Zen Modern

Paul’s Google SketchUp Model of the House

The architectural style of the house is “Zen Modern”.  You won’t find that style described in an architecture textbook, but there is a bit of talk about it in architecture circles as possibly a new “home grown” architectural movement in California (like the Craftsman).  So, we’ll either have a house that in 20 years is an example of early Zen Modern, or, more likely, no one will ever have heard of Zen Modern.

We didn’t go to our architect saying that was the style we wanted, but when we started describing open floor plans and rows of wooden framed sliding doors that let you live both inside and outside like Frank Lloyd Wright’s prarie and usonian architecture, use of stone and natural reed and wood like one finds in some Asian architectures, and a modernist line with minimal ornamentation (no crown moulding, no frames around windows, no baseboards), and a dramatic circular staircase…he said this was sounding Zen Modern.  Especially with our plans to have an informal California native garden with rocks (he initially proposed the pond, which has now become a pond with a seasonal stream with big rocks too!)

We will have lots of natural wood, polished concrete floor downstairs, wood floors upstairs, and smooth, but not shiny stone tile or counters throughout the house.  The inside doors will most likely have translucent panels with embedded reeds in them  (www.lumicor.com)

The view coming in through the front door

Reeds implanted in the door glass

We like the juxtaposition of the “clean” lines of more modern architecture with the relaxed lines of the natural materials.  After all, we live too cluttered a life to really live in a spare modern house.