“We like to provide different ways of experiencing the environment,” says architect Alice Fung of her firm Fung + Blatt’s outside-in approach to design. Such was the case for her and partner Michael Blatt’s slow-but-steady development of a hillside property in San Marino, where a constellation of pavilions now dot the landscape.

On a promontory at the center sits the original 1954 house, designed by Calvin Straub in a Japanese-influenced midcentury style. Over a period of five years, the architects remade the main house and added a ceramics studio, library, guesthouse, and pool house to align with the owners’ artistic inclinations and love of entertaining.

The ceramics studio was built with the posts and beams of an abandoned pergola from the old estate." layout="" credit="Photo by Mark Mahaney" photoUserId="6133431443184836608"/>

Inspired by the rigorous geometry and post-and-beam construction of the original home, but wanting to evolve it to something more playful and open, the architects designed the pavilions one at a time to be in dialogue with the site.

From the glass-backed shelving forming the walls of the ceramics studio to the massive sliding doors that transform the pool house into an open-air pavilion hovering over the water, the architects embraced the California midcentury spirit of indoor/outdoor living. “We’re always trying to relate to the site so the architecture isn’t just an object propped there,” says Fung. Blatt agrees: “The buildings are made to become the landscape.”

More Open House: Los Angeles tours:

This Australian Architect’s Silver Lake Home Is a Love Letter to Los Angeles

You’d Never Guess This Revamped Midcentury Cabin Is in the Middle of L.A.

The Hollyhock House: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ode to California

Project Credits:

Architect of Record: Fung + Blatt Architects / @fungandblatt

Interior Designer: Fung + Blatt Architects

General Contractor: Westmont Construction

Structural Engineer: Fung + Blatt Architects (main house remodel, library, guest house, ceramics studio); Polon + Lewis (pool house)

Landscape Design: Elysian Landscapes, Fung + Blatt Architects

Lighting Design: Arsene Design Lighting Studio (pool house)

Cabinetry and Finish Carpentry: G. Shirk Construction