never turned away. She makes no profit.

Barry Rattray is a dream house designer and builder. Email feedback to barryrattray1@hotmail.com and lifestyle@gleanerjm.com.