Indoor and outdoor

Located above the Sunset Strip in Hollywood Hills, the Sunset Plaza opens up to the surrounding landscape allowing the project to utilize all of the relatively flat site, unique to the hills. The design has been primarily driven by the motivation to extend the precedent established by the modern architecture of Rudolph Schindler, Richard Neutra, and Carl Maston found in the area. The clients asked for an indoor-outdoor experience, addressing the dramatic views from the inside out while still regulating the views from outside in. The site is designed as a series of outdoor, interlocking spaces expanding the living area. Simple geometric forms with a horizontal, low-profile silhouette receive subtle shifts and breaks in response to the prog... More

Marsh and McClennan turned to ID Studios to redesign their 85,000 s.f. workspace to reflect their San Diego roots dating back to 1909 and the local Southern California environment they inhabit. ID Studios responded with a design centered on San Diego, the most biologically diverse county in the United States where temperatures, landscapes and wildlife can vary greatly within just a few miles. The new design showcases and embodies the five habitats, including farmlands, wetlands, beaches, mountains and deserts through a diverse layering of natural materials and textures. The work of local surf and nature photographer Aaron Chang is featured as well as graphics depicting the “fingerprints” of several local tree species which provides visual w... More

Nestled between a park and a hill, this house for a Catholic family is a vessel that channels views in from the front and rear, and where they meet in the middle, bridges them across.Flanked on 3 sides by other houses, it finds itself in between a small park in front and a hill further behind. The house uses this position to set up a distant dialogue between the 2 green spaces. In front, a U-shaped balcony cantilevers out above street level to channel the park into the interior where raintree canopies frame an intimate study. At the back, an open roof terrace cuts back the house massing above the rear neighbors to take in views of the forest hill. Between this 2 ends, internal rooms are pulled back to create a non-linear spatial passag... More

A country house is anchored to the horizon line, where the bank of the Tresinaro torrent stands as background and scene of the environmental field. The house reinterprets an historical countryside typology space named porta morta in contemporary terms, defining a hollow space that becomes the fulcrum of architecture.Two side wings help to ground the house in the plot: they slide on each other by a transparent double height passing through which links and connects the spaces of the bedrooms / studio on the first floor through an hanging balcony.The porch as a solar diaphragm and jasmine canopy configures the open-air extension of the living room, while the first floor rooms extend the house towards the landscape.&nbs... More