11 May KKC Fines Homes Featured on Dwell

Olivares Residence, featured on dwellondesign.com

Back to South Bay Home Tour 2015
While the seaside portion of Manhattan Beach is constantly humming with activity, the Tree Section offers the benefits of a coastal climate but with a quieter, more secluded quality to it. When Dean Nota was tasked with designing an infill home from the ground up in this neighborhood, he was confronted with a compact 40-by-130-foot lot. It offered little opportunity for outdoor living spaces and was surrounded with unappealing sights. His solution? Wrap the house around an internal courtyard, which boasts built-in seating and a slatted ipe screen. “This evolved as a strategy for opening the house to light and air, while creating an internal focus in the absence of external viewing opportunities,” Nota says. The two-story, 3,290-square-foot stucco-clad modern house is massed in a way that respects the existing structures on the block while allowing for a visually arresting double-height interior.

Area: Manhattan Beach, CA
Livable square footage: 3,290 square feet
Number of bedrooms: 4
Construction completed: 2011

ABOUT THE ARCHITECT
Born, raised and educated in Southern California, Dean Nota received his Bachelor of Architecture degree from the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI ARC) in 1973, where he was a founding student and a member of the first graduating class. He interned, and over a period of ten years, rose to the position of senior associate architect in the internationally acclaimed office of Raymond Kappe FAIA, prior to opening his own office in Los Angeles in 1982. Concurrent with the establishment of his practice, he served on the design studio faculty at SCI ARC from 1982 to 1988. His professional experience includes architectural, planning, transportation planning and urban design projects. He is the recipient of regional and local design awards from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and Sunset Magazine, and has served on design awards juries sponsored by the AIA. His built work and drawings have been published and exhibited nationally and internationally.

COLLABORATORS
Structural Builder:
KKC Fine Homes, Hermosa Beach
Kim Komick
Interior Furnishings & Materials:
Chimera Interiors, Los Angeles
Marina Mizruh
Structural Engineering:
Palos Verdes Engineering, Palos Verdes
Paul Christenson, Project Engineer
Civil Engineering:
Piai Engineering, Hermosa Beach
Victor Piai, Project Engineer
Photographs:
Pfeiffer Photography
Erhard Pfieffer

SOURCE INFO
Thermador applicances
Duravit toilets and sinks
Heat n’ Glo fireplace
Hansgrohe bath fittings
Dornbracht kitchen fittings
Franke kitchen sinks