Palisade House

The brief was a weekend house that could become a full-time one. The site falls eleven metres from road to shore, which made the conventional floor plate feel like an act of aggression against the land. We answered with three volumes, each stepping down the slope, joined by a glazed circulation spine that gives every room two horizons — the garden and the sound.

Structure is exposed Douglas fir, left honest and oiled. The thermal mass of the concrete base stores the mild coastal winters, while the upper volumes open fully to the water. Clerestory light tracks the stair from morning to dusk.

The house is built to outlast fashions and, more practically, to be maintainable by two people in their seventies. Every material was chosen to be repairable, replaceable, and — where it faces the weather — patient.