Millions of years ago, the volcanoes of Sonoma Valley spewed hot magma across the landscape.  As the lava quickly cooled, the eruption’s gases became trapped, forming porous cavities instead of crystallizing into dense stone.  These blackened rocks —rhyolite, basalt, andesite, and pumice—still dot the landscape today, surprising in their lightness despite all appearances.

The structure sits as another “dot” in the open landscape, and references the resiliency of the blackened rocks, using inherently fire-resistant materials, cementitious stucco, standing seam metal, and blackened cedar siding in the tradition of the Shou Sugi Ban. The latter is both a conceptual nod to the process of volcanic rock formation nod and practical strategy for fire protection. 

Despite, or perhaps because of, the project’s small scale and basic functions, every detail counts.  Here, the uncanny feeling of lightness in the dark massive roof is the critical leitmotif for the project.  We treated the structure as a sculptural object reminiscent of the volcanic rocks strewn across the valley landscape. The project proposes a lasting, non-invasive relationship of the house to this increasingly fire-threatened landscape –an architecture that treads lightly but with resilience on this fragile land.