Rich and Krista Coffin are not only great clients but also great home builders who have helped us realize many of our custom designs over the years. It was a very special experience to have the opportunity to design their home with them and then have them build it. This project was a true collaboration… a labor of love.

Visiting their rugged, remote, untouched ranch property is like stepping back in time into a beautiful serene coastal oak woodland. Forested with 100+ year old oak trees, it is a pristine native California coastal habitat. Our site-inspired house design is all about the relationship with their amazing site.

Rich and Krista’s mission statement for their family ranch compound was that it should be organic to the land, warm in character, and in keeping with their surfing/ranching lifestyle. Additionally, given that the remote region is subject to high winds and wildfires, all of the structures were to be weather and fire-resistant as well as easy to maintain. We purposely selected rugged, natural, low maintenance, fire-resistant materials and landscaping to blend naturally with the harsh environment and to weather well over time: a weathered copper roof and rusted rain chains, integrally colored rough board form concrete walls, integrally colored hand-troweled plaster walls, exposed wood beamed ceilings, natural irregular flagstone flooring that seamlessly flows from inside to exterior decks, native sandstone boulder site walls and landscaping of native/adaptive plantings that preserve the Oak woodland habitat.

What we appreciate most about Rich and Krista’s place is how it's truly become their family’s place of retreat, just as they had envisioned, their serene place to commune with nature. Their ranch compound of buildings feels so connected and natural to their site, as though it has been there as long as the ancient oaks.