Ridge House

Mork Ulnes Architects has created a stunning guesthouse in Sonoma County for a family of five. The Ridge House is a unique perch that overlooks the surrounding landscape and hosts extended family and guests. The guesthouse’s siting, form, and materiality craft dramatic, peaceful spaces within three raw concrete volumes.

The building is composed of three distinct volumes that step down progressively with the grade. The building nestles into the site’s natural contours so that the mass of the building is softened into the hillside. A continuous, multi-gabled roof joins the units into a coherent whole while its peaks and valleys echo the hills beyond. The owners requested three private guest areas, each with a separate entrance, en-suite bathroom, and outdoor terrace.

Given the regional ecology and desire for a low-maintenance project, robust, fire-resistant, board-formed concrete was chosen as the primary building material. The project was crafted almost entirely in concrete, which gives it an organic tactility and inherent ruggedness that roots it into the rocky hillside. This material was chosen for its fire resistance since the building sits on a ridge prone to wildfire. During the 2017 Sonoma wildfire, the main house was severely damaged, neighbors' homes were destroyed, but the guesthouse was unscathed.

Upon entering the guesthouse, the space expands and gives way to a total openness and continuity with the landscape. The diagonal roof ridges orient the space outward and upward to the panoramic hilltops in the distance. The floor slabs float out over the steep ground below and project each bedroom into its private view. From the shared perspective of the adjacent plateau, the three volumes are solid, concrete prisms.

The Ridge House is a testament to the power of natural landscape, fire danger, and topography in driving the design of a compact, sculptural guesthouse. The project was a collaboration between Nordby Construction, ZFA Structural Engineers, Surface Design, and The Office of Charles DeLisle. The result is a stunning guesthouse that provides a unique perch for the family and their guests to enjoy the beauty of Sonoma County.

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