When Deirdre Bohan welcomed me to South Mountain Company’s West Tisbury headquarters, she introduced me to a firm that has spent 50 years shaping homes and community institutions across Martha’s Vineyard. She took clear pleasure in showing the workshops: stacks of reclaimed wood labeled with their provenance, a blend of vintage and state-of-the-art tools, and worktables spread with samples for a project with Martha’s Vineyard Community Services. The first to step into the CEO role after founder John Abrams retired, Deirdre displayed both a command of multiple projects and a deep commitment to South Mountain’s holistic approach — where beauty, sustainability and craftsmanship converge.

Between her role at South Mountain and her husband Dave Diriwachter’s ownership of AutoEuropa in Vineyard Haven, life is full raising their son, Declan — now a freshman at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School — in their Oak Bluffs bungalow. Deirdre first put down Vineyard roots greeting customers at The Black Dog Tavern; she looks at that experience as part of the foundation of her Island community today. Just as importantly, she learned the value of having a great boss who made her feel valued — which she hopes is reflected in her own management style today.

Q. Tell me about your journey to the Island.

A. My parents bought a house in downtown Vineyard Haven. My mother had grown up in Rhode Island and wanted something similar for her kids. I went to seven different schools in three different countries and this was the one place I had community. And when I was eligible to vote, it’s the place I decided that I cared about most and had been more influenced by than any of the other places I’d ever lived.

Q. What is the memory of meeting John Abrams 30 years ago?

A. I had been spending winters in the Caribbean, and I was tired of having no money and needed a year-round job. I answered an ad in the paper and remember vividly being in our office next to Allen Farm, and in the interview, something I said made John laugh and it was like, “Oh, this just feels comfortable.”

Q. What does South Mountain do differently than other firms on the Island?

A. We are architects, construction, solar and interiors all integrated into one. You come to us for a house and we are with you until the towels are on the racks. The planning and design process is maybe a year and a half, and then it’s another year and half to build. It’s really a strong relationship sharing those three years. There’s no question as to who’s doing this or that. We’re responsible for everything. It’s wonderful to help people realize their dreams.

Q. Is caretaking and property management part of the model?

A. It’s not a big part, but we are thinking about expanding it. Right now we have 34 sets of keys to all our clients’ homes, and over the winter they will ask us to do repairs or rebuild something or replace a bathroom floor. So, it’s a lifelong relationship — for all of us and for the client — built on trust.

Q. What do you think accounts for South Mountain’s staying power, and how does its Island-grown quality contribute to the strength of your professional community?

A. Fifty years of evolution. Fundamentally, we employ people year-round with full healthcare for you and your family and with other kinds of benefits. That’s guaranteed stability with competitive wages that brings you in and keeps you here. And once you’re here, you kind of really like the people you work with, people you can sit down with and have lunch with every day — which we do together.

Q. I got a sense of that familial feel with the kitchen table at the entrance to the office. Today it had a pie on it.

A. Well, the birthday cakes (what we do!) … everyone gets to choose their flavor, baked by Amy Miller, and today it’s a pie. But seriously it’s the ownership that is the real factor. After five years you’re eligible to buy in as an owner of the company and you get one share. The board is now made up of 20 people, just the South Mountain owners.

Q. Tell me about this leadership transition. You moved from bookkeeper to COO to CEO through 30 years. Did the company give you the sense that this top job was your path?

A. With a degree in computer science, I came here to digitize all the finances. And when I finished, I went to John and said, “I think we need an interiors department to include all the furniture and finishes and everything for the house – coordinated with the architect from the very beginning – to look like it was conceived all together.” That was the vision, and to start I took a night class at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) for a couple of sessions. And since I already had the job, I didn’t need the certificate. So, with people to help me, I started doing interiors and eventually became COO in 2007.

Q. That’s a very encouraging business culture! Does that same opportunity and flexible spirit play out today even with a hybrid workplace?

A. There’s lots of flexibility and lots of, “That’s a good idea. Let’s try that, let’s examine that as a group and see if we can take it to the next level.” You’re welcome to come up and say whatever you want. It really is that kitchen-table culture. Most of us bring our lunch and eat it here at the table in the winter and outside in the summer. And everyone contributes. Some people have found that they could get more concentrated, focused work done at home, and they’re happy to come here to collaborate with those close connections. And we are respectful of the people in the field. Yet there would be no home here if there was nobody here.

Q. What are some of your high-profile projects that we might see around the Island right now?

A. Our core business is residential architecture and construction, and you don’t always see those — a house on Stonewall we just finished, or the fifth house we’ve built for a family on a 70-acre piece of land on North Road. With our fiftieth year and this leadership transition, we’re reintroducing ourselves and our beautiful residential projects. People know us for [Martha’s Vineyard] Community Services, Chilmark Preschool, Island Grown Initiative, and Camp Jabberwocky, but really we do exceptional residential work alongside institutional projects.

Q. Why do you think the institutions come to South Mountain?

A. Because we’ll do the whole thing, and we also have the advantage of a crew embedded in the community. Everybody lives here, kids go to school together, everyone has health insurance. It’s a healthy environment — there’s no yelling on the job — and that matters.

Q. Is there a quintessential South Mountain look?

A. There isn’t, though there used to be. As part of our reintroduction, you’ll see on our website projects as varied as a Camp Ground cottage, a one-story house in central West Tisbury and a 100-year-old home on East Chop. We can do what you want us to do. It’s really about your vision for being on the Vineyard.

Q. Sustainability has been central to South Mountain since the 1970s. How do you define that approach today?

A. In the last two years, we’ve developed a model to guide us and our clients called the seven senses: place, water, energy, materials, well-being, equity and experience. We call this framework: live fully, tread lightly.

Q. Your very own cool vintage kitchen in Oak Bluffs shows off your early design training — it even reminds me of Julia Child’s famous Cambridge kitchen.

A. I know! She had the pegboard, I have the rack. I bought my charming bungalow-style house when I was single, after reading an article about bungalow kitchens that said vintage appliances were the right scale for the style. People ask about my stove, “You cook on that?!” You get used to it — I cook and bake all our meals on it.

Q. Wearing your property service and renovation hat, what tip do you have for homeowners as we ease into the colder months?

A. Be prepared that whatever you’re asking for, it may be bigger than you think it is. It may be more complicated than you think!

Sissy Biggers is the Q&A columnist for The Vine and a regular contributor to Martha’s Vineyard Magazine.

Jeanna Shepard

Jeanna Shepard