Project Description
Builder’s Choice and Custom Home Awards Finalist
The Ziering Residence is located in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, overlooking the Pacific Ocean with the backdrop of the Santa Monica Mountains. Strict viewshed restrictions for maintaining views for neighboring residences resulted in a low slung profile that never exceeds more than fifteen feet. The front façade follows the arc of the street and is further accentuated by a gently rising roofline that anchors the house to the specificity of its site. The street façade clad in 1×2 Ipe wood rain screen offers a quiet, unobtrusive face to the neighborhood with strategic slot windows that give glimpses of what lies beyond. The front door and pivoting wall panels transform this façade when opened, presenting views of the interior, the courtyard and the ocean beyond. What appeared as a closed world opens to reveal a picture of contemporary southern Californian domesticity. The courtyard side of the house is an exercise in transparency. Sliding glass panels open up the entire house to the outdoors. A deep overhang offers an interstitial covered area for al-fresco living. An open floor plan with the living, dining, parlor and kitchen laid out along a curve with the master suite turning the corner creates a sense of intimacy within the relatively generous accommodations. Finally, the lower level has the family room and kid’s bedrooms- present a contrasting world of calm and solitude with a sunken courtyard extending the private domain to the exterior.