West Dry Creek.

West Dry Creek

This project represents a thoughtful return to a home and site already deeply understood. Originally renovated in 2016, the modest mid-century ranch sat on an extraordinary hillside overlooking the Dry Creek Valley. While the earlier work clarified the interior and modernized the home, the larger potential of the landscape remained just outside reach. The renewed scope focused not on expanding the house indiscriminately, but on recalibrating the relationship between architecture, movement, and view.

The new addition operates as a quiet but decisive intervention. Positioned as a hinge between the existing home and the landscape beyond, it reshapes how the property is experienced from the moment of arrival. Glass, steel, and carefully proportioned planes draw the valley inward—framing it, reflecting it, and allowing it to register throughout the day. Rather than competing with the site, the architecture recedes and sharpens perception, turning the act of moving through the house into a continuous engagement with light, horizon, and terrain.

Highlights Of The Project

A single, carefully calibrated addition reshapes how the entire property is experienced. The steel-and-glass living space cantilevers toward the Dry Creek Valley, drawing the landscape directly into the heart of the home and establishing a new visual and spatial anchor. A long, concrete planter–lined deck connects the main house, barn, and surrounding terrain into one continuous sequence, reinforcing a sense of cohesion across the site.

A small, sheltered balcony off the entry introduces a quieter moment—protected yet open—while the rooftop deck fulfills a long-held client ambition, offering an elevated place to sit with the wind, the light, and the valley as it opens in all directions. Together, these elements transform a compact intervention into a series of layered experiences that allow the house to fully live with its landscape.

Before

Scott’s approach

Returning to a Home We Already Knew

This project began in a familiar place. Back in 2016, our clients had purchased a modest 1950s ranch house overlooking the Healdsburg Dry Creek Valley. The bones were simple, the interiors outdated, but the site was extraordinary. We renovated the home then, transforming it into a clean, simple residence that took better advantage of its surroundings.

By 2022, they were ready to return to the project and elevate the entire experience of the property. The goal was to let the valley become part of the house and create new indoor and outdoor spaces that truly lived with the landscape.

A Home That Needed to Meet Its Views

The clients wanted more than a room with a view. They wanted the experience of the valley to be present throughout the day. The walk toward the entry should draw you through the new living space. The interior should expand toward the landscape. And the rooftop should give you a place to sit in the breeze at sunset and feel the whole property open up around you.

This small addition became the hinge point between house, site, and view. Steel framed, lined with glass, and quiet in its form, it reshaped how the entire property feels.

After

Scott’s approach

Finding the Right Balance Between Modern and Traditional

The first design was a minimal steel and glass box, open on all four sides. It was clean, simple, and very modern. But our clients had been leaning toward more traditional textures and warmth in recent years. The challenge was how to keep the clarity of the glass box while giving the space an architectural language that felt more rooted and tactile. We found our direction by looking back at historic cast iron and glass conservatories.

Instead of putting a steel frame inside a glass box, we reversed it. We wrapped the glass with the steel. That move allowed us to detail the frame with wrought iron tendencies while using modern materials and geometry. The result is a modern conservatory that changes throughout the day. Light moves across the steel, and the steel casts shifting patterns back across the interiors. It is a simple room, yet it never behaves the same for long.

One Addition, Four New Experiences

This single addition generated four distinct spaces, each reshaping how the property is lived in.

The glass lined living room cantilevered over the valley reframes the entire interior experience. The views now sit directly in the room.

The long concrete planter lined deck ties the house, the barn, and the yard together in one continuous line.

A small balcony off the front creates a quiet space for one or two, sheltered yet open to the landscape.

The rooftop deck completes a long held client wish and adds an entirely new perspective of the valley and vineyards beyond.

A Home That Finally Lives With Its Landscape

What makes this project special is how such a compact addition reshapes everything around it. The interiors feel lighter and more connected. The exterior spaces now belong to one another. And the valley is present from the moment you walk toward the door until the evening when you sit on the rooftop deck and watch the sun fall behind the hills.

The outcome is a home that feels renewed, more grounded in its site, and more attuned to the way the clients actually live on the property.