dwell entire cabin article

The original home was converted into a bedroom level, and given a second-story addition and roof deck. The dark exterior color, a charcoal-eggplant hue, lets the landscape colors stand out in contrast. “The existing house roof became the roof deck,” says Rogers. “And then I just shifted over the addition so that it floated over the landscape.”

We think this centrally located custom metal/brass bar is an entertainers dream!

In a secluded garden by an old limestone quarry, in a town in northwestern France, Isabelle and Patrice Girard-Donnat built a humble wooden house with a fantastical metal roof. Connection to the garden was paramount for the couple and their two daughters, who moved from Paris to Caen in search of a more bucolic life. Léontine, 17, sits with one of the family’s three cats in her bedroom, which has a glass door that opens to the exterior.

Folding glass doors on the north and south elevations create cross ventilation and open the cabin, clad in Western red cedar, to its forested setting and views of the ocean.

At just 350 square feet, this remote cabin with a view for the Sol Duc River sits on stilts to protect it from flooding and the dampness of the northwestern rainforest. Its shutters can be operated manually by custom steel rods.

The kitchen almost blends into the background of the home, thanks to the all-over use of plywood across the cabinetry, appliances, and ceiling.

The owner and architect chose to outfit almost every aspect of the studio in Douglas fir plywood.

With plenty of storage and pretty details like the scalloped pantry doors and oversized pendant light by Lana Launay, the new kitchen blends practicality with whimsy.

For Gabriel Ramirez and his partner Sarah Mason Williams, following the Sea Ranch rules—local covenants guide new designs—didn’t mean slipping into Sea Ranch clichés. The architects love Cor-Ten steel, with its ruddy and almost organic surface, and they made it the main exterior material, along with board-formed concrete and ipe wood. The Cor-Ten, which quickly turned an autumnal rust in the sea air, and the concrete, with its grain and crannies, mean the house isn’t a pristine box, Ramirez says. His Neutra house “was very crisp and clean,” he says. “This house is more distressed, more wabi-sabi.”

Dyed to match the area’s natural black boulders, the mass wall extends 20 feet beyond the home’s exterior to create a private bathing courtyard, sheltered from prevailing winds.

Concrete and weathered steel form the home’s low-profile western facade, anchoring it to the desert.