Just 15 minutes north of the Golden Gate Bridge, nestled on a south-facing knoll in the idyllic town of Mill Valley, California, sits a house that’s as much an architectural masterpiece as it is a comfortable retreat for the minimalist couple who call it home.

Designed by architect Stanley Saitowitz—in his signature style—and composed of natural woods, concrete, steel, and with floor-to-ceiling windows, no detail can be considered an afterthought. And for the homeowners—Chicago transplants who’ve lived in Marin County for the past 14 years—buying the newly built property was an opportunity to completely redefine their interior style with the help of San Francisco–designer Nicole Hollis. “They’re a lovely couple with great taste,” Hollis says. “They’re also very design savvy and have a particular point of view, so it was a natural fit [for us].”

Completed in 2019, the 3,600-square-foot two-story home—with sweeping views of downtown San Francisco, the Bay Bridge, and Alcatraz—was basically a blank canvas for Hollis’s team, although the clients’ sensibilities required a streamlined design process. “They were really decisive,” explains the project’s principal designer Adele Cunningham. “When we started, they only wanted two options for everything and that’s it. Maybe they’d need to deliberate overnight, but we’d always have answers for everything in the morning.”

For this five-bedroom, 4.5-bathroom project it was out with the old, in with the new—and that included literally everything, from the custom furnishings to the art on the walls. “When we sold our previous house in Belvedere, we got rid of it all, including the artwork,” the homeowners explain. “It wasn’t like we were sick of seeing [the art], but part of moving into this house was to break away and start over with things we’d never looked at before.” To provide an additional perspective, Hollis recommended the couple engage Laura Smith Sweeny, principal of LSS Art Advisory. “They had really nice artwork in their old home, but it didn’t translate to the new space and they needed someone who could help them [make that transition],” Cunningham notes.

And in terms of furnishings, less was definitely more for the design team. “They didn’t want a lot of furniture, so every piece we chose needed to be meaningful,” Hollis adds. “I’m [fairly] minimal, but they took it to the extreme by pulling [us] back even more. Aesthetically, though, it felt right for the house.” Whether it’s the monumental Rick Owens Plug concrete dining table, the Pierre Augustin Rose sofa, or the eye-catching artworks of Charles Gaines and Matthew Day Jackson, every element in this light-filled hillside residence represents an entirely new outlook for the couple.