Project Description
Builder’s Choice and Custom Home Awards Finalist
A small beach house that required significant structural modifications was remodeled in an additive process resulting in what essentially became a new 3,500 SF residence. The design parti utilized a “wrapping motif” that dissolves the corners of the cubic volumes with window openings that capture panoramic views. Details like a stair of wood clad cantilevered steel, illuminated art niches and suspended display cabinets are tectonic examples of how this motif is carried from the exterior to the interior.
Varying degrees of privacy are achieved on this waterfront site by the use of articulating screens, covered terraces and an exterior room that is oriented to the sky. The result answers the client’s primary charge; to provide seclusion on this urban beachfront while enabling directed views to the islands of Puget Sound and the mountains of the Olympic Peninsula beyond.
The design success of this project can be measured in four ways: 1) It is cohesive despite an additive remodeling process, 2) It re-orients views from orthogonal rooms through corner wrapped fenestration, 3) It is privatized with inventive sliding screens, articulating gates and directed fenestration and 4) It is grounded in it’s waterfront context by the overall massing, the use of natural materials and tactile details.