There’s something timeless and a little monumental about the forms, sort of “monumentality meets domesticity,” in a way.
— Dan Kaplan, FAIA
Location Austin
Client M.J. Hawes and James E. Smith
Architect Mell Lawrence Architects
Design Team Mell Lawrence, FAIA; Hector Martell; Erin Curtis; Megan Mowry
Contractor Pilgrim Building Company
Structural Engineer Architectural Engineers Collaborative
Lighting Studio Lumina
Landscape Lead and Installer Word + Carr Design Group
Landscape Architect Shaney Clemmons
This 4,284-sf home consists of a “lantern-like” two-story main house and a smaller guest house with its opaque back wall toward the street. The ground floor of the main volume, which holds the kitchen and living room, features a ceiling of steel beams and structural fir decking and opens onto a shared courtyard via glass sliding doors. This space, along with the guest house, is open in plan, except for a utilitarian box wrapped in fir boards. Upstairs, perimeter floor-to-ceiling glass connects the interior to the tree canopy and provides views of downtown. A 15-ft-deep screened porch is located on the western end.