Tree House

Project Details

Project Description

This single-family residence is situated in a dense suburban context in northern California. The temperate climate of this location presented an inherent dilemma: balancing privacy with the desire to spend time in the site's outdoors spaces. In addition to the inherent characteristics of the site, the owner brought specific criteria to the design process that would ultimately inform its outcome. As a family with two children, one of which has hearing sensitivities, they desired a house that was very open and loft like, but that offered enclaved spaces that provide privacy and acoustic refuge. This combined with an overarching desire to engage the landscape led to a design that treats indoor and outdoor rooms as interchangeable. Anchored by monumental coastal live oaks and majestic redwoods, this sustainably-designed home offers expansive living spaces that extend into the landscape. The existing trees inform a spatial arrangement of framed views, outdoor rooms, and screening for privacy. A series of interlocking vertical and horizontal volumes help to obscure the demarcation of inside and outside. Concrete floors, wood ceilings, and reflection from glass participate in a virtual fusion between the homes interior and its landscape. A zinc metal canopy mediates the homes relationship to its surroundings and serves to edit unwanted views of neighboring properties and afford mutual privacy. The zinc skin frames a stand of redwoods at the entry, provides privacy for sleeping spaces on the second floor while engaging adjacent tree canopies, and lifts at the ground floor to allow interior space to spill into the landscape. This spatial arrangement enables passive ventilation and stack effect. The home's concrete plinth, steel and glass armature, and zinc skin respond to the site's high water table, allowing both interior and exterior ground floor spaces to float in the landscape and resonate with its natural splendor.