“It looks absolutely stunning looking up from the river with the water below. It has a feeling, when you are at the top deck, of floating in space, kind of endless space.”
Rising out of the steep wooded hillside, the vertical tongue-and-groove redwood siding of the Deck House terminates at the main level of the house, where glass and copper-clad windows provide views across the valley and the Colorado River below. Above this, the redwood roof doubles as an exterior deck for the existing main house. Glass guardrails along the curved edge of the deck allow for an unimpeded panorama of the Austin Hill Country.
The Deck House is a new house built in the back of an existing six-member family residence in Austin, Texas. Unconnected to the existing residence, the Deck House has independent access from the street and constitutes a separate house. As such, it is conceived autonomously and in a contrasting vocabulary from the original house. The Deck House transports the owners to a different experience: a weekend house or a vacation house in the woods right in their own backyard.
On the exterior of the house, redwood siding and glass predominate. This material palette shows a sensitivity to the natural landscape surrounding the site and provides continuity between the interior spaces and the spectacular views beyond.
Inside the Deck House, the revelation of the wooden “waffle slab” supporting the roof deck expresses a remarkable integration of aesthetics, structure, and form. The 55’x 45’ interlocking grid of fir glu-lam beams, spaced 4’ on center each way, extends 45 feet over the cliff, providing a large, outside gathering space for the deck above, and hovering over the new entertaining spaces below. The structure, with its sweeping design, embraces the landscape. It also enhances the openness of the lower level as it projects from inside to outside providing overhangs in all directions.
The exposed fir glu-lams in the ceiling work in conjunction with fir wall panels and doors, bamboo and limestone flooring, and teak furniture to create warm, cohesive interior spaces. Within this vocabulary, well-conceived details provide the finishing touches that integrate mechanical and audio systems with seamless elegance.
PROJECT
Deck House
LOCATION
Austin, Texas
SCOPE
New Construction
AWARDS
Honor Award, Texas Society of Architects
Merit Award, Custom Home Design Awards
Honor Award, AIA Austin
PHOTOGRAPHY
Paul Finkel, Paul Bardagjy, Sebastian Schutyser