For This North Vancouver Home, Landscaping and Architecture Work Hand-in-Hand
A collaborative effort between landscapers, architects, builders, and interior designers ensured a large property felt fully in unison.
While the architecture of a house is important, it must work in concert with the interiors and landscaping that create the whole. For a residence built on two lots in North Vancouver, collaboration was key when creating the main residence, a pool house, and a greenhouse.
That collaborative effort was between Garret Cord Werner Architects, Donahue Living Landscapes, Meister Construction, and interiors firm HB Design, striving for a sense of continuity over the unusual plot of land, which is bisected by a lane. The house style is modern farmhouse, a tall structure with a gabled roof, although made modern by sleek light-coloured bricks and large light-admitting windows. “The use of brick, typically associated with weight and solidity, is balanced by expanses of glazing and slender wood slats, giving the home an airy, refined sensibility,’ says Shannon Bradner, partner at HB Design.
Indoor/outdoor living has been a buzzword for some years now, and the effect is achieved in the separate pool house with large doors that fully open out onto the pool and a large sunken seating area surrounding a fire pit.
Inside, the interiors lean to warm, earthy tones and simple design. The colour scheme is reminiscent of the outer walls, an intentional choice by HB Design. “Sourcing the appropriate base materials involved finding the right tones in the tile and millwork to complement the architectural brick and highlight the home’s palette, a process that took several months to refine,” Bradner says.
All of this leads to the landscaping, where the ideas in the interior design and architecture are translated into the organic world of plants and nature. Donahue Living Landscapes constructed the inorganic and structural elements using only natural materials that will last longer and better suit their surroundings.
The shape of the plot either side of the lane created challenges for the team. “Because of the length of the two lots positioned end to end, we took an approach where we developed a landscape design language of Tetris, like hedging of various widths and heights working in conjunction with bronze-painted metal 90-degree screening forms—also fabricated to various widths and heights,” says landscape designer Ryan Donohoe, the founder of Donohoe Living Landscapes. “The result is that of an artistic and dynamic fencing program between the naturalized grassland and the functional spaces inside the property, which provide privacy for the clients, screening of the neighbours, and guides the view corridors to the North Shore mountains.”
The result is a modern home that does not impose itself on its surroundings and maintains a consistent character throughout the landscaping, interiors, and exteriors, demonstrating that collaboration is indeed the key to a successful project.
