The summer house was designed by
William Rutherford Mead, brother of Mrs. (Elinor Mead) Howells, and a partner in the architectural firm of McKim, Mead & Bigelow. The following year
Stanford White joined the firm, and it was renamed
McKim, Mead & White. The house was originally roofed with red-stained wood shingles, hence the name "Redtop". The family discarded other naming ideas including "Sub-Hub," "Monte Rose," "The Parlor Car," and "The Spindles." The owner of the new house was, in fact,
Charles Fairchild (1838–1910), a Boston financier, who rented it to the Howellses. However, it was designed from the start for the Howellses' taste, with Mead's partner,
Charles Follen McKim becoming more and more involved. Construction began in 1877, and the Howellses moved in on July 8, 1878. By 1885, the Howellses had moved to Beacon Hill in Boston, in part due to family illness, including that of Elinor Howells. Howells experienced great literary success during his time at Redtop. By the end of the 1880s, he had published nine novels, a novella, several magazine articles, and a few plays. At Redtop, he worked in an elegant white-paneled study with a carved
inglenook for naps. Here, he completed
The Lady of The Aroostook (1879) and
The Undiscovered Country (1880) and began writing ''A Woman's Reason'' (1883). Several other American authors visited Redtop during the period when the Howells family lived there. To judge from published letters,
Mark Twain visited Redtop eight times. Other visitors included
Thomas Bailey Aldrich,
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
Henry James, and
Charles Dudley Warner. ==Location and design==