Our Story | Peconic View Cottages

Wedding photograph of the Rottino family, early 20th century

Peconic View Cottages began with Jean and Joe Rottino, both born in the early 1900s to Italian immigrant families who arrived in America with very little. Within a generation, they had built a life that would have been difficult to imagine from where either had started.

Jean was a woman ahead of her time — an entrepreneur and business owner who built a successful career in New York’s beauty world, styling the hair of the wealthy, glamorous, and well known. At a time when relatively few women owned businesses or earned substantial incomes of their own, Jean did both. Joe built a steady career in government service with the U.S. Postal Service. Together, their work gave them a measure of security through the Depression and war years and, ultimately, the means to create something of their own.

Three girls sitting on a large rock at the beach, vintage photograph

c. 1952

In the early 1950s, Jean and Joe bought a sandy stretch of waterfront far from the city, with a clear enterprising purpose: to develop an enclave of guest cottages. To many people around them, the idea seemed impractical. The East End felt remote, and there was no guarantee anyone would come. Jean and Joe believed otherwise. With help from brothers, cousins, friends, and coworkers, they began building the cottages themselves.

Two girls sitting on a smaller rock at the shoreline, vintage photograph

c. 1952

What they built became far more than a business. It became a gathering place, a summer tradition, and the setting for generations of memories among guests, friends, and family.

Some of the original guests at the base of the bluff by the old wooden stairs, vintage photograph

c. 1953

Since welcoming our first guests to the beach more than seven decades ago, Peconic View Cottages has offered countless ways to live and escape in the Hamptons — family vacations, college semesters, summer house shares, romantic getaways, quiet winters, and long-term living among them. The property has evolved with the times, just as the Hamptons have, but without losing the intimacy, character, and sense of place that made it special from the beginning. From those very first summers, warm hospitality and unforgettable stays became part of the fabric of Peconic View — a tradition carried forward by generations of guests, friends, and family.

A legacy, brought forward.

Jean and Joe’s greatest gift was not simply the cottages themselves, but a place worth preserving and sharing across generations. Nearly 75 years later, the things that first made Peconic View magical are still here — the water, the sunsets, the quiet, the fireflies, the shooting stars, and the rare pleasure of feeling removed from the noise of everyday life.

Today, Peconic View Cottages is evolving with intention. What has been cherished for generations is being carried forward with a nod to the past and a modern sensibility — preserving meaningful details, family history, and the spirit of the East End, while layering in refined materials, modern lines, and an elevated expression of coastal living.

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