The neighborhood is dotted with single family homes centered on their lots, with both front door and garage door facing the street. The Art Compound carves out a secret world for the owners within this context, at once echoing the surrounding domestic architecture, and subtly asserting its difference. Although the scope and scale differ from neighboring lots, at the speed of an automobile, it could easily be mistaken for two separate houses, belying the interconnected landscape lying just beyond the hedge.

An expansive landscape separates the house, pool, and private art gallery across two lots. Art exists throughout the structures and within the landscape, uniting the compound. The entire site is surrounded by vegetative screening that provides privacy and allows for the world to unfold within. Behind the screening, the site opens up and a landscape installation weaves plants and art throughout the compound. The main house is the most articulated volume on the site indicating its domestic nature and responding to the family activities within. The art gallery retains the gable roof of the main house, but is much less articulated and creates a neutral setting for the client’s extensive art collection. The covered pool and gym extend from the main house volume and are expressed as the most minimal forms on the site, distilling it’s massing to a horizontal planted plane above the pool, on which sits a minimal gym box.

In a city of residential excess, the Art Compound achieves a subtle grandeur and an expansive landscape, while not disrupting the rhythm of surrounding residential fabric.