Castor Architecture

Daniel was the architect for my house in Palo Alto, finished in 2009. He did an absolutely great job in every respect. In terms of the finished product, the design reflects both my own preferences and tastes, communicated during the design phase, and Daniel's own vision and style. Although the house fits with the neighborhood (developed in the 1940's and 50's), the design is distinctive and accomplishes what I wanted. Daniel was particularly adept at dealing with a very arduous planning process, complicated by constant complaints and challenges from an unreasonable neighbor. Although the design is bold in some respects (which involved building a second story where only a single level house had been before), Daniel was a forceful advocate before the Palo Alto Planning Department, ultimately getting the plans approved with quite positive comments from the City. Daniel was also quite competitive with respect to fees. I love the house in large part because of its design, and I continue to receive frequent complements on it. Now, in 2017, because of the fine job that Daniel did on my Palo Alto house, I have again engaged Daniel to design and prepare the plans for a major remodel of a house in Palm Springs. I recommend Daniel without reservation.

We hired Daniel Castor to renovate our 1930-era house, originally a cabin, which had been added on to and changed over the years to ill-effect. The existing floor-plan was dysfunctional, with poor flow and a too-small kitchen and no dining room. Daniel worked within the limitations imposed by our desire to work within the existing setbacks; that is, we did not want to have a lengthy process involving design-review hearings. He managed to come up with a brilliant addition which gave us a fabulous large kitchen and an added dining room, all within the existing setbacks. The room flow problem was solved by a radical, but necessary, moving of the staircase. We are thrilled with the result and recommend Daniel unreservedly. He was very easy to work with, had great ideas, and was an excellent problem solver. He shows great attention to detail and is very sensitive to traffic flow / practical usage, as well as being very conscious of the mathematical proportions of a room / living space. Oh, by the way, he designed a stunning wooden-truss canopy over our outside entryway.