In California, the relaxed and informal luxury of a beach house

This vacation home sits placidly on the California coast of the Pacific Ocean, but seems to be echoing references from the opposite coast of the United States: the relaxed yet refined atmosphere of Horace Gifford's modernist architecture in The Pines, Fire Island, stripped-down and essential, then increasingly sophisticated, amid minimal geometries, local materials, and hybridization of indoor and outdoor, which served as a backdrop to a carefree seaside life of partying and lounging. The context is totally different, but with a similar versatile and enthusiastic spirit welcoming the soul of the place, Feldman architecture realized this project in Santa Cruz, interpreting the desire for freedom and escapism of surf-loving clients who demanded an informal but cozy dwelling, sustainable and harmonized with the landscape and the neighborhood, with a simple and “unpretentious” character.

The complex is located on a long, narrow plot and integrates three buildings: the main building on two levels, facing the beach, with the communal areas and a guest room on the ground floor and, on the first floor, a master suite with terrace, an additional bedroom and a study room; two service buildings at the rear, one housing the garage and the other the surfboard storage room.
The buildings are connected by a central patio where, with no interruption between indoors and outdoors, domestic and convivial life expands; on the west front towards the sea, the terrace with hot tub hedonistically amplifies the experience of Californian sunsets.

A homage to the rough, natural materiality of the context connotes the composition. On the outside, the building is entirely clad in rough Monterey cypress wood slats, locally sourced and resistant to the harsh coastal climate, as the result of a carefully handcrafted and waste-reducing manufacturing process. In the interior, shells of the same material dialogue with the essential furnishings and earthy colours of the fabrics and upholstery, enhancing the pleasantness of relaxed luxury by the sea.