The Montessori Elementary School sits in the small triangular remainder of a site prone to flooding and houses classrooms, a conference room, and a new commercial kitchen.
This is a modest, sustainable building with a big presence in a big landscape.
The Hill House sits on a long, narrow, rocky ridge line, sloping gently to the south and steeply to the east and west. Site conditions dictated a long, narrow structure, and client expectations suggested a building deeply rooted in the landscape. The resulting project is conceived as a habitable landscape, a place to gather, shelter and rest, closely aligned with the rugged beauty of the site and responsive to the natural conditions.
This project consists of a single-story addition and renovation to an existing mid-century ranch house in Menlo Park, California.
Conceived for a retired couple, the open and accessible design integrates the living space with the rear garden to create a well-lit domestic extension. Comprised of two floating volumes, the addition formally designates the bedroom to the west and the main (common) space to the east. The two wings gradually diverge from the original structure to generate a glass-clad fissure in between. This void space pulls the garden inwards, injecting elements of the outdoors into the core of the house.
The Ranch Operations buildings presented an opportunity to explore the juxtaposition of simple utilitarian structures against the Hill Country landscape. Designed with a common 16’ module, the structural layout for the three buildings is identical, leaving manipulation of the skin system as the primary vehicle for meeting the programmatic needs for the project. These needs include office space and a shop, maintenance vehicle storage as well as general storage.
Woodland is a small residential community nestled among a grove of large trees in a neighborhood that is just minutes outside of downtown Austin, Texas. The development started with a simple program of four houses, but quickly became complex through the site’s general conditions and restrictions. Unusual property lines, a steep bluff, and an abundance of old-growth trees squeezed the buildable area for the project. This, in turn, presented privacy and view concerns given the close proximity of each house to the surrounding trees, as well as one other. Along with these issues, permitting violations from a previous owner had to be overcome.
Formerly a parking lot on the southeast corner of Fulton and Gough streets, the Drs. Julian + Raye Richardson Affordable Apartments has risen on one of the sites freed for development by the demolition of the collapsed Central Freeway. This five-story building will provide permanent supportive housing for a very-low-income, formerly homeless population.
In the little-known neighborhood of Hermon, located just outside of downtown Los Angeles, a dilapidated 1920’s bungalow has undergone a major remodel, bringing new life to the old structure. The new addition to the front of the house forms a unique alliance with the remodeled existing house. This new frontispiece appears to be intimately nested within the older existing house, while maintaining a stark differentiation. The frontispiece has been clad in a clear cedar which contrasts the torched cedar that wraps the rest of the structure. The front addition integrates the house with the adjacent streetscape as it terraces down to the sidewalk and forms a long bench.
On a steep, narrow, vacant lot in Richmond Heights we built a modern home. The process wasn’t easy, including months of back-and-forth discussion with the municipality, losing the original contractor that introduced us to the project, and editing $100k out of the budget. In the end, we created one of The City’s only modern, energy efficient, affordable, new homes and one that still meets most of the clients’ wishlist as well as their budget.
With design accents from Banker Wire, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company recently opened its much anticipated Mills River Taproom and Restaurant in Mills River, North Carolina. The taproom features 23 beer taps and a chef-inspired menu with beautiful interior elements parallel in appeal.
Wild Walk is an interactive nature walk at the Wild Center, a non-profit organization and nature center committed to helping people explore and learn about the natural environment of the Adirondacks. Built in the forest, Wild Walk is designed as an elevated trail of bridges that creates a learning landscape; bringing visitors up into the treetops to offer a new perspective of the forest. The project consists of a series of platforms connected by bridges that start at grade level and gradually bring people 40 ft. above grade to look out over the surrounding woodlands. The platforms are supported by Corten steel posts designed to be an abstraction of the surrounding white pine trees. Wild Walk is almost fully accessible, family oriented and includes a four-story twig tree house, swinging bridges, a spider’s web for shared play hovering 24 ft. off the ground and many opportunities to sit, observe and learn about the forest below. The walk culminates in a life-sized bald eagle’s nest at the highest point that visitors can inhabit.
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