The San Diego coast at sunset: the sun on the water, surf along the sand and hillside houses stepping down to the beach

San Diego, California · Built

Soledad Residence

A hillside house that spends everything on the one thing the site gives it: the edge.

The house

Built along the drop

The lot falls away to the west, over the canyon and the rooftops, to a line of ocean on the horizon. Everything in this house is arranged to be on that side of it.

So the plan is long and thin rather than deep. The rooms run in a single band along the drop, each one opening onto a terrace, and the terraces step down with the grade instead of sitting on a podium. Glass rails keep the view; planted beds keep the edge from feeling like a cliff.

The architecture stays warm where you touch it and quiet everywhere else. White stucco, timber brackets carrying the deep entry canopy, wide-plank soffits, dark steel windows. The brackets are the one structural gesture the house makes in public — they are also the first thing you walk under.

Inside, the kitchen takes the view rather than hiding behind the living room: a marble island, a window wall, and a counter that faces the water instead of a backsplash.

Photographs

The house as it stands

The terrace at dusk with fire tables lit, the city below and the sky burning orange
Dusk on the terrace: fire tables along the rail, the whole town underneath.
Upper terrace with lounge seating, glass rail and the ocean on the horizon
The terraces step down with the grade, so each one keeps its own piece of the view.
Entry at dusk: timber door under a deep canopy carried on angled brackets
The entry canopy, carried on timber brackets set at an angle.
The timber canopy and its brackets seen from below against the sky
From underneath: the one structural gesture the house makes in public.
Kitchen with a marble island, pendant lights and a window wall onto the view
The kitchen takes the window wall, not the back wall.
Lower terrace with lounge seating and planting along the glass rail
Planting along the rail keeps the edge from reading as a cliff.
Street face of the house with its timber screen and the house number on the wall
From the street the house gives away almost nothing.

Selected Work in Mexico. Projects led by our principals over three decades of practice in Mexico, many in collaboration with ARTC Arquitectos, our studio in Mexico.

← All selected work Next: Adobe Residence →

Contact

Office(480) 289-9446 Emailinfo@raintreedg.com

Partnerships

ARTC Company Merge Architectural Group

Credentials

American Institute of Architects Project Management Institute Arizona State Board of Technical Registration

AIA · LEED AP · NCARB · Licensed in the U.S. and Mexico