The 21,000-square-foot home was designed by California-based design studio EYRC Architects for a young couple in a 1920 neighborhood in Palo Alto, California.The architecture is a study in strong simple composition and highly refined materiality with an emphasis on craft. The massing defines solid and void, captures natural light, and connects the indoors with the landscape, seeking to ‘experience the outdoors from within.’

The ground floor volumes wrapped in an elongated hand-fired brick, emphasizing the horizontality of the architecture that lays solidly on the land. Bronze-trimmed ceiling planes slide between the brick masses, and floor-to-ceiling glazed openings are captured by thin-profiled bronze frames.In contrast to the grounded brick volumes, the second floor is clad in stainless steel panels and oversized aluminum-framed windows. The lightness and openness of the second floor is nestled among the oak-tree canopies of the site.

A custom-designed element is the steel mesh screen that wraps around to enclose the kitchen for privacy, separating this from the more public “guest hosting” areas adjacent. The steel screen slides along a track embedded into the teak slatted ceiling and disappears into the pantry when retractedAt the basement level, a wine cellar and tasting room open to a sunken landscaped courtyard.A grand stairwell of floating stone steps connects the three levels.

A freestanding structure set deep back into the site is a zen-like fitness/yoga studio as well as a guesthouse with a kitchenette.An exterior trellis connects the main house with the backhouse and studio, and helps frame the backyard and surrounding landscape which integrates California native plant species, grasses and trees to compliment the materiality, geometries and site response of the architecture.