EYE ON DESIGN BY DAN GREGORY

Case Study House #3

December 11, 2009 · Leave a Comment

FOR SALE: Bay Region Modern Case Study House Plans

Our newest exclusive modern plan is historic: we now offer copies of Case Study House #3 designed by William Wurster and Theodore Bernardi. The avant-garde Los Angeles magazine Arts & Architecture and its editor John Entenza addressed the need for new housing after World War II by launching the Case Study House Program in 1945. The plans for CSH #3 were published in the June 1945 issue (cover shown below).

The program promoted low cost, experimental, contemporary home designs using donated materials from industry and manufacturers and showcased the work of mostly Southern California modernists like Charles and Ray Eames, Richard Neutra, Craig Ellwood, and Pierre Koenig. Wurster was the most famous Northern California architect to be included in the program. At the time, Wurster was Dean of Architecture at MIT while Bernardi ran the office in San Francisco.

Wurster’s work embodied the Bay Region Style in his use of simple understated forms, natural materials, strong indoor-outdoor connections, and straightforward construction methods. He once said: “I like to work on direct, honest solutions, avoiding exotic materials, using indigenous things so that there is no affectation and the best is obtained for the money.”

(Photo courtesy Environmental Design Archives.) He was what I would call a “Back Door Modernist” in that he made plainness and simplicity artful and current. One of his earliest houses, from 1928,

shows the emphasis on light, proportion, and natural textures (Roger Sturtevant photo above courtesy EDA). He was fond of using ordinary but modern materials like plywood and concrete block. He returned to California in the late 1940s and helped found the College of Environmental Design at U. C. Berkeley.

Case Study House #3 (originally called CSH #2, as shown on the drawing) is our Plan 470-9 and is an H-shaped design that celebrates nature with a tall covered outdoor room called “the porch” between the kitchen/dining/living area and the bedroom wing.

It’s basically a modern version of the “dogtrot” — two rooms separated by a breezeway — a classic early American vernacular plan. The carport is cranked away from the main rectangle to meet the driveway. A drawing by delineator Arne Kartwold (who worked in Wurster’s office for a few years) captures the expressive energy of the design

complete with a big-fender automobile idling by the front door. Kartwold’s rear perspective

shows how the central porch and master suite open to the backyard, combining indoor and outdoor space in a unified design. Another distinctive feature is the “work room” adjacent to the kitchen. It was conceived as a hobby room but could become a mudroom/laundry. The plans would need to be brought up to code and a few details updated — for example, the master bathroom is small by today’s standards (see our Customization Department!) — but the graceful flow between rooms, the elegant windows and doors,  and the generous use of sheltered outdoor space make this design compelling. The house was built in the Mandeville Canyon area of Los Angeles. Arts & Architecture covered the completed house in its March 1949 issue.

A percentage of the plan price supports the Environmental Design Archives at U. C. Berkeley, which preserves the drawings and papers of significant California architects and landscape architects. For more on the Case Study House program see the Arts & Architecture website above and Case Study Houses: 1945-1962 by Esther McCoy (Hennessey & Ingalls, 1977), and Case Study Houses: The Complete CSH Program by Elizabeth A. T. Smith (Taschen, 2009).  For more on Wurster see An Everyday Modernism: The Houses of William Wurster, edited by Marc Treib (SF Museum of Modern Art, 1995) and Bay Area Houses, edited by Sally Woodbridge (Gibbs Smith, 1988).

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How To Think Like A Designer

December 4, 2009 · 1 Comment

Opposites Attract — at IDEO and Beyond

Contradictions make us concentrate. Look at this image from Heyri, Korea, a new planned city outside Seoul.

Is it a leafy wall or a concrete tree, and how did they build it, anyway? The photo is one of many shot by folks at IDEO, global design consutants based in Palo Alto, California. (Find the image on their website under “Postcards.”) I think it begins to illustrate what IDEO calls “design thinking,” which is a way to derive new ideas from opposing extremes.

The firm’s Chris Waugh and others explained this approach at a fascinating all-day retreat for builders, developers, architects, designers and others that I attended recently. The gathering was sponsored by The Vine: A Conversation on the Nature of Community, which is an offshoot of the Pacific Coast Builders Conference. (Full disclosure: I’m on the advisory board of The Vine.) As Chris pointed out, design thinking is about being comfortable with ambiguity and, in fact, finding new potential in it. The discussion made me realize that design thinking isn’t new; it’s what the best architecture has always been about.

One of IDEO’s current projects is helping the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) rethink airport security checkpoints. (What a great idea — up to now these areas appear to have been made up on the fly — so to speak). IDEO looked beyond the detection of objects to the environment of the checkpoint, and they studied human behavior.

Their prototype design, called TSA Checkpoint Evolution, uses informational screens, “Prep Stops,” and soothing lighting as crowd-calming devices in order to make potential  “hostile threats” more visible. In other words IDEO looked beyond the narrow security function and concentrated on how to relieve the stress as a way to make the most serious potential stress stand out. They may also be creating an instant community out of a collection of strangers. So out of ambiguous and even contradictory circumstances and needs  — stress vs. relaxation — comes a possible solution for increased security.

The home is a similar interactive environment, only more intimate, and one hopes less in need of security checkpoints  — The White House notwithstanding. Each room or space has the potential for different kinds of behavior: from gathering to seclusion. A well designed home encompasses these potential contradictions. New Yorker architecture critic Paul Goldberger’s  insightful new book Why Architecture Matters – I highly recommend it — deftly illustrates this zoning principle in his description of architect Sir John Soane’s breakfast room in London: “with a round table set under a low dome that is not a real dome but a canopy, supported by narrow columns at four corners. Where the canopy meets the corners, Soane placed small round mirrors, so the occupants of the breakfast table can see one another without looking directly at each other.”

(Photo courtesy Livejournal.com) Paul continues: “Soane liked to create rooms within rooms and spaces that connect in unusual ways with other spaces, and in the breakfast room you can see that he is doing it not just as the early nineteenth-century’s version of razzle-dazzle but to provide a kind of psychic comfort. The dome is protecting but it is not quite enclosing, a reminder that while we may feel uncommunicative and vulnerable early in the morning, we need to move out of that stage into the world. The breakfast room functions as a kind of halfway house…it introduces us to the day…a room of great beauty and serenity, perfectly balanced between openness and enclosure, between public and private.”

So how does design thinking inform our house plans? Gregory La Vardera’s latest scheme, Plan 431-12, demonstrates. I asked Greg to explain what he did.

Compact at 1,800 square feet –  for three bedrooms and two-and-a-half baths — “there is no room for hallways or circulation space in the tight footprint,” says Greg.  “So for that reason we arrived at the unusual configuration of placing service spaces – bathrooms+laundry & coat closet –  on the stair landing levels of the house.”

Greg continues: “After wrestling with the floor plan it became apparent that any other location of the bathroom would require more hallway, or require the stair to be located elsewhere in the house. By using the stair itself as the “hallway” to reach the bathroom we gained back considerable space, enough to make the master bedroom suite quite generous for such a small house, as well as the open living area.”

“So the laundry area and bathroom serving bedrooms 2 & 3, and the powder and coat room on the main level are off-set from the floor they serve by 1/4-1/3 level. That uneven division itself may also seem a bit peculiar but it serves two purposes. It gives these functions bias towards the levels they serve – for instance the laundry + bathroom is much closer to the bedrooms than it is to the downstairs – it’s clearly part of the upstairs realm, there is no ambiguity about which floor it belongs to. This is because it’s just a couple of steps down from the bedrooms. On the living level the powder room has a similar but different relationship. Its definitely part of the first floor – you would never have the sense that the powder room is in the basement. Yet because it is a few steps down from the living areas it gives it a distance, both physical and experiential, that serves the design of the house well. You don’t want a powder room right on top of your living spaces. Yet with a small footprint house it is hard to avoid. The house in fact lives much larger than it is because the use of vertical as well as horizontal separation of these service spaces.”

Here an architect, like the designers at IDEO, willingly embraces — but is not bound by — the constraints of his problem.  IDEO’s CEO Tim Brown reminds us in his new book  Change By Design, that this is an approach most famously articulated by the great mid-century modern designer Charles Eames.

As you explore Houseplans.com you can practice design thinking as well by seeing how a particular plan is or is not able  to turn limitations into advantages.

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Holiday Gifts for the Home

November 25, 2009 · Leave a Comment

Start With a Bauhaus-designed Tree

Michael Cannell — our fearless correspondent in Manhattan, blogger for Fast Company, and former Home Editor for The New York Times — presents ten home-oriented gift suggestions for the holidays:

1. Believe it or not, fake Christmas trees are coming back into fashion as mid-century artifacts.

Kuno Prey, a Bauhaus professor, designed this 58-inch tree (it’s widest branches are 44 inches) to resemble a cluster of pipe cleaners. ($325)

2. Here’s a good way to replace ornaments dented or cracked in storage.

These felt holiday ornaments by Joshua Stone — snowflake, dove, tree, and snowman — are die cut from thick grey industrial wool. Each is threaded with orange yarn for hanging. ($20 for a set of four)

3. Kids will love this walking elephant because it trudges forward with a realistic rocking motion, making them feel like they’re on their own jungle safari.

Parents will love it because it’s made with non-toxic dye and chemical-free rubberwood. ($250)

4. These star-shaped lights can be hung from a light fixture, doorframe, or rafter to cast a dappled holiday glow.

Called Starlightz by Artecnica, they’re made from chlorine-free bleached paper and silk-screened and glued by hand. Light and cord included. ($35 each)

5. There’s no rule that you have to use those old-fashioned red-and-white stockings.

Give your mantel a more contemporary spin with wool felt stockings decorated with monkeys, mermaids and a surfing Santa from the New York textile company Hable Construction. ($76 to $135)

6. These super energy efficient L. E. D. (light emitting diode) mini lights — they use 80% less energy than conventional lights — will last up to 100,000 hours.

So no more replacing dimmed bulbs. Unlike earlier L.E.D. Christmas lights, which produced a bluish white, this version emits a pure white. ($14.95 for a string of 50 lights)

7. Here’s a modern variation on the cardboard take-out drink carrier: Brigade by Furni is a set of four porcelain cups, glazed on the interior and top lip.

They fit snugly into a walnut-veneer carrying tray so the quartet of mulled cider can be safely conveyed to the fireside. ($79)

8. The mid-century designers Charles and Ray Eames were fascinated by toys. They scattered their office with a menagerie of playful objects, and in 1969 they made a short documentary about a spinning top.

Their interest prompted the artists James Klein and David Reid, who collaborate under the name KleinReid, to design a limited-edition set of three solid walnut tops made by Herman Miller. (set of three for $199)

9. How great is this? Bertand Planes, an artist and designer, created a mashup of high and low technologies by turning an iron windup music box into a USB drive.

The handle acts as a mouse, allowing you to scroll up and down text, change window size, etc. (Limited edition of five, price available on request)

10. The holidays occur in waves: first comes the tsunami of catalogs. Then gifts. Finally, the obligatory thank you notes.

Make your gratitude stand out with these vintage-style cards from John Derian. ($1.50 apiece)

Thank you to you, also, Mike!

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Modern Cottage and Bungalow Plans

November 20, 2009 · Leave a Comment

In Pursuit of the Perfect Little House

I’m always looking for contemporary plans with a sense of history; that is, deft designs for modern living that also have warmth and character. Well, Eureka!  I’m very excited about the regionally-inspired designs by Peter Brachvogel and Stella Carosso for their Perfect Little House Company. These plans are the newest additions to our Exclusive Studio Collection. For example, Plan 479-6,  the Tower Studio,

is actually a 262 square -foot  “micro cottage” with a small kitchen/living/sleeping area and bathroom


over a compact one car garage. I think it’s an ideal home office/retreat. With its simple square shape, tapering shingled walls, pyramid roof, and band of windows at the top it recalls early 20th century forest fire lookouts across the rural West, from Tumac Mountain Lookout

near Washington’s Mt. Ranier (Bob Baldwin photo, above) to

California’s  Gardner Lookout on Mt. Tamalpais (courtesy California State Parks). What could be more fitting for a writer’s retreat than a lookout, anyway –  isn’t that right, Virginia Woolf?  I’ll take it!

Classic early 20th century cottages,  bungalows, and farmhouses — which were themselves usually built from stock plans — are important reference points for Peter and Stella. Their 780 square-foot Willow, Plan 479-9,

wraps a generous porch around a compact 1 bedroom 1.5 bath layout to make the house feel larger than it is. A starter home with architectural character — suitable for an infill lot in an older neighborhood or as a mountain or lakeside cabin — this plan

could easily be expanded at the stairway as the family grows and budgets allow. Upstairs,  windows on all four sides

flood the bedroom and bathroom with daylight. Now compare this modern design to the 1908 Wietzel House from Tukwila, WA, shown below,

(photo courtesy Nickel Bros. House Moving). The old bracketed eaves, L-shaped porch, and big gable (not necessarily the weedy front yard) are signature features of many old cottages and farmhouses.  Add a contemporary looking standing seam metal roof and crisp shingled corners and some color — not to mention a new open floor plan — and there you are: another Perfect Little House.  Or compare the Weitzel house to The Cove, Plan 479-2 –  shown below.

It’s even closer in appearance — as if the older house has simply been remodeled. In the  new plan

the garage is on an alley at the rear.

On a somewhat larger scale, the Perfect Little House Company’s 1,914 square-foot, 3 bedroom 2.5 bath Kingfisher, Plan 479-4

offers larger gathering spaces and cozy nooks for reading and relaxing,

and on the second floor each bedroom is designed as a large window bay

for views across the treetops. Note the free-flowing circulation pattern — you can walk through the bathroom to the closet and back through the master bedroom — which adds a sense of spaciousness.

The trellis, shed dormers, and simple gable (shown above in the rear elevation of Plan 474-4) echo features of early Craftsman style houses, like this example

in Gustav Stickley’s Craftsman magazine (courtesy Arts and Crafts Homes magazine).

Peter and Stella earned their architecture degrees from the University of Michigan and recently founded the Perfect Little House Company as an offshoot of their firm, BC & J Architects. Peter has extensive town planning experience with emphasis on project management and building technology, and teaches architecture at the University of Washington. Their Cottages on the Green at Roche Harbor,

shown here, create a strong sense of place: it’s a new community that feels as though it has always been there. Welcome to our neighborhood, Peter and Stella!


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Frames of Reference

November 13, 2009 · 3 Comments

Boxes and Barn Doors

I am always struck by how important frames are, visually and virtually, in helping us see. Take this very simple vignette by artist Spy Emerson that caught my eye recently at Flora Grubb, an exceptional garden design nursery in San Francisco.

spy-boxes-3

The wood box — no bottom, just sides — focuses the eye on the blue bottles and the small plants, creating a vivid still life. The rough wood and the way the plants extend beyond the frame reinforce the naturalness of the arrangement. So sometimes thinking inside the box is more important. Flora Grubb is a talented designer/entrepreneur whose sense of composition is especially strong. She is most famous for her dramatic vertical succulent gardens — framed in sturdy boxes like this one

succulent wall

on the patio of her plant gallery. Each of those tiny plants comprising the mosaic grows out of a small soil niche that’s set on a slight diagonal. The frame literally holds everything together while the strong outline contrasting with the busy field of green is visually compelling in its own right. The surprising vertical placement is the clincher, making us look again — and again.

All of this rumination is by way of considering how we design or reinvent the boxes we inhabit and call home. The shape and character of the frame — walls and windows, their depth, height, materiality, proportion, and placement — are the keys to good design. One frame that has always appealed to me is the barn door. I like it because it’s a space saver (no extra feet required for the door swing — I like pocket doors too for the same reason), and it makes the opening simple and dramatic

photo2 atherton hse by tgh

as in this marvelous house by Turnbull Griffin Haesloop Architects (photo courtesy the architects) where one outside wall opens through a series of elegant contemporary glass barn doors. Here the door becomes a feature in its own right and also disappears as one slides across the other.

photo4 atherton inside-outside

It’s a form of architectural magic.  Barn doors always seem to harbor an element of surprise when they’re used indoors, as in this more rustic example  by Johnston Architects of Seattle.

cabin-bedroom-l barn homes by mary

Here they open to reveal the bedroom, as if it’s on stage (photo courtesy Sunset Magazine). In many cases there are latent or obvious references

Carlson

to real barns with elements like exposed diagonal bracing and expressive hardware. The example above is by Hutker Architects of Falmouth and Vineyard Haven, Massachusetts (photo by Brian Vanden Brink). The rustic aspect can become a signature fetaure and is used to dramatic effect by Faulker Architects of Truckee, California

tahoe-house-barn-door-l tahoe idea house, sunset

and seems especially appropriate for a rugged ski country home (photo courtesy Sunset Magazine). There are almost as many examples of sliding barn doors as conventional swing types because almost any solid door can be hung on barn door hardware.

Hardware choices include spoked flat track

spoked flat track

(shown above), heftier barn-evocative type

flattrack02sm u shape

as in this U-shape example, and elaborate stainless steel systems

section3_img stainless steel track

as shown here. All three tracks are from Barndoor Hardware.com.

Though a very simple architectural element, the barn door — like the box frame — can become a defining feature.

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