A Glass Act
A craggy hill with heart-stopping water views
provides the perfect setting for a crystal palace
It’s the right address, but where’s the house? From
the street high in the Oakland hills, all that’s visible
is a short strip of grass-softened driveway, walls of clear glass,
and a panoramic view of San Francisco and the Bay. But wait.
There, to the left, seems to be a doorway. And beyond that door,
hidden behind a translucent wall, appears a stairway that cascades
down a steep slope, leading to the house itself.
As they step inside, most visitors gasp audibly at the dramatic
and startling effect of the spectacular view, framed by floor-to-ceiling
glass. But then, says one of the owners, “You can almost
hear them saying, ‘I could never live like this.’ ”
“Like this” means pure modernist architecture in
all its glory—minimalist, clean-lined, parsimonious in
color and limited in materials—and just what the owners
wanted when they moved from the sprawling suburban house where
they had raised their family.
When they decided to build on the hillside slope, the couple
chose Kanner Architects FAIA, a Santa Monica firm that
has excelled in rigorously modern design since its founding
in 1946. Although the company is often associated with the
quirky, ’60s-inspired
movement called pop architecture, architects Stephen Kanner and
Damian LeMons worked in a stricter and purer form for this Oakland
house.
“We’re identified with the funky shapes of pop architecture,
but for this project, we opted for something more purist and
minimalist,” says LeMons. “And she was the right
client. She didn’t want walls.”
Wherever possible, the design incorporates translucent
and transparent materials, to maximize both views and light.
In addition to the soaring window walls, the barriers on
the west-facing balconies are clear glass. Inside, the
dining room table, a rectangle of glowing gold-colored
resin, is at bar height, with chairs to fit so diners can
look straight out over the living room furniture toward
the setting sun. And all the lighting comes from ceiling
fixtures, eliminating the clutter of lamps.
Even with so much glass, the house feels remarkably private.
The side walls are curves of raked plaster 16 inches
thick, barring the view of neighboring houses. The property
slopes toward several acres of municipal land, so it’s unlikely that any new
structures will impinge on the view. Even downstairs, where the
master bedroom and bath form a single room, the freestanding
bathtub and open shower don’t feel exposed. Outside the
bedroom, a 36-foot infinity-edge lap pool runs parallel to the
windows, the glass wall providing a protected swimming area.
“This was a complicated custom house,” LeMons recalls. “The
curved walls are an engineering feat, because you can’t
just lay it on the ground. I talked to the contractor every day
and I came up here every two weeks.”
The owners also wanted the house to be welcoming. “It’s
a challenge to make all this steel and concrete appealing and
comfortable,” one of the home
owners admits, so she gave careful thought to
details, large and small, that would make the
house, if not exactly cozy, at least personal. “Stephen Kanner likes everything to be
rectilinear, but I wanted some curves,” she says.
One compromise was the round tabletop that hovers
above a corner of the square kitchen island; it was
specifically designed so the owners could face each
other while seated, as opposed to the usual side-by-side
arrangement of a kitchen bar.
The homeowner confesses that while she’s not crazy about
wood, she chose Lyptus, a reddish-toned farmed eucalyptus, and
mahogany for the stairs, because “the wood definitely adds
warmth.”
When it came to furnishing the new house,
her husband was adamant that, above all,
the furniture should be comfortable. “I
wanted all three kids to be able to sit around and talk with
us,” he says. So instead of the familiar icons of modern
design—furnishings that make an aesthetic statement but
don’t invite a leisurely sprawl with a book—they
opted for clean-lined but traditional pieces. In the living room,
facing the pale-green marble-framed fireplace, a U-shaped sectional
sofa covered in chenille was designed specifically to make conversation
easy.
Touches of pure fun and unexpected color
also lighten the mood. A brightly painted
table and chairs, bought several years ago
in Santa Fe, stand in a corner of the living
room. A guest powder room features a sink
and counter made of a single piece of flexible
plastic.
These playful elements are the perfect counterpoint to
the boldness of the inventive design. The happy
result is an effervescent tribute to modernism.
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