FRAME OF MIND

A HOUSE IN ROSS SHOWCASES JAPANINSPIRED MODERNISM.

BY ZAHID SARDAR PHOTOGRAPHS BY MATTHEW MILLMAN

Zinc-clad boxes are contrasted with a glowing clear glass stairwell that links three floors in this house designed y Ehrlich Yanai Rhee Chaney Architects. The courtyard has stylized landscaping by Surfacedesign Inc. that complements a view of Mount Tam.

FRAME OF MIND

PERHAPS THE GREATEST HURDLE of building on a hilltop where the towns of Ross and Kentfield share a territorial border was that a woodsy midcentury summer home by noted architect William Wurster already stood there.

Its historic value was hotly debated, but because of clumsy additions and other changes made to it over the years, both cities eventually allowed a new house by the Los Angeles and San Francisco firm Ehrlich Yanai Rhee Chaney Architects to take its place.

Completed about a year ago, the 7,500-square-foot home, designed collaboratively by principal architects Steven Ehrlich and Takashi Yanai, has nearly the same-size footprint as its predecessor. Nestled amid an acre and a half of redwoods and sun-loving live oak forests that thrive in that ecotone, the new house also takes full advantage of a wide panorama, crowned by the county’s emblematic peak, Mount Tamalpais.

Composed of four rectilinear volumes laid in a roughly reverse Z-shaped plan and stacked on three flors, the house has discrete public and private open-plan areas that flw easily from one into the other to accommodate the owner, an audiovisual systems specialist who often works from home.

PHOTO CREDIT

From the polished concrete foyer, wood steps lead down into the sunken living room. Floorboards are lined up with decking outside. An infinity pool and viws of the bay are in the background.

Facing the wood front door is a wall of light that illuminates the foyer, where a polished concrete floor flows toward the open-plan kitchen/dining area. A striking Madagascar ebony–wood dining counter, flaned by high chairs, abuts a kitchen island topped with basalt. The sink backsplash is made of glass.

When this room’s glass doors are pushed open, the dining counter feels just like a picnic table.

Inside the wood-lined master closet. Opposite, top to bottom: The cantilevered master bedroom has views on three sides; a view of the living area from outside; the master bathroom looks onto

62 WINTER/SPRING 2019 a rooftop gravel deck. SPACES

The owner can also toast the summer fog that quietly floats past Mount Tamalpais and edges the valley below.

Thebuilding’s rigorous right-angled geometry allows him “a variety of indoor-outdoor experiences,” says Yanai, who admired such layouts when he was an architecture magazine editor in his native Japan.

Because of its floor plan, nearly all the rooms have access to stone-covered courtyards and wood decks interspersed with Zen-like gardens planted by the San Francisco landscape architecture firm Surfacedesign.

To establish other subliminal links to nature, the building exterior features German-made terra-cotta panels that match the color of redwood bark and all-weather Rheinzink roof fasciae. And large slim-line aluminum-and-glass doors and windows by Vitrocsa literally reflectthe surrounding woods.

A dramatic glass-walled stairwell, visible from the entry court, links the building’s top floor to the ground floor and a state-of-the-art screening room in the basement. Figures walking up or down the stairs animate the sculptural tower, which illustrates a Japanese concept called ma. Loosely translated, “ma is a desirable empty space, a gap or an interval between forms, sounds or emotions,” Yanai says.

On the ground floo, even though the nine-foot-high solid wood and blackened steel front door seems impenetrable, rooms inside seem to have only invisible boundaries, suggested largely by the materials that cover floors or walls.

For instance, the kitchen/dining area’s polished concrete floors abut black American walnut wood floors in the adjacent sunken living room, and its boards in turn line up perfectly with a teak deck just outside sliding glass doors.

Theowner’s casual lifestyle obviated a formal dining room, so the custom kitchen by New York–based Minimal has an easy-to-clean back-painted glass backsplash, dark wenge wood cabinets, and a wood dining counter that springs off the Corian kitchen island. Its bar stools are comfortable enough for dinner parties — at the chef’s table, as it were — as well as for the owner to sometimes do his work there, facing the south lawn and mountain views.

“When this room’s glass doors are pushed open, the dining counter feels just like a picnic table,” the owner says.

A square infinity-edge plunge pool in the middle of the courtyard mirrors the sky.

On the top floo, above the living area, the cantilevered master suite has wall-size windows on three sides, facing views. Opposing doors on the east and west walls open onto teak terraces. In sync with Northern California’s preference for natural building materials, a large walk-in closet and dressing area at the north end of the room are wood lined, and the master bathroom looks onto a gravel-covered roof deck.

A separate one-story pavilion on the northeast side of the main building contains a home officegym and sauna. Its fla roof cantilevers westward to meet the main house at a right angle, forming a breezeway between the conjoined buildings. The L-shaped wing also shelters a dark basalt-and-concrete tile courtyard with unhampered views of the San Francisco Bay and the East Bay hills. Thecourtyard abuts the living room deck as well as a highly reflective black tile swimming pool perched on the east slope. A square infiity-edge plunge

Opposite, a stone courtyard is studded with a raised infinity spa and edged with an infinity pool tht reflects the sky as well as Mount Tam. A fie pit next to the water is both evocative and effective on a foggy day. This page: A view of the breezeway that separates the main house from the owner’s office on the left.

The rear courtyard is surrounded by glass walls and filled with pools tht all reflect the surounding redwoods and oak-covered hills. Opposite: A view of the owner’s blackened garage. The back door opens to the courtyard.

pool in the middle of the courtyard also mirrors the sky. In this stylized Japan-inspired setting that “borrows” elements of the landscape, a long rectangular gas fie pit next to the larger pool adds a ceremonial finishing touch.

Part retreat and part home officethe house is also a showcase for the owner’s growing collection of modern furnishings, art photography and cars. Thethree-car garage, painted black inside, is like a theater that can be viewed through a large “proscenium” window cut into the wall of a corridor that separates the garage from guest rooms.

“Even my Mini Cooper looks like a million dollars in that garage,” the owner says with a chuckle.

Despite such deliberately jazzy features, the house does settle into its wooded site comfortably, thanks to its material and color palettes. Several corridors within the structure offe long telescopic views through windows placed strategically at the ends, and from his vantage point high above the center of Ross, the owner can also toast the summer fog that quietly floats past Mount Tamalpais and edges the valley below.

“This landscape is very powerful and calming at the same time,” Yanai says. “We have just tried to honor it and frame the view.” n