Residential architect '04 Design Awards

Residential Architect, May, 2004 by Meghan Drueding, Cheryl Weber, Nigel F. Maynard, Shelley D. Hutchins

principal in charge-project architect: James Estes, Estes/Twombly Architects; general contractor: McLaughlin Housewrights, East Greenwich, R.I.; project size: 1,990 square feet; site size: 0.5 acre; construction cost: Withheld; photographer: Warren Jagger Photography. See page 128 for product information.

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custom / more than 3,500 square feet grand

misha/twaddell residence, san jose, calif.

burks toma architects

berkeley, calif.

because one of the clients for this California project uses a wheelchair, the architects designed it with accessibility in mind. But they were careful not to make it feel institutional, an achievement the judges admired. "The accessible design doesn't overtake the aesthetic," said one judge. It is simply a beautiful house, said another.

The house--collaboration between Burks Toma Architects and Min/Day--sits on a hill overlooking San Jose's undulating landscape. Its shape, a long bar with three volumes all on one level, takes advantage of the site and answers the clients' need for light and undemanding circulation. The volumes also create courtyards, protected from the winds and the strong Western sun. "We kept the house open and easy for the client to move around," says Jeff L. Day. Instead of walls, they used cabinetry on legs to delineate space while permitting the flow of natural light. In the kitchen, a stainless steel countertop with no base cabinets accommodates a wheelchair and allows ceiling-to-floor windows.

Although an accessible project, the house has only one ramp on the property, used for access to the backyard, Day says. It's not conspicuous, however, thanks to careful grading and landscaping. According to one judge, "The ramp is a really nice way to engage the landscape."--n.f.m.

principal in charge: Marc Toma, Burks Toma Architects, Berkeley, Calif., in collaboration with Min/Day, San Francisco; project architect: Lisa Trujillo, Burks Toma Architects; general contractor: Tim McDonald, Praxis, St. Helena, Calif.; landscape architect: Eric & Silvina Blasen, Blasen Landscape Architecture, Sausolito, Calif.; interior designer: Marie Fisher, Marie Fisher Interior Design, San Francisco; project size: 4,000 square feet; site size: 5.0 acres; construction cost: $250 per square foot; photographer: Cesar Rubio. See page 128 for product information.

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renovation

grand

mankins-camp residence, san francisco

herbert lewis kruse blunck architecture

des moines, iowa

architect Paul Mankins relished having carte blanche to renovate his twin brother's newly purchased home. The house enjoys a spectacular hilltop vista of San Francisco's skyline, but four decades of unfortunate remodels made it difficult to get past the bad taste to the great view. Hidden by haphazard changes were remnants of an original design by noted Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice Aaron Greene. Mankins says, "A lot of the solution was mainly getting rid of the bad stuff to get back to a more stylistic version of Greene's underlying order of strict 4-foot grids."