OUT & ABOUT - SUMMER 2023
CONNECTING SPACES — WHERE ARCHITECTURE MEETS THE OUTDOORS
Summer is a busy time for us, both in and out of the office. We bubble with excitement over the long days, eagerly awaited vacations and inspired designs that reflect our ideas about indoor/outdoor living. We were thrilled with the coverage of our recently completed Orinda project in Diablo Magazine. This project embodies our approach that integrates architecture, interiors and landscape to create spaces that inspire everyday life.
DANISH ROOTS, MODERN VISION
Our main goal was to connect the home to its surrounding natural landscape by activating unused portions of the sloping site through the placement of living spaces. We opened the house up to the outdoors in numerous areas on all levels. We designed spaces that are imbued with natural light and reflect the changing of seasons and the patina of time. We leveraged material expression and small artistic details for meaningful impact, and we developed a strategy that respects the site and emphasizes sustainable building materials.
We also found inspiration in the city of Copenhagen, which received official recognition as the UNESCO-UIA World Capital of Architecture for 2023 and has long been a special city to all of us. Our early story started in 1992-1993 at DIS, where the three of us spent time studying Architecture and Design at the non-profit study abroad foundation centered in Copenhagen. Living in Copenhagen meant interacting with thoughtful, elegant creativity at every turn and a recent visit has us reminiscing how studying Danish design early in our educations has had a lasting impact on our work and our multi-disciplinary approach to projects.
While in Copenhagen we immersed ourselves in the tenets of Danish design by studying first-hand the works of Architects, such as Jorn Utzon and Arne Jacobsen, whose holistic design strategies were incorporated into every aspect of their projects from the urban landscape to the building to the fixtures and furniture within. Furniture designers Kaare Klint, Finn Juhl, Vernor Panton and Hans Wenger taught us the value of modern technologies, unexpected materials and forms inspired by nature and the human body. The work of lighting masters Poul Henningsen and Louis Poulsen instilled in us the idea that exceptional design never goes out of style and that the most beautiful, original forms can be the result of functional considerations.
The urban spaces in Copenhagen are rich yet relaxed. The ways in which Architecture and design are woven into the city’s urban fabric and into Danish culture create small moments that enrich daily life. The Danish Architecture Center describes these urban spaces as “well-designed outdoor living rooms, often serving as the glue that holds a neighborhood together,” and it is the quiet comfort of this glue that we strive for in all of our projects.
BOOK SHELFA new book on our shelf. We are absolute fans of world-renowned Landscape Architect Piet Oudolf, whose new monograph titled “At Work” showcases his spatially vast yet intimately detailed landscapes (highlighted below). Seasonality and the dynamics of passing time are ideas that are also important to our design approach, and we are continually inspired by Oudolf’s projects and process. Copies of the book are hard to come by but can be pre ordered at Phaidon.
Dutch garden designer Piet Oudolf