An Indoor/Outdoor Renovation Revives an Oakland Home’s Spirit of Connection

Updates over the years left it sealed off, so Sidell Pakravan Architects created open living spaces that flow out to a generous deck for a family to gather.
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Project Details:

Location: Oakland, California

Architect: Sidell Pakravan Architects / @sidellpakravan

Builder/General Contractor: Proyecto Build

Footprint: 4,000 square feet

From the Architect: The Bay Area’s brown shingle houses were designed to celebrate relationships with others and with the outdoors. Coined "the original party houses," they often had large spaces for entertaining, sleeping porches, and doors that opened wide to appreciate the garden and the Bay Area’s mild climate. Modified over the years without regard to its original spirit, this home in Piedmont had no large gathering spaces and a completely enclosed back façade with no connection to the yard. The renovation of this 4,000 square-foot home focused on reviving this original spirit of connection, creating fluid spaces for contemporary family life and a renewed relationship with the exterior. A generous new deck and twenty-seven-foot opening create a seamless outdoor extension of the kitchen and dining space. A steel and wood awning provides shade for the late summer hours when the sun is at its strongest. Vertical lines create visual connectivity throughout, visible in the quarter-sawn oak partitions and cedar slat deck railings. The patterns continue in the kitchen, where a sturdy block of stone with etched vertical lines anchors the kitchen, surrounded by navy and white kitchen cabinetry with reliefed paneling. Sidell Pakravan is responsible for both architecture and interior design.

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Vertical lines create visual connectivity throughout.

Vertical lines create visual connectivity throughout.

A generous new deck and twenty-seven-foot opening create a seamless outdoor extension of the kitchen and dining space.

A generous new deck and twenty-seven-foot opening create a seamless outdoor extension of the kitchen and dining space.

An Indoor/Outdoor Renovation Revives an Oakland Home’s Spirit of Connection - Photo 5 of 12 -
An Indoor/Outdoor Renovation Revives an Oakland Home’s Spirit of Connection - Photo 6 of 12 -
A steel and wood awning provides shade for the late summer hours when the sun is at its strongest.

A steel and wood awning provides shade for the late summer hours when the sun is at its strongest.

A generous new deck and twenty-seven-foot opening create a seamless outdoor extension of the kitchen and dining space.

A generous new deck and twenty-seven-foot opening create a seamless outdoor extension of the kitchen and dining space.

Kitchen cabinetry is navy and white.

Kitchen cabinetry is navy and white.

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A sturdy block of stone with etched vertical lines anchors the kitchen.

A sturdy block of stone with etched vertical lines anchors the kitchen.

An Indoor/Outdoor Renovation Revives an Oakland Home’s Spirit of Connection - Photo 12 of 12 -
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