After a Devastating Wildfire, Lorcan O’Herlihy Reimagines His 1987 Trancas Home in Malibu

In 1987, architect Lorcan O’Herlihy—nonetheless in his 20s, with no official agency of his personal—printed his first solo venture, a home for his mother and father, in Malibu, California. This obscure work had been chosen as a Report Home that yr. And its cluster of white, rectilinear types on a excessive, hilly web site overlooking the Pacific Ocean remained his mother and father’ beloved dwelling for 20 years. However after his father, actor Dan O’Herlihy, died, in 2005, his mom, Elsie, offered the property. Then, in late 2018—about 32 years after the venture’s completion—Lorcan acquired a cellphone name out of the blue. The couple on the road mentioned, “You don’t know us, however we purchased your mother and father’ home a number of years in the past, and beloved it. However, sadly, we misplaced it within the Woolsey Fireplace—and would really like you to design a brand new home for us on the identical web site.”

For the architect, who’d established Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects (LOHA) in Los Angeles in 1994, it was an emotional second. His private connection to the home ran deep, however he additionally wished to lift its successor from the ashes. He already knew that the Woolsey wildfire, which tore by means of nearly 97,000 acres in November 2018, had claimed this and quite a few different homes in Malibu’s Trancas Canyon—and now, clearly, hearth safety can be a prime precedence.

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The visually taut pores and skin of Trancas 2.0 is product of board-formed concrete (1 & 2), whereas its predecessor’s deep-walled types had been realized in stucco and wooden framing (3 & 4). Photographs © Paul Vu (1 & 2), Paul Warchol (3 & 4), click on to enlarge.

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Thankfully, Malibu provided expedited allowing for post-Woolsey rebuilding: Eligible owners might acquire permits comparatively rapidly—right here, in just some months—if the redesign exceeded the prevailing footprint by not more than 10 p.c. That suited the shoppers, who’d cherished the best way the home sat on the land and captured panoramic views.

On this 9.9-acre web site (with just one.5 buildable acres, attributable to steep slopes), O’Herlihy’s authentic “Trancas Home” was organized alongside two perpendicular axes that intersected within the entry lobby: the principle axis—of sight and motion—prolonged eastward from the parking space, by means of a protracted pergola, over the home’s threshold, and, on the far finish of that area, drew the attention by means of glass doorways, down the middle of an out of doors swimming pool, and out to the canyon’s edge. The cross-axis had bedrooms on its north finish and, to the south, culminated in a “nice room” with a 10-foot-square window to the panorama, ocean under, and horizon past.

The glazed entry (above) is on axis with the pool. Picture © Paul Vu

The home got here into being when Postmodernism reigned and Modernism was passé—however O’Herlihy had all the time rejected PoMo, embracing as an alternative a clean-lined Miesian aesthetic. So his design was spare and unadorned—a “commentary,” as he places it, on the ornate structure, rife with manipulated historic references, that dominated the interval. The home’s restraint and pure geometries—its boxy, stuccoed, deep-walled types—married minimalist Modernism to the California Spanish model his mother and father favored. However its stick-frame building burned to the bottom.

In response, O’Herlihy and the present house owners determined to rebuild primarily with concrete, utilizing the noncombustible materials for roofs, flooring, and all exterior and most inside partitions. Increasing the prevailing footprint by about 16 p.c (the expedited-permitting allowance, plus a property-specific bonus), the reimagined home shares a lot DNA with its predecessor. The brand new cross-axial composition of single-story, flat-roofed volumes carries ahead many of the earlier features in the identical areas. But LOHA was additionally free to reinterpret, probing the potential of area, mild, and materiality. “It helped enormously,” recollects O’Herlihy, “that the house owners [a couple that divides its time between Canada and Malibu] actually understood and appreciated structure. They had been very open to re-envisioning the unique design, but in addition wished to maintain what they beloved most about it.”

So, “Trancas Home 2.0,” like its predecessor, has an nearly choreographed arrival sequence—however with a extra playful and sculptural entry pergola, changing the sober post-and-beam wooden one with a full of life cadence of orthogonal metal loops, painted black and cantilevered overhead.

The compound’s three freestanding volumes—a storage/studio alongside the trellis; the principle constructing, on the entry path’s japanese finish; and a poolside visitor pavilion, simply east of the home—are additionally reworked. They’re extra open, with different window sizes and rhythms, in distinction to the stricter alignments and repetitions—the “studied simplicity”—portrayed in RECORD’s 1987 article. Rather than expressively large exterior partitions with deep openings, Trancas Home 2.0 has a pores and skin of wealthy grey board-formed concrete with flush glazing, framed in black, producing a floor that’s visually taut. Now seven mild wells—like massive, rectilinear periscopes—plus a chimney, venture upward from the elevations. The inside area spans 4,800 sq. toes (versus 4,150 initially, together with the circa-1988 visitor pavilion), and the principle constructing’s plan has gone from L- to U-shaped, with the addition of a den, or sitting room, and additional bed room.

However the sense of procession amid unfurling views stays—now even heightened. Past the glazed entrance door, the lengthy entry axis nonetheless attracts the attention straight exterior once more, down the middle of the pool (the identical form and dimension as earlier than) and into the panorama. Now, nonetheless, the general spatial fluidity and indoor-outdoor circulation are enhanced. The kitchen is extra integral to the good room, and floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doorways, to the south and east, open that grand area—together with its whole southeast nook—to the vistas.

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Practically each room has a light-weight effectively, together with the den (5), a shower (6), and the first bed room (7). Photographs © Paul Vu

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The place the Eighties dwelling/eating room had Mexican tile underfoot and rustic timber beams overhead, the brand new home has clean polished-concrete flooring all through, with wooden enjoying extra nuanced roles. Freestanding cupboards, veneered in oak, double as low partitions beneath the 12-foot ceilings, creating intimate zones with out diminishing spatial continuity. And slender, finely milled slats of white oak line the good room’s ceiling, extending vertically down key partitions within the transition to the bedrooms. Close by, the den addition—with a two-faced hearth that additionally opens to an out of doors patio—replaces an enclosed hall. All through, imprints from the concrete formwork—the stratified rhythm and pronounced grain of boards—add a tactile high quality, in addition to finer-scaled continuity. Catching the play of sunshine, the concrete’s wooden texture turns into notably animated inside the mild wells (one in practically each room), breaking luminously from the horizontal ceiling datum.

The dwelling space opens to vistas to the south and the east by means of floor-to-ceiling glass. Picture © Paul Vu

Freestanding cupboards double as low partitions. Picture © Paul Vu

LOHA oversaw the panorama scheme, working with designer Michael Boyd to attain a dialogue between the home and its fast environment (together with painterly compositions of hillside plantings, framed by particular home windows). The landscaping, just like the structure, met—and, in locations, exceeded—Malibu’s stringent hearth rules, influencing, for instance, irrigation programs and plant choice, density, and distance from the buildings. The redesign additionally enhanced hearth truck entry and turnarounds, whereas eschewing such ember-vulnerable components as attics and flammable eaves. Different measures embrace inside sprinklers—together with the ever-present concrete.

The venture’s seemingly easy complexity and refined detailing may not have been potential with no mature architect’s expertise and confidence (liberated by the demise of Postmodernism). “Additionally, with each homes,” O’Herlihy hastens so as to add, “I acquired fortunate with a necessary ingredient: nice shoppers.”

However how may his mother and father have reacted to Trancas Home 2.0, had been they nonetheless alive? “Truly, my father studied structure significantly earlier than performing, fairly unexpectedly, turned his life’s work,” says O’Herlihy. “He and my mom had been drawn to design and had been actually proud mother and father—I believe they’d have beloved the brand new home.”

Click on drawings to enlarge