Kara Van Dyke breathed new life into an A-frame built 30 years ago by her grandfather. The family home now features rustic modern decor inspired by Kara’s Scandinavian roots.
In summer, trees help to filter out some of the heat during the warmer days.
The great room is anchored by a 25-foot-high granite, wood-burning fireplace with a reclaimed timber mantle located beneath Alumicor skylights.
The couple wanted the cabin to mesh with its beautiful natural surroundings. "To us this meant small," says Kenny. "We wanted the design to put you right into the landscape, and by making it small we feel drawled by the night sky and mountains that surround us."
"I wanted our home to have as many windows as possible," Jorie says. "I love how the plywood ceilings turned out looking so clean and natural."
The home’s geometric silhouette echoes the classic typology of the region’s gable roof barns. “We took our inspiration from this vernacular architecture and re-interpreted it with a contemporary twist,” Dworkind says.
The weeHouse exteriors are clad in corrugated Cor-Ten, but with a custom pattern of folds to create an organic randomness. The foundations were designed with a shallow recess around the top to make the modules look like they’re hovering. After they bought the property in early 2014, the Siegels camped there for two summers while they saved up money and planned a permanent structure. In his research, BJ came across this design, a customizable prefab house by Alchemy Architects. "Of all the things that I found, I was drawn to that one because it was absolutely the simplest and cleanest," he says.
The Woodman's Tree House stands interwoven into the landscape in Dorset as part of a larger luxury camping site.
The Wedge is among the new cabin designs that will eventually be integrated into California State Parks.
When the Ferguson Sauder family—parents Meg, a school counselor, and Tim, a design instructor, plus kids Cole, Olive, and Asher—wanted a multifunctional backyard addition, they decided to build it themselves. Two Liftoff chairs by Tim Miller, one of Tim’s former students, surround an oil-drum fire pit set in granite dug up on the property. On the deck, the Panamericana chair is by Industry of All Nations.
"We did our best to tuck the buildings into the site—the goal was to get up high on a perch. It was a matter of setting that elevation and working back down with the topography," says architectural designer Riley Pratt.