Wall with a View
A simple gesture—attuned to nature—magnifies the beauty of the surrounding landscape.
Mendocino’s rugged landscape holds a strong allure, and from this ridge-top perch, unbound in all directions, the power of nature is both breathtaking and humbling. Building in such a place can be a contest of wills—humans against earth, wind, fire and scarce water—but with deference to nature, comes a poetic efficiency.
The house is a simple gesture on the land. A long exposed concrete wall slices across the site until it disappears into the hill. Responding to the site as a windshield and viewing aperture, the home’s concrete spine shapes its programmatic strategy by holding its working spaces—kitchen, bathrooms, laundry, closets, and utilities. Life unfolds in a linear series of rooms—some enclosed with glass, others open yet sheltered. Highlighting the wall as an autonomous element in the landscape, a long linear skylight separates it from the home’s roof, which floats over living areas and culminates in a dramatic cantilever.
Situated in a High Fire Severity Zone, the home’s redundant energy and water infrastructure are engineered for extreme resilience. Photovoltaics, thermal coils, a whole-home battery system and generator ensure power during an outage, while emergency sprinkler systems extending into the hill are supplied by a dedicated, fire-hardened well and water storage tank.
Backed up against a protective concrete spine, the living spaces of the home are enclosed minimally with a floating roof and all glass walls that capture sweeping vistas of hills stretching to the ocean. With its narrow compact and efficient footprint, the house is light on the land. Natural, minimal landscaping supports maintaining a defensible space and allowing local wildlife and plants to take center stage.
