1989-1990 Western Home Awards - includes 20 winners in this year's biennial program

Sunset, Oct, 1989

Materials are simple: board and batten, vertical-grain fir and gypsum board, with fir flooring. The decking is pale sky blue.

AWARD OF MERIT / Dean A. Nota Architect, Hermosa Beach, California, for Peggy Marsh Taking advantage of a prized locationtwo blocks from the beach-meant overcoming some mighty design problems posed by the tiny, steep, triangular lot. The architect's complex solution pushes the definition of what a combination house and studio can be.

Oriented to the acute angles of the surrounding streets, the outer walls set up an interplay of planes that repeats throughout the multilevel plan. This angular geometry becomes the ordering element for the interior spaces.

The innermost space was left as a void, in the form of a skylight and stairway well. The leading edge of the triangular well parallels the front street, and the trailing edge runs perpendicular to the side street; they spread to meet the glass blockwalled stairwell.

Combined, the stairwell and skylight bring light deep into the 2,100-squarefoot house-from top-story bedroom to kitchen-dining level to studio-living space.

The house is complex in plan and form, but the consistency of patterns pulls it into a pleasing sculptural composition. The materials used-many of them more familiar to industrial than residential construction-reinforce the bold lines.

The main material, 'concrete block, plays off tones of the nearby beach. Note how the grid of the concrete block repeats in that of the glass block, and how steel screens and railings are used both inside and outside. The different materials break up the overall mass of the house.

White walls provide a background for the crisp detailing. Subtle warm tones are provided by the natural oak floor, vertical-grain Douglas fir doors, and yellow railing up tbe stairwell.

SPECIAL AWARD FOR RESTORATION / Charles Robert Schiffner, Phoenix, for Christian Peterson Built in 1951 for Raymond Carlson, the editor of Arizona Highways magazine, this little jewel of a house was designed by his friend Frank Lloyd Wright. By 1986, it had undergone years of questionable remodeling, and time and tenants had taken their toll. As with any good restoration, the architect who salvaged it warrants credit as much for what he didn't do as for what he did.

Before approaching the restoration, he did careful research on how the house had originally looked. He then did his best to recapture the original spirit, while incorporating needed add-ons and updating mechanical, electric, and plumbing connections as necessary.

The original 1,088-square-foot house used an innovative and inexpensive framework of notched and doweled 4-by-4s assembled in rectangular modules measuring 2 or 4 feet on a side. Walls were then filled with cement-board panels or windows. Over the years, gravity's pull had caused tbe 4-foot-wide eaves to droop at tbe corners, so they had to be lifted and strapped diagonally across the roof.

Exterior paint colors were restored to Wright's original specification. Inside, all the fir woodwork was stripped and refinished. Electric and plumbing installations were replaced, and roof insulation was added. The architect contributed a final touch by incorporating Wright-influenced tables, chairs, lamps, and hassocks of his own design.