1.13.23 | DIGS.NET 61
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optimal contemporary living, the original
2,746-square-foot residence featured what
SAW describes as "a segmented layout of
small rooms and a highly congested core."
To work around the home's "organizational
flaws," the firm enlarged the space to 3,457
square feet, unchaining it from its layout to
create an open-plan central living space in
dialogue with dramatic views.
"It's meant to be perceived as a building
that is both low and extremely high," says
Spiegel of the structure, which, in reference
to its mid-century roots, keeps a low-slung
horizontal profile from the street. Bringing
it into the modern era meant maintaining
"most of the structures on the two outermost
sides of the project, working with the exist-
ing outermost edges of the perimeter, while
tactically removing excess overhangs and
eave structures, and recladding the entire
exterior with rough-sawn cedar—a material
that is both traditional and contemporary,"
explains Spiegel of toggling between
past and present. "In the interior of the
remaining structures," he continues, "we
sand-blasted the existing exposed beam
structures to feature the old structure, but
stripped of paint and other concealing
surfaces, and celebrated both finished
and structural materials."
Central to the house is its idyllic alliance
between indoors and out that SAW sought
to exploit, starting with creating a clear
sightline from the entry to the rear deck
that not only links the home's communal
and private spaces, but also fosters a
sense of expansion as it moves toward the
valley-facing rear yard. "While the entire
home is an exercise in blurring distinctions
between interior and exterior, this reaches
its fullest expression at the rear," says SAW.
"The kitchen-dining zone spills without
interruption into living and family rooms
bordered by floor-to-ceiling windows and
glass doors that open to the suspended
upper deck, implying layered continuity."
The rear landscape is itself volumetric, with
a wide upper deck connected to stepped
lower decks and terraces staggered as
"landscape rooms" across the slope, with
steel and wood beams and columns help-
ing to frame the views as pictorial.
